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...

"I put it to you very few people who have full time jobs have time to go on the rob"

So... you've not seen the news stories about MPs and the expense scandals?

The lower working classes have been dumped on the shit tip.
Britain is becoming more and more Dickensian by the year.
Sectioned off as daily mail reading anti-social scroungers who leave school without the ability to even read in a lot of cases.
Then some idiot of privilege points out that some people drag themselves out of poverty by their bootstraps and make good.
By make good they mean be a constructive member of society.
Instead of someone with no job prospects and a damp house with a shitty private landlord.
The solution is to employ even more middle class people to monitor the lower working class and report back to their paymasters.
I'd use the word overseers but that might just be a little too contentious.

oh so you're looking at the specific 'neglect' that involves not paying bills to the housing association?

so middle classes neglect their children but pay their bills so that's ok???

oh and all these problems are caused by idleness and too many benefits.

i pity the families that you are supposed to be empathising with and helping find solutions to their complex problems i presume.

anyway this is not addressing this policy.

if you think it's great then why do you think it's great?

why would it be better than investing in social services so that social workers could get back to doing quality work with families rather than having so many cases piled on them they're lucky to meet a family more than once?

Maypole is grossly oversimplifying the issue by insisting that these families cannot be helped by the giving of further benefits or support.

A large scale fostering of children from troubled families would never work, and would not be good for the children.

I am very much in favour of putting in a support network so that the children are able to stay with their parents. This costs money but is preferable to the issues that children may have if they are taken from their parents.

Added to this, the major issue, imo is that cost of living to income is totally out of whack in UK so even if the parents wanted to work, and many do, they know that they will be worse off if they have to pay for childcare, lose hb.

Would you willingly give up the money that keeps your kids fed, and your heating on?

And don't come back at me with comments about flat screen tvs. Of course there are people who abuse the system. Just as there are people who abuse the system by banking in Switzerland or Belize.

Who is worse for the country - a benefit scrounger "raking in" £200 a week, or a business man who has his money off shore and pays little tax in UK. Or companies like Vodafone who pay less tax than a person working in middle management

Here is a bit more info

The Independent lists the ?criteria? to be considered ?troubled? by the government

Problem family? The seven criteria

• No-one in the family is in work.

• The family is living in poor or overcrowded housing.

• No person has any qualifications.

• Mother has mental health problems.

• At least one parent has a long-standing illness or disability.

• The family has a low income.

• The family is unable to afford a number of food or clothing items.

You?ll be happy to know that you only need to meet five out of these seven to be ?targeted? by a troubleshooter.

note then that the main criteria is being poor.

so long as you're not poor you're not a problem family even if you're raising antisocial little brats and choosing not to take care of them properly. the fact that you could afford to if you wanted to means you're not a problem. interesting.

And this is very interesting - how the plan is likely to cost double the estimate, and the money is not ringfenced.

What a waste of time and money.

lol at being long term ill, with a mental illness on the mother's part and therefore not being able to work and having a low income and being housed in inadequate housing makes you a problem family. not that society has a problem with screwing over the sick and disabled oh no! it's the family that is the problem.

so what we'll do is make sure they have an even lower income and kick them out of their housing if it costs too much or has a box room too many by cutting their disability benefits and spending money on a trouble shooter to come round and patronise them.

yep. all makes perfect sense

thanks for listing the criteria mmelindor

Just out of curiosity, why does it list "Mother has mental health problems" and not "Father" or simply "Parent" ??

Good grief. we only meet 2, thank goodness. I swear, I have visions of Daleks going house to house of these "problem families".. "you will be exterminated."

I personally detest the term "problem family." Makes it sound like a vermin infestation, which I suppose is probably what they think.

Apparently, mother with MH issues has a larger impact on the family's well-being. Someone on Twitter told me that and is looking for the report that she read that in.

Yes, a lot of these "problems" would be eased by the family not being left in poverty in first place.

I meet 2 and work for social services....

"Families that refuse to co-operate could lose benefits or be threatened with eviction, but Mr Cameron argues that the vast majority want help."

From the Indie.

FFS

That will help the mother's fragile MH then.

yeah - and being homeless will solve all their problems.

it's mother's mental health i guess because even in this day and age most families well being depends on the mother who does the vast majority of emotional caretaking.

it's not that somehow ill mum's are monstrous it's that if the mum goes down the family goes down with her.

clue to a solution? decent mental health services and support for mothers with mental illnesses. NOT cuts to disability benefits, cuts to mental health services and closing surestarts.

of course the majority want help - they're screaming out for help - not for some commission paid untrained facist to come round but for therapy without a 2 year waiting list to then be offered 8 sessions of cbt. for SS to be able to use the funding that was given for preventing problems for families liek this by for example offering a small amount of childcare or support to struggling families to prevent things getting worse on the families it was intended for. instead the black hole of dealing with those officially at risk swallowed that money before it even hit the pot.

