Trust that inspired big society to lose its youth services
Joe Lepper
Friday, March 11, 2011
The community group that inspired the government's big society agenda is to close down its youth services due to funding cuts.
St Paul’s Community Development Trust, set up in the 1970s to improve the Balsall Heath area of Birmingham, is to see its funding from Birmingham City Council cut by about a third this year.
The hardest hit of its services will be youth work. The trust has announced it will now have to "close its youth service doors" and its six youth service staff have now been served with redundancy notices.
The trust’s youth team coodinator, Sarah Gallagher, said the move will be particularly devastating for families who relied on its holiday provision.
She said: "This area has a large number of people in work on low incomes who depend, or I should say depended, upon us. Now some may have no option but to leave their children on their own during the holidays."
She added that without its youth clubs and holiday schemes "the fear for many in the community is that some of the young people will fall foul of a diminishing gang culture, which it is now feared will begin to increase."
The work by the trust is regularly praised by Prime Minister David Cameron as the inspiration for his big society agenda.
The trust is collecting signatures on a petition to be delivered to Cameron calling for an end to youth service cuts. It also wants Cameron to "realise the devastating effect this will have on a generation of young people".
The petition states: "St Paul's youth services are one of the only youth services in the Balsall Heath area and without this there will be many disadvantaged young people who rely on this support left with nothing."
The hardest hit of its services will be youth work. The trust has announced it will now have to "close its youth service doors" and its six youth service staff have now been served with redundancy notices.
The trust’s youth team coodinator, Sarah Gallagher, said the move will be particularly devastating for families who relied on its holiday provision.
She said: "This area has a large number of people in work on low incomes who depend, or I should say depended, upon us. Now some may have no option but to leave their children on their own during the holidays."
She added that without its youth clubs and holiday schemes "the fear for many in the community is that some of the young people will fall foul of a diminishing gang culture, which it is now feared will begin to increase."
The work by the trust is regularly praised by Prime Minister David Cameron as the inspiration for his big society agenda.
The trust is collecting signatures on a petition to be delivered to Cameron calling for an end to youth service cuts. It also wants Cameron to "realise the devastating effect this will have on a generation of young people".
The petition states: "St Paul's youth services are one of the only youth services in the Balsall Heath area and without this there will be many disadvantaged young people who rely on this support left with nothing."
