Published 4 November 2021

Youth Services: Another One Bites the Dust

Change Maker By Will Solomon

Youth services are run by every council in the UK and are incredibly important for young people’s lives, wellbeing, prospects and skills. Yet over the years funding has been stripped and young people left stranded.

There are two types of work youth services do: the required (or statutory) duties and the non-statutory, which are just as important. Due to massive cuts to local government many of the non-statutory duties have either lost significant funding or been cut altogether. The most obvious loss is youth clubs.

Youth clubs are vital parts of any community. These walk-in centres are safe spaces for young people to relax, find help and, more often than not, play pool on a table just a little older than them. These centres operate outside formal education, yet prove to be incredibly worthwhile. They are vital for emotional support and life preparation skills. And yet, their funding has been slashed beyond belief with over 760 youth clubs closing in the UK over the past 10 years. The total spending cut between 2010-19 is about £400 million. And this is a conservative estimate. YMCA (the oldest and largest youth charity in the world) predicts a 71% decrease in funding for youth services from £1357 million (2010) to £398 million (2019).

A service can’t function without proper funding. It is as simple as that. A walk-in youth club’s power is in its informality. Kids can come in off the streets, talk, have a laugh, relax. And when they’re not in an environment where they’re being pressured into speaking then they open up about what’s troubling them; maybe not all at once but over time trust is built and lives are changed. These services have a tangible impact on society and young people’s lives. When youth service budgets are closed you see rises in knife crime and teen suicide – because these kids don’t have anywhere to go anymore.

Youth clubs take the strain off emergency services like the NHS and police, providing early support to young people so they may not need emergency services in the future. There are many things the government can do to rebuild youth services. They could:

  1. Increase funding to local authorities and expand the statutory duties to include youth clubs.
  2. Give a more developed definition of the standards youth services should be held to. The current standard is that youth clubs must be ‘sufficient’, and what this means is up to local authorities. Young people must be at the centre of developing a more specific definition of the standards and local authorities who don’t meet these standards should be held to account.