Funding for Youth Services

Debate between Sarah Dyke and Rachel Hopkins

Wednesday 28th February 2024 Westminster Hall

[Rachel Hopkins]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. I wanted to have this debate so that we could press that point, particularly for constituencies similar to mine of Luton South.

After 14 years of the Conservatives cutting funding, local authorities are struggling under the substantial weight of funding pressures. Youth services are often one of the first services to be cut. Councils and councillors want to deliver high-quality youth services for young people, but the Conservatives have given them no choice. My local council, Luton, is a case in point: it has had £170 million cut from its budget since 2010.

The Local Government Association has stated that councils in England face a funding gap of £4 billion over the next two years just to keep services standing still. Significant budget pressures mean that there are few options available to maintain high-quality youth services. Children’s social care puts significant pressure on local authority finances, so general, more universal services for young people are compromised as the limited resources are targeted at ensuring that the young people most in need are kept safe and supported. It is a difficult decision that councillors of all party colours must make, but the Government are ultimately responsible, due to their swingeing cuts to local government finances.

[Sarah Dyke (Somerton and Frome) (LD)]

I thank the hon. Lady for securing this important debate. My experience as a serving Somerset councillor is that investing in youth services is often seen as a preventive measure to address future social and economic issues. Somerset has seen an 80% reduction in real-terms spending on youth services over the past 12 years. Does the hon. Lady agree that cutting such services leads to higher costs associated with problems that could have been mitigated through early intervention and support for young people, and that local government needs to be adequately funded?

[Rachel Hopkins]

I thank the hon. Lady for making an excellent point. I absolutely agree, and I will address that later in my speech.

During the Conservatives’ time in office, youth organisations have fought to keep delivering great youth work, amid a £1.1 billion real-terms cut to local authority spending on youth services. I thank the YMCA and the National Youth Agency for their support in preparation for this debate. The YMCA’s “On the ropes” report found that drastic underfunding means that spending per head on youth services in England has suffered a real-terms cut of 75% since 2010-11, which means that it sits at £48 per five to 17-year-old. Although cuts have been significant across the board, there are clear regional funding inequalities. In 2022-23, the lowest spend per young person was in the west midlands, at £24, followed by the east of England and the south-east, at £38. In contrast, in London it is £69 and in Yorkshire and the Humber it is £71.

I am also concerned about the funding cuts to my constituency of Luton South since the Conservatives took power. The YMCA found that real-terms spending on youth services in Luton has been cut by 73%, with spend per young person sitting at £34.60. In the central Bedfordshire part of my constituency, spending per head for young people is £25.17—a 53% cut. Although passionate youth workers continue to battle to deliver high-quality support, many have had to leave the profession: there has been a 35% reduction in full-time equivalent youth workers employed by local authorities in England over the same period.

This should not have to be said, but all children, irrespective of background or geography, deserve high-quality youth services to support their development. After 14 years of the Conservatives, youth services are at breaking point, and too many young people have no access to youth services at all. Our voluntary and community sector has brilliantly stepped up to fill the gap left by the Conservative Government cuts, but that is not a long-term solution.

The physical and mental health support previously offered by youth services has been shifted on to schools and overworked, under-resourced teachers. Schools have their own pressures. According to National Education Union research, in Luton South per-pupil funding has been cut by £751 since the Conservatives took power—that is more than £14 million stripped from our school system. The case for greater resources for youth services is compelling. Youth work has proven, positive impacts on improving young people’s mental health and wellbeing, behaviour, engagement with education and attainment. Youth workers achieve life-changing outcomes for young people through intervention and prevention, building voluntary, trusted and educative relationships with the young people they support.

If the Minister needs to hear an economic case for youth services, for every pound the Government invest in youth work, the benefit to the taxpayer is between £3.20 and £6.40. Youth work saves £500 million annually by preventing incidents of antisocial behaviour, knife crime and other associated criminal justice costs, according to UK Youth and Frontier Economics. To pre-empt what the Minister might say in response about Government funding directed at specific youth club buildings: as welcome as any capital funding is, there is a pressing need for additional support for training and sustaining well-qualified youth workers. There is an absence of a co-ordinated strategy across Government Departments, leading to fragmented and insufficient funding for targeted youth services.

The YMCA has set out the following recommendations to support youth services. It mentions:

“sustained and long-term revenue funding to bolster universal and open-access youth services, catering to all young people throughout the year”,

a cross-departmental strategy for youth services,

“fostering a long-term vision for nationwide provision”,

and enforcing

“a duty on local authorities to ensure that all young people can access youth services in their respective areas, with necessary government support and resourcing.”

Will the Minister respond to each of those recommendations in his closing remarks?

I want the impact of this debate to be that the Minister, his officials and other Government Departments reflect on the true value of our youth services. I do not doubt that the Government recognise the good those services do in our community, but I ask that additional actions be taken to ensure that they receive the support they desperately need. Will the Minister outline what recent discussions he has had with colleagues in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the Department for Education and the Home Department about long-term resources for youth services? Will he also outline what steps the Government are taking to increase the number of full-time equivalent youth workers across the UK to ensure that all young people receive the support they deserve?

Labour recognises the need for a long-term, co-ordinated approach to revitalise the delivery of youth services. At our last party conference, we announced a 10-year programme to bring together services and communities to support young people, providing new youth mentors and mental health hubs in every community, and youth workers and pupil referral units in A&E, along with a programme of public sector reform to help to deliver that. Communities will come together to transform the lives of children, giving them the best possible start in life. Will the Minister explain why the Government have not implemented such a scheme during their 14-year tenure?

I look forward to hearing the contributions of Members from across the House. Together, we must continue to call for Government action to ensure that young people in our constituencies get the best possible start in life. That means supporting our local youth services and youth workers.