It's a shocking statistic, but around 77,000 children and young people run away from home every year in the UK, including 20,000 aged under 11. And many of these young runaways slip through the net of services and drift into crime, prostitution and drugs.
A report by the Social Exclusion Unit (SEU) last November flagged up the problem, and now the Government's Children and Young People's Unit (CYPU) is putting 3m into a variety of pilot schemes across England, aimed at improving service provision for this vulnerable group.
The projects, which run until March 2004, are wide-ranging and led by organisations including youth offending teams, social services departments and voluntary organisations, says Althea Efunshile, CYPU director.
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