The Government's new 'Family Troubleshooters' plan: what do you think?

[HelenMumsnet]

Hello.

We've been asked by the BBC what Mumsnetters think of the Government's plans to set up a new network of "family troubleshooters" who will be paid to help turn around the lives of problem families.

The idea is that these troubleshooters would work with these families and be given targets to meet, such as helping the parents to work, stopping them from drinking or taking drugs, and/or ensuring the children go to school and do not behave anti-socially.

Prime Minister David Cameron says that appointing a single troubleshooter for each family is now "crucial" as problem families can currently be visited by up to 28 different public-sector workers - none of whom may have the chance to see or work with the family unit as a whole.

So, what do you think of this plan? Do please tell...

It's hard to know where to begin with with what's wrong with this plan. Many posters have made good points already.

1. The troubleshooters will need training.
2. The pay of 3750 per family is laughable for the amount of intervention being suggested. (TBH DC sounds like he expects the troubleshooter to virtually live with the family, which will be very welcome i'm sure.)
3. Social services and surestart/homestart are already trained to do much of this (and yet their funding has been hugely cut).
4. No new money is being offered.
5. The tone is patronising and insulting. There are too few jobs to go around and the situation is getting worse. How are people supposed to find work in such circumstances?

Grrrr. Soundbite politics at it's worst.

Good point Chaotica.

I imagine a lot of the troubleshooter interventions would go like this:

'You have to get a job!'

'But there are no jobs.'

'You have to get a job!'

'But there are no jobs.'

'You have to get a job!'

etc

and so on

MrsMicawber so do dong have any valid arguments then

yawn

dreamingbohemian I happen to think this is a awful idea but I don't think its about jobs it about children being out past 1 am when the looting was going on WTF

A lot of these families have lost control of their children, have domestic violence issue/metal health and have a inability to see having 6,7,8 children will not improve their situation but only make it worse , or were drug taking is not a big deal

Being on benefits is just part of it but not the whole thing

I work in childcare in a very deprived area and we have vast experience with 'problem' families. I do believe that, as ever, there are still problems with communication between agencies. For instance we often dont get invited until last minute and then cant attend, SWs that dont call back/turn up, constant changing of SWs/professionals involved.

However I dont believe this will be changed by stressing out the professioals involved by inventing this role that the cynic in me sees something that will cut existing staff and pile extra pressure on to a select few.

'troubleshooters would work with these families and be given targets to meet, such as helping the parents to work, stopping them from drinking or taking drugs, and/or ensuring the children go to school and do not behave anti-socially.'

Are the government aware of how hard it is to make 1 family comply with this? Never mind a caseload of x amount. If these 29 workers cant sort these problems out I doubt family troubleshooters will be able to

It stinks of substance-free soundbite. 'Troubleshooter' Oh, yea! Like that John Harvey Jones bloke for industry. Yea, thats what these workshy proles need, a bit of industry-style troubleshooting. Bollocks.

Who are these 'troubleshooters'? There are only so many capable and skilled people out there, has DC suddenly found a whole load of them hiding under a rock?

So what is being cut to rebadge provide this? What is in place to make it actually WORK? What are these people actually going to do to make a difference?

The cuts to the disability budgets will cause many problems and potentially allow families who have coped up until now to become what the Government term 'problem families'. Also, it may well be the case that the most challenged families cope with multiple, complex needs which will not be improved by punitive measures such as taking the children into care, which has been forwarded as a sanction for non-compliance in this voluntary participation scheme.

Maypole -- as I said earlier, I think jobs is a big part of it, but the other aspect I think needs to be addressed is addiction/mental health.

I think you are right that it's not only about jobs, but I do think this would alleviate the problems for a big chunk of the families being targeted.

If this proposed plan is sensitively handled and well funded (which it won't be) it could help break the cycle of poor parenting and low expectations leading to low educational attainment and poor employment prospects.
I work with children, and have just completed a course about how professionals can work together to support children and families.
Training people within localities to help each other, and to develop local support networks to raise aspirations could bring employment opportunities to communities and would be more effective than bringing in "supernanny" type people who may lack experience of the hard choices families make.
That's my opinion anyway, not that anyone in power will take it on board...

Oh here we go again more dressing up an old service in new clothing to make it look like the government is doing something by announcing a "new" scheme.

FFS do they really think we are that thick? obviously the answer is to that is yes...well if thats the case hopefully they will not see the revolution coming, as they are so up their own arses distanced from the serfs.

So the official response from Mumsnetters to DC appears to be: "This plan is shit misguided"

So David Cameron watches Supernanny does he?

Right.

