Radical new plans for
a network of “family troubleshooters” who will be paid thousands of pounds to
help 
problem families in the wake of last summer’s riots are set to be unveiled
by Prime Minister David Cameron (pictured) later today.
The troubleshooters,
who are expected to be a mixture of charity, council and private sector workers,
will receive almost £450 million in taxpayers’
money to help 120,000 troubled families, according to a report in the Daily
Telegraph.
Such families are
estimated to cost the taxpayer a total of £9 billion annually, an
average of £75,000 each in benefits and the costs of other public
services.
A number of
politicians and opinion leaders, including the Prime Minister himself and Labour
MP David Lammy, who represents the constituency of Tottenham, which contains the
area where the riots started, partially blamed the unrest on the collapse of the
family.
The proposed
troubleshooters will help each target family to design a plan to turn around
their lives with targets to return parents to work, stop them from drinking or
taking drugs, and ensuring children go to school and do not behave
anti-socially.
The troubleshooters
will be paid an average of £3,750 for each family, with 60 per cent of the money
paid upfront and the remainder “on results”.
In a speech today, Mr
Cameron will say that there is just as much need for a social recovery in
Britain as there is for an economic recovery.
“So while the
Government’s immediate duty is to deal with the budget deficit, my mission in
politics — the thing I am really passionate about — is fixing the responsibility
deficit, building a stronger society, in which more people understand their
obligations, and more take control over their own lives and actions,” he will
say
He will add: “I don’t
think people are pre-programmed to fail because of where they come from and I
hate the idea that we should just expect to pay ever larger amounts in welfare
to an ever larger chunk of society and never expect the recipients to change
their lives.”
A new Troubled
Families Team, headed by Louise Casey, Tony Blair’s former “respect” tsar, will
oversee the new scheme along with Eric Pickles, the Communities
Secretary.
Appointing a single
“family worker” for each family is now crucial as problem families are currently
visited by up to 28 different public sector workers, Mr Cameron is expected to
say.
Over the next few
months, councils will appoint the new troubleshooters and charities and private
firms are expected to bid to take part in the programme.
Each troubleshooter
will then confirm the number and location of each troubled family in their area
and draw up a plan with them.
“When the front door
opens and the worker goes in, they will see the family as a whole and get a plan
of action together, agreed with the family,” Mr Cameron will say. “This will
often be basic, practical things that are the building blocks of an orderly home
and a responsible life.”
The Prime Minister is
today expected to visit a problem family which has been turned around following
“persistent and intensive work”.
Talking about the
family, he will say: “Where it’s been tried, this approach can work
wonders … The Family
Intervention Project worked with one family whose criminality and anti-social
behaviour had spiralled out of control. Police visits to their home were
happening almost every day to follow up on reports of anti-social behaviour, to
arrest one of the children or to check that curfews were working. The story of
the misery that one family can cause one small area is all too
familiar.
“The breakthrough
came when the mother admitted to the housing officer that she was struggling to
cope at home. The Family Intervention Project gave the family a key worker, who
over the next nine months helped the family transform its behaviour. The change
is lasting too — there are now no calls to the police, the teenage children are
engaging with school, the younger children are more
settled.”
The scheme is
expected to be closely monitored by the Prime Minister and other senior
ministers as previous programmes have
floundered.