Devon considers early intervention-focused youth service

The local authority wants to focus its resources on providing early help and prevention services to vulnerable young people as it looks to save more than £1m from its £3.7m youth service budget over the next two years.

If the council goes ahead with the proposal, put forward as part of council-wide plans to save £110m by 2017, it will be unable to continue to fund universal centre-based provision at its 34 youth centres.

Instead it wants community and voluntary organisations to take over the running of the centres – a move Mark Richards, regional officer for the Unite union, which represents youth workers, fears will leave many young people without access to support services.

He said: “We are facing a postcode lottery where Devon’s youth centres could be taken over by private bidders, voluntary organisations or even individuals.

“Our members provide targeted services such as sex education and assistance with substance abuse problems within a universal framework for young people – that could disappear.

“The council undertook a consultation last September with hundreds of young people and voluntary organisations and not one said they wanted youth centres to shut.”

However, Will Mumford, cabinet member for youth services, said he is keen to work with young people, local residents and staff to develop the proposal further.

He said: “We’ve already had a number of meetings with young people, our staff and voluntary and community groups to talk about how we might proceed.

“We will be particularly keen to work with local communities to develop a new offer for young people for which the county council might be able to provide some initial support.

“We would also be happy to discuss with our staff the possibility of forming a staff mutual or social enterprise to take on local youth provision.

“We want to harness capacity and expertise to help develop a sustainable model for the future.”

A 12-week public consultation on the proposal has been launched.