Young people can escape the ghost towns

This week, I visited a town in Wales (that shall remain nameless), where I was given a reliable estimate of the percentage of people in the town that take illegal drugs. Out of a population of around 100,000 souls, I heard that an estimated 20 per cent of people take, or have taken, cocaine, cannabis, crack or heroin. I then asked for legal highs and alcohol to be included in the estimate and the figure quickly jumped to between 40 and 50 per cent.

The people I was putting these questions to were all drug and alcohol workers, so I imagine that they should know. In this town, the drug taking and alcohol consumption can start early, well before school leaving age. By the time young people who have become involved in drugs leave school, they can be well and truly challenged by an addiction that will define their experiences of life for decades to come.

In this town, the pits are long gone, so the biggest employers and providers of ways into work have disappeared. Either that or the capacity of employers to deliver skills and preparation for life beyond school has been significantly reduced. On top of this, the public sector is shrinking faster than welfare support for young people.

I realise that I am painting a depressing and seemingly hopeless picture that is not often cited during debates about the state of the economy. Neither is it a picture that is referred to in invitations to discuss the reducing role of the welfare state, starting with the government’s proposal to withdraw housing benefit to those under the age of 25.

The policy is proposed on the basis that young people should be at home with their parents rather than burdening the taxpayer if they cannot afford to move out. But what about those young people who do not have parents in their lives?
In the town I visited, the withdrawal of housing benefit for young people will pass unnoticed for many of them as they cannot afford to leave home in any case.

For the young people I speak of, it looks as though their futures are under siege. One substance misuse worker I spoke to had left the town to study, gaining a university education. She had returned home only to find that even with a good degree, it would be over a year before she got the job that she has now. She knows many other young people who have also returned to face a workless future if they intend to stay in the town.

But all is not lost. My visit took me to a small project that is training substance misusers to become counsellors with qualifications and a career path in the health and care services. The young people start as volunteers and their first job is to understand addiction and what professional help looks like.

They then move up to become peer mentors and, after taking on further training and gaining experience, soon become not only rehabilitated but fully trained and possibly fully employed in the health and social care sector. The last national needs analysis I looked at told me that there was likely to be a massive shortfall in health and social care workers.

And this is the crucial point – young people in the most deprived places around the country are finding routes out. These routes may be narrow and sometimes under attack, but young people are finding them, often against incredible odds.

As I left the town behind, I thought about the experiences of young people who have not been able to find such a way out – lack of jobs and opportunities, the withdrawal of benefits (including the education maintenance allowance) and now the suggestion that housing benefit could be taken from those below the age of 25.

Young people in this town, and undoubtedly in many others across the country, are making an effort. Like many that I spoke to, they are trying to find ways out.

Still, we must surely be able to see why the prospects they face – when taken together – must feel like they amount to an attack on young people.

Lord Victor Adebowale is visiting professor and chancellor at the University of Lincoln and chief executive of Turning Point