Frank White - "Social Inclusion and Community Safety in Bolton"
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These are notes from the talk by Bolton's Tonge Ward Cllr. Frank White, Portfolio Holder for Social Inclusion and Community Safety, taken directly from the Deane-Cum-Heaton Labour Party's Branch minutes.
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Graham welcomed Frank who has held the Portfolio for Social Inclusion and Community Safety since the reorganisation of Bolton Council about two years ago.
Frank said that his remit on social inclusion essentially comes down to the elimination of poverty in the Borough and there have been peaks and troughs in his work in the last two years. He explained that the Portfolio is cross-departmental and that there is no actual department for the topic itself. However, the Sure Start Scheme has been established which has the objective of helping the badly deprived families in Bolton.
One aspect of the scheme is the appointment of permanent mentors to disaffected young people between the ages of 10 - 13 to guide them through their education, training and into work. This seems to be working very well for children without parental support.
A "One Stop Shop" has been set up so that people needing help and advice don't simply get shuffled from pillar to post, Department to Department in the Council without their real needs being addressed.
Frank admitted that many of us have had misgivings about how our Government has performed since 1997 but he believed their attitude towards social inclusion and eliminating poverty is exactly what is needed. He felt that we are getting "tough on the causes of crime" as well as "tough on crime" itself.
He outlined a number of schemes within the Borough. For example, £1.8 million is being spent in Burnden, Tonge and surrounding areas, the most deprived in Bolton. This has been mainly education based and he believed that it has helped people a lot more than the millions spent on regeneration in Deane and Daubhill.
Frank said that Tonge has gone from only a 30% success rating to over 80%, primarily because of the efforts made by the staff of the school with Government and local authority support. There has been a spin-off to this as poorly educated parents and grandparents have become involved and they too have improved their own education.
Withins is another problem school, which had become a "dumping ground" for excluded pupils from other schools. Many have been admitted to a social inclusion unit at the school and it's beginning to have an effect. Some of the children are starting to come around but it won't work with all of them.
Bolton is the recipient of substantial funds from Single Regeneration Budget Round 4 (SRB 4) and the authority has prioritised funds to help the most needy children. For example, Bolton has ~380 children in care. The vast majority of these are the products of parental neglect, violence, verbal, physical, and sexual abuse and other terrible family problems. A lot of these children have awful problems - drug addiction, alcohol abuse and bad behaviour. The expectations and esteem of many of these children is so low that they "act up to their reputation".
Frank said that one of the ways of tackling their problems is to close down the homes and establish much smaller units with only two or three children and full time staff who provide "parental relationships".
Another initiative has been the establishment of Family Learning Centres where young mothers (mostly single parents) can go. Their children cared for as they undergo training and learning to develop skills that will enable them to get employment. Even basic skills, such as cooking and childcare are being taught.
Frank also mentioned SRB 6, which is quite different from SRB 4 in that it is not education based but is building on the reorganisation of the Council's structure. There are five main themes, from leisure to education, covering all the main activities of the people of the Borough. Each theme will be controlled by three councillors and 17 members of the community and the total Borough budget will be up to £20 million over seven years.
Frank's portfolio also covers Community Safety - the catchall phrase encompassing policing, crime and disorder. He believed that, without doubt, the Crime and Disorder Partnership in Bolton is having a major impact on how the Police do their job in the Borough. Burglary, violent crime, youth crime and domestic violence are quite high in Bolton and intensive work is going on, concentrating on those areas as a priority.
At the Area Forums, Frank said, the complaints are almost always about youth crime from children between nine and 19 years. In Bolton, there are 30,000 children within this age group. The Police think that ~1,600 are involved in any sort of criminal activity. Of these the "hard core" is ~700 and policies need to be developed to deal with and help these children.
Such a scheme has been piloted in Farnworth with 200 children, supported by the Youth Inclusion Programme. The top 50 of these offenders were targeted. They were given a range of activities seven days a week and the youth crime in the area dramatically declined. Frank believed that we now need to have permanent, properly funded schemes to help these children.
But as well as helping the disadvantaged we also need to "nurture" the gifted children in our community. Also at Withins school there is an Excel unit for really clever children from surrounding primary schools in the Breightmet and Tonge areas. The unit challenges them and they are beginning to excel. In addition, every primary school in the Borough has the opportunity to take part in the Education and Sport Learning Centre at the Reebok Stadium. Children who have attended this unit show a 5 - 10% improvement in educational performance.
There is also a Centre of Excellence at the Bolton Arena with superb sports facilities and schools are getting involved in programmes there too. Every primary school in Bolton will have a day at the Centre during the coming year.
Frank finished by saying that upwards of £100 million is coming into Bolton over the next few years for social inclusion projects, as part of the Government's Urban Renaissance Programme. We are beginning to see the benefits of this and there is much, much more to come.
Frank's talk was followed by questions and answers:
| Eve: | What about SRB money being spent in the Deane, Chip Hill, Platt Hill and Johnson Fold areas of Deane-cum-Heaton? |
| Frank: | Parts of these areas, some in Horwich and Westhoughton, too have been identified and provision is being made. £80 - £130,000 sums are being made available to each of the Area Forums to be spent on projects that the community itself determines are needed. They will prioritise how the money will be spent. |
| John: | How can really needy areas get funding? |
| Frank: | The Council can carry out household surveys and this sort of question is one that the Area Coordinators, working for the Area Forums, can initiate. |
| Graham: | A lot of what is happening depends on funding that has to be bid for and programmes that have to be worked within. But surely what is needed is an overall ongoing permanent strategy with proper financing. |
| Frank: | Yes, it depends so
much on the Government and the whole programme needs proper permanent funding
rather than so-called "bid funding". Gordon Brown holds the purse strings and a
lot will depend on his plans for future public expenditure. Not all schemes are targeted and this too can cause problems. For example, Bolton received £13 million under the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund and the authority has been given carte blanche as to how they will spend it. Initially, Officers had problems in prioritising schemes for the expenditure but this has now been done. Projects with defined targets and outcomes have now been set up. It's important to remember that all the money spent must be accounted for, e.g. by the District Auditor. |
| Leilia: | Why aren't Antisocial Behaviour Orders used more? There has only been one in Bolton and the community needs protecting. |
| Frank: | Antisocial Behaviour
Orders are very serious things and last year eight were considered:
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| Olwin: | Is there enough provision for drug rehabilitation in the Borough? |
| Frank: | No! We had the money for a rehabilitation centre and several sites were earmarked on which to develop it but each time there was an outcry from local people and it wasn't built. Therefore drug addicts have to go to Manchester and it is very unsatisfactory. There are often problems with setting up any sort of rehabilitation unit or any place where problem people are to be helped, simply because no one wants such places anywhere near where they live! |
| Leilia: | What about children congregating on street corners? |
| Frank: | Unless they are misbehaving then they are no committing an offence and nothing can be done. |
| Graham: | What about the provision at Bolton College for pupils excluded from school? There doesn't seem to be a way to bring together the various providers for excluded pupils, to share their problems and experiences, thereby being able to provide a better service. |
| Frank: | To some extent this "coming together" is beginning to happen. Schools can't just continuously exclude pupils and not take in any problem ones. But there does need to be better contact between the exclusion units, although there is now an Officer who is going around the units doing this work. |
| Leilia: | There is concern about the situation at Deane School, which has had to take 60 excluded pupils from other schools. |
| Frank: | I'm surprised at this and will look into it. However, lot of money and extra staff have gone into Deane school. |
Graham thanked Frank for his excellent talk and members for their contribution to the discussion.
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