SalfordOnline
Your local community website
   Salford praised for giving complex families a better chance in life
Salford City Council has been praised by the Deputy Prime Minister for taking an innovative and forward thinking approach to supporting complex families. In his speech to the Local Government Association, Nick Clegg gave the example of a particularly complex family of five that Salford City Council has worked with to get their lives back on track, saving tens of thousands of pounds in the process. Speaking about complex families at the conference, Nick Clegg said: "Their complex problems mean they can end up seeing dozens of professionals across public services - but those professionals aren't always joined up, making it near impossible for anyone to get an overall picture of what that family needs. "Community budgets are budgeting for real life, breaking down the barriers between different parts of the machine, and treating people with troubles like human beings, not figures on a spreadsheet." Before Salford's Better Life Chances team worked with this family, they were costing the taxpayer more than £200,000 per year on top of the normal costs for public services, with more than 250 interventions form a wide range of agencies, including the council, police, housing and NHS in a one year period. Their chaotic lifestyle meant they used more than 109 hours of police officers time across 58 call outs resulting in five arrests and the children being placed on supervision orders. There were also five occasions of them ending up in hospital due to overdoses, self harm, stabbing and assault, as well as two housing injunctions taken out against the family. By taking a more proactive approach to working with the family, Salford City Council and their partners have helped them to get their lives back on track, while also significantly reducing the impact they have on public resources. The outcome for this particular family was a saving of more than two thirds of the £200,000 cost of reacting to the problems in this family's lives. The work involves a wide range of agencies sitting around a table to look at a family's problems in their entirety, rather than each agency dealing with individual family members. By sharing what they know and finding solutions for the family, the Better Life Chances team reduces the strain on the public purse. In the case of a family in Salford, the team worked with them to deal with their debt problems and look at ways to get them back into work. This reduced the mother's anxiety, meaning she was less dependent on the health service, as well as lowering alcohol consumption which reduced the chances of the family becoming involved in antisocial behaviour. This ultimately has a positive impact on the younger members of the family as they have more stability at home and are therefore more likely to re-engage with the education system, increasing the likelihood of their success further down the line. Councillor John Merry, Leader of Salford City Council, said: ""For some time now we have been developing this new approach to dealing with families that seem to have been failed by the state and yet cost the most to support. My main aim is to help everybody in Salford to achieve their full potential. For some families this takes more time and work so we have to find ways of working right across public services that suit the family whilst also reducing the money we are spending on them. Allowing single agencies to lead rather than all trying to do our thing is definitely the way forward here " Photo: Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg Due to problems with spam only SalfordOnline members can now leave comments. Becoming a member of SalfordOnline only takes a minute, just hit the red Join Us button at the top right hand side of the page to create your Personal account. Got a news story? Need help with publicity for an event in Salford? Send it to newsdesk@salfordonline.com or call the SalfordOnline newsdesk on 0161 789 5377. |
