text: Topics Accountability & transparency Civil society, nonprofits & NGOs Climate philanthropy Community philanthropy Digital & technology Diversity Foundations Funding and Grantmaking Funding practice Gender philanthropy Philanthropy infrastructure Philanthropy research Social investment Sustainable Development Goals
  Regions
  Regions Africa Arab region Asia and the Pacific Europe Latin America USA and Canada Global
  Newsletter
  Focus on: Decolonising philanthropy Learning from failure Mental health philanthropy Climate Philanthropy 2030
  Funding families in a cold climate
  Matt van Poortvliet
  1 May 2012
  1
  Enjoying the Alliance blog? Subscribe to receive full access to all of our content. Find out more about Alliance subscriptions here
  Latest from Alliance
  Daily, free-to-view philanthropy content providing a space for news, thinking, debate and peer exchange among philanthropy practitioners worldwide.
  Filter by Content Type
  Analysis
  Appointments
  Conference reports
  News
  Opinion
  Practical advice
  Featured
  Philanthropy & the global sex industry
  Ukraine-Russia war
  Trust-based philanthropy
  Regional representatives
  Most Popular Posts
  Srikrishna Sridhar Murthy
  Seven years of CSR in India – disruptive yet evolutionary
  Theodoros Chronopoulos
  Fortify young minds; invest in youth mental health
  Alice Amorim
  The power of Philanthropies at COP27
  Shalini Eddens and Kate Kroeger
  Funders, it’s time to change how we think about risk
  1 Rhodri Davies
  Effectively over: What Does Sam Bankman-Fried’s downfall mean for philanthropy and Effective Altruism?
  1 Joanna Marinova
  Partnering initatives in Bulgaria: The Lachezar Tsotsorkov Foundation’s experience
  If you would like to submit a blog post to Alliance, please email Elika Roohi, Alliance’s Digital Editor, for more details.
  Matt van Poortvliet
  As the dust settled on last summer’s riots in the UK, attention shifted from the young people who had been rioting to the ‘troubled families’ they grew up in. The prime minister pledged that his government should be judged on its success at transforming the lives of 120,000 such families by 2015. But in an area where government has claimed it will fix the problem, is there still a role for charitable funders?
  Troubled families, according to the UK government, are those where parents are out of work, children are not in school, and family members are involved in anti-social behaviour and crime. These problems are often long-standing and inter-generational – children whose parents have multiple problems are eight times more likely to be suspended or excluded from school than other children, and ten times more likely to be in trouble with the police. The 120,000 most troubled families in the UK cost society an estimated £9 billion every year.
  Troubled families are a UK government priority – last month it committed an extra £448 million to target the most difficult families, and has pledged to expand early years services to try to prevent problems emerging. These efforts are encouraging, but they will not reach all families in trouble, and financial pressures threaten the success of work in this area.
  Independent funders do have a role to play in supporting these troubled families, but it is not a straightforward one. However, there are gaps where more support is needed and where charitable funding could have real impact.
  Support for vulnerable families in the earliest years can prevent problems later in life. The government have talked a lot about early intervention, but there are still a lot of gaps to fill – for example, the commitment to doubling the Family Nurse Partnerships programme by 2015 will still only cover 40 per cent of estimated need. Trusts and foundations can take a longer-term view than government, and help to build the evidence for early years support and strengthen the case for government involvement and funding further down the line.
  Ensuring the quality of support for the most challenging families. With recent cuts in public funding, projects supporting troubled families face larger caseloads, and are having to shorten their interventions and are provide fewer outreach services – which undermines their effectiveness. Additional funding can help to ensure the quality of existing services and provide longer-term support.
  Providing support for mental health problems. There is a need for staff who are trained to recognise mental health problems, make timely referrals and provide families with practical support. There is a strong case for philanthropic funding to fill this gap by providing additional mental health support for troubled families that do not meet the threshold for acute services.
  Charities can make a real positive difference in this area – charities like Family Action, whose Building Bridges project helps families with multiple and complex problems. When Family Action first met the Barker family, the parents were out of work and in debt, struggling with mental health problems, and their daughter Amy was beginning to show problems with speech and behaviour. With support from their Building Bridges key worker, things started to change. The charity helped the family in practical ways – to establish a routine, eat more healthily, exercise more and spend time playing with Amy. Their key worker helped them to build confidence and support each other, and soon the family relationships grew stronger and Amy’s speech, behaviour and self-esteem improved considerably. Both parents started studying and volunteering, and reviewed their budget to reduce debt. With the support of a dedicated key worker from the charity, who they knew they could rely on, they could begin to see ways to manage the many difficulties they faced.
  This is a challenging and complex area, but that is not a reason for funders to shy away from it. Helping these families to tackle problems early can prevent a generation of children growing up to face the same problems their parents have. The potential for a positive impact is huge.
  Matt van Poortvliet is a Senior Consultant at NPC, and author of NPC’s new report, Out of trouble, which provides a guide to working with families with complex problems for charitable funders, and is available to download free from NPC’s website.
  NPC is holding an event called ‘Avoiding another summer of riots – the role of the third sector in helping troubled families’ in London on 31 May. Click here to find out more
  Tagged in: Government Mental health Troubled families UK charities
  Share this page
  
  
  
  ✉
  Comments (1)
  Comment: Minding the gaps | New Philanthropy Capital's Blog
  Leave a Reply Cancel reply
  Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *
  Name *
  Email *
  Website
  Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
  Δ
  Alliance
  About Advertise Contact us Funders & sponsors Partners Refund policy
  Contact Us
  Alliance Magazine
  1st Floor
  15 Prescott Place
  London
  SW4 6BS
  Tel: +44 207 062 8920
  Alliance © Alliance Publishing Trust 2008 | Charity Number: 1116744 | Company Number: 5935154 Terms and Conditions Privacy Policy and Cookies Alliance Publishing Trust is a limited company registered in the UK. Registered office: 15 Prescott Place, London, SW4 6BS, UK