Under-fire Troubled Families initiative has helped thousands, says minister
Ministers have rejected claims the Government’s Troubled Families initiative has been “a failure” and insisted it was successful.
The Government was forced to defend the flagship programme after criticism was raised by peers.
The initiative, launched in the wake of riots in 2011, aims to turn around the lives of thousands of families by tackling often interlinked problems such as addiction, absence from school and anti-social behaviour.
However, there have been claims that a critical evaluation of the programme was suppressed after it cast doubt on its effectiveness.
Last month, the BBC’s Newsnight reported it had seen an unfavourable and unpublished report, apparently held by the Government since last autumn, which suggested the scheme had no discernible impact on things such as unemployment and criminality.
A senior civil servant also told the programme that the report was “damning” and attacked the scheme as “window-dressing”.
However, pressed over the criticism in the House of Lords, Communities minister Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth (pictured) said: “The first troubled families programme which finished in 2015 was successful – for example, in seeing nearly 105,000 families with children back in school for three consecutive terms.”
But Labour peer Baroness Massey of Darwen, who put the cost of the scheme at £1.3bn, asked: “Is he aware that this programme has been criticised by many as being a failure and not successful with either children or parents?
“Could he say what analysis has taken place of the methods used in the programme in order to develop more successful methods and ones which work in any future programmes?”
But Lord Bourne argued the first programme had not been “unsuccessful in any way”.
The figures Baroness Massey highlighted included the second phase of the programme, which had “taken on board some of the lessons that we have learned”, the minister added.
He said the initiative had been “embraced” by local authorities and all political parties.
Peers heard changes made to the second phase included the introduction of spot checks and starting assessment and monitoring at the beginning of the programme rather than leaving it to the end.
Lord Bourne said: “We have learned some of the lessons from the first programme and the second programme I think will be even more successful than the first, which I believe was a success.”
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