The plan sounds very like supernanny.
I suspect if they actually look at how people parent in these "problem areas" they will find people who do their best for their families in trying circumstances.
If the government want the plan to succeed they need to work locally, and employ people who understand the challenges they are helping other families overcome.
I like the idea of a lead professional though, but getting the right people trained to deliver the project will take longer than one parliamentary term. Cameron needs a long term plan rather than soundbites.

If this idea is about getting some joined-up thinking into some very complex problems, then it has my support.

Here is my plan for dealing with troublesome families/people.

1: Cap rent and house prices to ensure that both are affordable to all and have strict inspections of properties for rent to make sure they are up to scratch, install laws for minimum room sizes on new builds and property conversions.

2: increase wages and encourage more worker stock/share options, introduce laws making it illegal to pay/reward any kind of bonus to a worker who has failed to achieve/exceed their performance the year before or has actually caused the company loses.

3: Overhaul the benefits system to make it less complicated, retrain all benefits system staff so that they provide a useful sympathetic/friendly service and don't sneer at people, service providers abolished and replaced by real education/training at colleges, polytechnics (yes I'll bring those back) free for lesser courses (the basic PC skills, maths etc), reduced cost for higher courses, apprenticeships and on the job training in skilled trades. All those who do not speak english will be required to attend courses to learn the language in order to claim benefit.

4: affordable childcare for up to 40 hours a week, provided in large school like buildings.

5: Cut in the costs of public transport/caps on pricing to ensure that pricing is all ways in line with a workers daily pay and never exceeds a set proportion of it (provided they work within a reasonable distance of a set number of miles).

5: Cut general taxation by cutting the amount of government waste on expenses, excessive number of buildings, sending money aboard to countries that don't need it or to ones that would be better served by the government leaving the money in the pockets of the people so they can give more to what ever charity they like instead.

There are so many things that can be done to deal with troublesome people and most of it starts by giving them a fare deal in the first place instead of stealing every grote from the serfs pockets.

The problems caused by poverty are myriad - inadequate nutrition, a home which is overcrowded, unheated, perhaps lacking furniture and internet for the childrens education, a general lack of funds for travel, educational activities, social activities, etc. over many years.

The great thing about poverty is that it is easy to solve - this is the ONE problem you CAN SOLVE with MONEY. I always wonder what the result would be to just give the £3000 directly to the families over the course of the year?

But david cameron wants to keep all the money for himself and his croonies, so I have a cheap solution for him: Put me on the 'telly and I will wag my finger at them. Or get suppernanny to do it. That'll learn 'em.

I think it's a ridiculous waste that won't actually help ANYONE and the money should be put back where it's been taken from. Social services, surestart etc.

TBH if I had to live with inadequate nutrition, a home which is overcrowded, unheated, perhaps lacking furniture and internet for the childrens education, a general lack of funds for travel, educational activities, social activities, etc. over many years, then I expect I would get rather antisocial myself!

what a load of shit.

if you sudddenly have a huge pot of money from throwing yet more families into poverty i recommend spending it on sorting out SS or how about keeping surestart and improving it or maybe just save it ready to deal with the amount of families who are going to be 'problems' when made homeless by the upcoming cuts.

what a load of, yet again, insulting sound bite wasting of resources we apparently are so short of they want to attack oaps and the disabled.

this government is beginning to make me feel antisocial too. funny that. keep going at this rate davey boy and you'll find lots of hitherto quiet people are suddenly roused to take action in the streets.

The upper and upper middle classes are the most antisocial, they sneer at everyone below them and think they are better then everyone else.

I hate the term Antisocial it is such a stupid label, to be anti social is to fucking hate everyone who lives near you and tell them to fuck off when they say hello.

stealing is stealing, having fights is GBH or other public disorder offences, loitering is, lets face it the most pointless and insulting law ever created.

antisocial to idiots like the Tories is simply being poor and having the audacity to show yourself in public, thus soiling their eyes with your presence and smell.

Like many of the posters above, I would like to know who they plan to get to do this work.

I work with children who come from these problem families and it takes extremely experienced and talented people to make an effective relationship with a family like that. And even then, it is extremely difficult to make even small improvements with parenting.

Where are they going to find all these workers?

I have some questions:

1. £3750 per family. How many hours is a "troubleshooter" expected to put in?

1. What qualifications and experience will be required for the "troubleshooters"?

1. Why is this money not being invested in social services and health and social care - who are the people doing this sort of work already but without any proper investment?

1. If 40% of money is paid for results, what are those results?

1. Who are these "problem families" and what is being done to prevent people becoming "problem families" in the first place?

At the moment it sounds very Emperor's New Clothes to me. All hype, no substance.

Why don't they give the money to the councils so that they can save the Sure Start schemes that do this work on a broader scale already?

Or pay for more social workers.

I don't actually think it will be popular with the DM readers, they will see it along the same lines as "free holidays" for troubled teens.