Children, Young People and Families Grant Programme

The DCSF have been in touch to let me know about the Children, Young People and Families Grant Programme:

The Children, Young People and Families (CYPF) Grant is a national programme to fund work by the third sector to improve outcomes for children, young people and families. The outcomes expected from this funded work are embedded in the Children Act 2004, the Every Child Matters outcomes and the Children’s Plan.

There are changes to the programme this year – the time period the grants cover is now 2 years and (for this grant round only) making strategic grants for 2 years.

The deadline for getting bids in is midday 31 October 2008.

Filed under: funding, Government, Children, Young People and Families Grant Programme

Towards a better understanding of drug-related public expenditure in Europe

The EMCDDA have been trying to work out how much European countries spend on drug related services. It’s not easy, as they point out:

drug services usually do not stand in isolation and form part of many publicly-funded programmes including education and crime reduction and other services that provide support to problem drug users.

Labelled drug expenditure

Furthermore, they’re also having to look at various levels of government spending:

while a large portion of public money may be voted for central government support for community development, this same money may then be disbursed for expenditure to a range of regional or local programmes or projects, which may be coded to a specific health-related or education-related activity.

Apparently the UK is the only country that labels its explicit drug education spend (it’s 1.3% which compares with 24% that is spent on public order and safety). But just using those figures would distort the picture:

in the United Kingdom, much of the expenditure data is aggregated at programme level and, without a detailed analysis of local expenditure documents, it is difficult to classify using broad headings.

Even so, it’s interesting to look at the differences between different countries and the screen grab from the report seems to show just how different things are.

Filed under: europe, funding

Mentor UK CHAMP Awards – one week to go

I’m guessing that this will be my final plug for the Mentor UK CHAMP Awards, unless Derek (who manages them) finds another way of getting my attention.

“One of the most pleasing aspects of winning the 2006 Mentor UK award is that it has led to requests for us to expand  the number of schools that receive the programme and we now offer alcohol awareness programmes to the whole of the East of Glasgow.  Other areas of Glasgow are also showing an interest. Since winning the award people are taking notice.  Minds are being changed” (GEEAP, 2006 winner of the Schools category)

This is the final reminder for the 2008 Mentor UK CHAMP Awards (Promoting Children’s Health through Alcohol Misuse Prevention).

The Mentor UK CHAMP Awards recognises projects that can help prevent children and young people from misusing alcohol by promoting healthy attitudes and behaviours.  Remember, there’s 60k worth of awards available and projects could be as diverse as classroom based prevention work, sports schemes, youth club initiatives, mentoring projects or websites created by young people – in fact anything that helps young people avoid the dangers of alcohol misuse both now and in their future lives.

If you think your project merits an award then we need to hear from you no later than 20^th April, 2008.  For an application,  guidance notes and the inspirational stories behind the 2006 winners, please go to the Mentor UK CHAMP Awards website at

www.mentorfoundation.org/uk/awards

Filed under: alcohol, Drug Education Forum Members, funding, CHAMP, Mentor UK

Charities receive £27m windfall – Youth Work – Youth Work Now

Youth Work Now:

The money from the Youth Sector Development Fund will bankroll the work of Kids Company, Speaking Up, Fairbridge, UK Youth and Leap Confronting Conflict. It will be used to help young people with problems such as drug use, homelessness and teenage pregnancy.UK Youth received more than £4m to form 10 youth achievement foundations across England, the first such organisation to provide alternatives to formal education for teenagers who are likely to end up unemployed and out of education. The work will be based on the organisation’s Youth Achievement Awards.

It looks like there’s more about for future years.

Filed under: funding, youth service, Youth Sector Development Fund

Small Grant Programme

Richard McKie from the NYA has sent me details of a small grant scheme that may be of interest to readers:

Small Grants Programme

The Speaking Out project has launched a small grants programme for funding of up to £1000 to deliver one-off projects or activities that aim to raise the voice of children and young people on three key issues: knife, gun and gang crime; substance misuse; and access to activities in rural and urban areas. The deadline for applications is 17 March and more information is available at:

http://www.ncvys.org.uk/index.php?page=597

The programme is open only to members of NCVCCO and NCVYS, though members can choose to sponsor or work in partnership with other groups that are not members.

Filed under: funding, Speaking Out

Comic Relief funding for young people and alcohol projects

Libby at Alcohol Policy UK has a post about funding opportunities for those working with young people around alcohol issues.  She says

They [Comic Relief] want to fund work that either:

• provides services for  young people with  alcohol problems;
• reaches more ‘at risk’ groups such as women,  young offenders and those with mental health problems;
• provides training to equip staff with specialist alcohol skills.

They particularly want to receive joint applications from young people’s and alcohol agencies and you will need to show the added value of working together.

More details over on Libby’s blog.

Filed under: alcohol, funding, Comic Relief

A young approach

Drink and Drugs News has a feature about working being done with young people who present at A&E with alcohol issues.  The article makes it clear how difficult it can be to stitch together funding for preventative work:

although it’s been evident for some time that alcohol is the main issue for young people presenting at A&E departments and despite recent policy initiatives and a government alcohol strategy, funding for service provision has been minimal, leaving Salford SMART searching for alternative ways to fund their projects.

The service has now successfully worked with Comic Relief, New Deal for Communities, Salford PCT, children’s services and others and recruited a team of workers to compliment the existing service.

Filed under: alcohol, funding

Gordon Brown cuts £50m from drugs work

The Sunday Telegraph suggests that the Pooled Treatment Budget will be cut over coming years:

The flagship government scheme for treating drug addicts faces swingeing budget cuts of £50 million, it can be revealed today.

