The National Troubled Families Programme

Abstract

This article describes the Government’s Troubled Families national programme setting out its aims to ‘turn around’ 120,000 families who have multiple problems. The eligibility criteria for the programme cover families involved in youth crime or anti-social behaviour; having children who are regularly truanting or not in school; an adult on out-of-work benefits, or otherwise are of high costs to the local authority. However for most of these families, such problems are elements in a complex picture where many other issues are at play. A representation is depicted of families who have multiple problems where there is no ‘single stand-out’ root cause. A holistic approach has evolved towards family intervention as it is claimed that to date problems have been treated in isolation resulting in services lacking a systematic approach. Some of the thinking behind this programme is laid out as are proffered solutions. Usually the Troubled Families approach employs one worker or team taking responsibility to enable a process of engagement to secure rapport, trust and participation in an agency intervention, introducing stability and consistency into the family home. The programme is to be expanded beyond 2015 to work with a larger number of families over a five-year period.