SantaIsAnAnagramOfSatan I clearly started I don't know what the answer is but you just to busy standing on your soap box to read the posts

I don't think is a brilliant idea but nor do I think its the worst I heard.

You do need sanctions if families won't comply, or else we will end up the way of sure start

SantaIsAnAnagramOfSatan sorry but I don't agree majority want help many families that have dealings with ss don't acknowledge their is a issue resent ss and are baffled by their enrolment proved by people even on here starting threads that the reason why ss removes children is to meet some type of adoption qutoa
Problem families have virtually no insight in my view the list of indcators are wrong wrong and are focused to much on poverty which is one part but not all my list would be.....

Here is a bit more info

The Independent lists the ?criteria? to be considered ?troubled? by the government

Problem family? The seven criteria

• No-one in the family is in work.

• The one family member is on drugs or alcohol

• No person has any qualifications.

• Mother/father has mental health problems.

• At least one parent has been in prison

*were one child or more has been in care or on the cp register

• The family is living do not have food or clothing

Now my list has nothing do with being roundly poor that has everything to do with being a poor parent

Plenty live on benefits and have their child fed and clothed so I dont believe that would be about being on benefits that would be about spending the money on other things say drugs ECt

SantaIsAnAnagramOfSatan please don't brother to comment on my post of your not willing to read it through please

You ranting a little wanting a fight also implying I am in favour or this trouble shooting plan when I have said no such thing

i've no desire for a fight with you i do reserve the right to disagree with your posts.

you may want to back off a little from being so personal.

oh and i tried to read it through but despite not being a pedant usually it was a little unclear in places as your grammar and spelling seems to have a lot in common with your logic

Maypole
I don't doubt that there are some families who would benefit from more intensive assistance, I just don't think that creating a NEW scheme for this is helpful.

And you might be surprised - in the coming years, if the cuts go through as they are then there will be people on benefits unable to clothe and feed their children. Or have to make the decision to buy food or put heating on.

It is not always a case of someone not wanting to buy decent clothes or food for their child, but not being able to.

And the truly abusive parents will not be helped by daily visits anyway.

It seems like another case of 'soundbite' politics and fragmented policies.

You can't solve difficult, complex, long-term problems with one poorly finded approach. It needs wholesale commitment and ££££££££. And the understanding that it will take a long, long time to make things better.

I think that the 'troubleshooter' approach could have some merits, but not for the group that seemed to be targetted. I think that the troubleshooter approach could work well for some families who experience a range of challenges, who COULD be helped by the existing plethora of services, if they could work their way around the system and be supported in doing that. So more of a preventative approach e.g. a family who are facing relatively short-term, chronic but not crisis issues; familes who could be in contact with a number of services but not high enough priority to red-flag them with any particular worker / agency; familes who could easily fall through the gaps between services, and therefore go on to become a family with long-term complex problems.

But that only works if the services which they could access are funded, and not crisis-based.

In addition, I think there needs to be some properly funded co-ordinated support for families who are, for whatever reason, facing long-term issues. Support that supports mental health issues over the long-term (not a 6 week brief intervention!), support that co-ordinates whatever issues are being faced, whether that is lack of employment opportunites or skills, parenting skills, poor housing. To do that is not something that can be achieved for the samll amounts of money that are being suggested, it would take people with extensive expereince and skills, people with some clout to ensure the allocation of resources and support.

And of course the trick is to do both. To invest in co-ordination support that prevents families from developing long term problems, and at the same times investing massively in long term porgrammes and solutions to help people who are already there.

Appalling spelling grammar and typos

I'm very about this proposed policy. It smacks of "We have to be seen to be doing something" politics.

In reality I think it will be a total waste of money. The only saving grace is that the proposal is that central govt will put up 40% of the money and it's doubtful how many councils will gamble the other 60% since there's still a big risk they won't get the funding since it's performance related. Especially given that many of the agencies which pay out are centrally funded. What I mean is tax credits, income support, disability. They all get paid from the DWP and not the council budgets. So where's their incentive?

And stopping their benefits sounds great on paper and plays well with the Tory faithful but in reality is Dave really ready for the inevitable headlines where a child goes hungry because they stopped the benefits of a family who "refused" to go to work. Of course it won't be reported as that. Said dad will claim he was ill etc.

I'm broadly in favour of any policy that targets specific people for help and gets away from the scattergun approach of the past... which clearly didn't work. Too often initiatives, although well-meant, are taken up by those that don't need help leaving the same people by the wayside, generation after generation.