Plans to slash total funding by more than 12 per cent, outlined in an email leaked to The Sunday Telegraph, come less than a fortnight after Gordon Brown tried to show off his anti-drug credentials by signalling his desire to reclassify cannabis from Class C to the more serious Class B.

We of course know that the Young People’s Substance Misuse Grant suffered a 10% cut this year, the effects of which are now becoming apparent:

A survey by DrugScope’s Druglink magazine has revealed the impact of the funding cut for front-line services:

• an award winning project in Brighton has had to substantially scale down its service for children of drug misusing parents. The service is threatened with closure in April 2008;
• in Kent a number of services are at risk, including prevention projects working with children in care, young offenders and young people excluded from school;
• in Bristol, an early intervention service which places a drug worker in every secondary school and pupil referral unit is facing closure in 2008;
• in Devon, a service working with schools and providing one-to-one support with young people is closing;
• services working with young people in Northamptonshire are being cut and job losses have already occurred.

Commenting on the impact of the cuts Martin Barnes, chief executive of DrugScope, said:

“Services working with young people are having to make cuts despite the Prime Minister’s call to improve drug education and prevention. Morale in many services is at rock bottom, not helped by further uncertainty about funding from next April. The cut is hurting and is indefensible.”

Filed under: funding

Parliamentary Question – Young People’s Substance Misuse Grant

Mr. Burrowes: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what the reasons were for the reduction in the Young People Substance Misuse Grant in 2007-08; and if she will make a statement.

Mr. Coaker: In addition to mainstream funding, the Government have committed £55 million of ringfenced funding in 2007-08 to support work on reducing young people’s drug use through the Young People’s Substance Misuse Partnership Grant. This grant is pooled centrally across Departments, administered by the Home Office and paid to local areas. The change in the grant allocation in 2007-08 is primarily due to a reduction of £4 million in the Department of Health’s Targeted Prevention Funding. The Department of Health had made a time-limited commitment to this funding, which was not renewed after the transfer of responsibility for drug education and prevention to the Department for Education and Skills. A further £2.6 million reduction was because the Home Office had increased its contribution, by way of a one-off subsidy in 2006-07, to help mitigate a similar reduction of £4 million by the Department of Health in that year.

Filed under: funding

Parliamentary Question – Health Education: Drugs

Tim Loughton: To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families how much has been spent on (a) drug awareness, (b) alcohol awareness and (c) volatile substance abuse programmes aimed at school age children in each of the last five years; and if he will list the projects funded.

Kevin Brennan: The Government are committed to reducing substance misuse related harm among young people, including harm arising from the misuse of drugs, alcohol and volatile substances. Education and awareness on these substances is a vital element of the current approach, and we have issued schools with guidance on drugs education. DCSF does not provide ring-fenced funding for schools’ drug education lessons, which are funded from schools’ general budgets.

The Government provide ring-fenced funding to prevent substance misuse among young people. The Young People’s Substance Misuse Partnership Grant (YPSMPG) is made available to local authorities for the provision of universal, targeted and specialist responses commissioned and delivered locally, based on their area’s needs and priorities. The grant funds a range of different projects across the country determined at local level, which are available for young people.
The grant brings together into a single pot, funding from the Home Office, the Department of Health, the Youth Justice Board and the Department for Children, Schools and Families. The following table details the total YPSMPG expenditure for the past five years (note that the first year, 2003/04, was a pilot year in 27 local authority areas):

	£ million
2003/04	(1)14.9
2004/05	58.8
2005/06	66.6
2006/07	64.1
2007/08	55.5
(1) Pilot year in only 27 local authorities

The YPSMPG is used in addition to mainstream funding to provide a comprehensive range of services for young people up to 18 years:

• Universal—substance misuse education, information and advice and prevention campaigns
• Targeted—early identification, assessment and prevention interventions with vulnerable young people in risk groups
• Specialist—provision of specialist substance misuse treatment for under 18’s

In addition to supporting the work of local partnerships, the Government fund specific programmes targeting messages for young people about substances, including the Frank campaign which has become a credible source of information and advice for young people and their parents. The cross departmental campaign was launched in 2003 funded by Home Office and Department of Health, with the Department for Children Schools and Families contributing from 2006/07.

	£ million
2003/04	4.25
2004/05	4.30
2005/06	6.17
2006/07	9.05

The Government are committed to expanding and improving the quality of school drug education (inc. tobacco, alcohol, volatile substance), through encouraging the development of well structured high quality programmes of PSHE across all key stages. The National Health Schools Standard requires schools to demonstrate effective PSHE provision. The Government have also invested over £6 million on blueprint, the largest research programme ever run in this country designed to test the effectiveness of a multi-component approach to drug education, involving an intensive set of school lessons for 11 to 13-year-olds supported by work with parents, communities, health professionals and local media. The full results of the programme will be available over the next 12 months or so.

The Department of Health lead on the Framework for Volatile Substance Abuse targeted at children and young people (launched on 20 July 2005). The document called “Out of Sight?………………not out of mind” outlines a number of key recommendations that the Government intend to take forward in partnership with key stakeholders at local, regional and national level.
The stated aims of the VSA Framework are to:

Provide effective education on VSA to all children and young people, including the most disadvantaged

Provide effective targeted interventions for children and young people abusing or at risk of abusing volatile substances

Reduce the availability and accessibility of volatile substances, with a focus on butane gas lighter refills

Build the capacity of parents, carers and practitioners to identify and work effectively with children and young people who are abusing or at risk of abusing volatile substances

Increase the evidence base with regard to what works in reducing deaths and harm from VSA.

Hansard source.

Filed under: alcohol, drug education, funding, VSA