“We don’t want New Deal money replacing services because Futures are making cutbacks.We don’t want the same old provision by the same people. But we must face facts – mainstream youth services will always be with Sheffield Futures. If New Deal wants to make lasting changes, we must work with them.”

New Deal have asked them to guarantee existing service levels, and to recruit new people to the posts, not just reallocate existing staff. Futures are prepared to commit to that, but it could be September before agreement is reached and workers recruited.

BCAF’s Children and Young People’s Working Group hoped the project would not just target certain groups of young people, giving the impression bad behaviour is rewarded. John Clark emphasised all activities will be open to all, with some work to encourage disaffected young people to be involved.

New Deal funding will also go to local organisations. Listen to Us will be providing activities and developing a youth council. Ellesmere Youth Project will continue work in Ellesmere and Carwood, and a Somali youth project is being developed. John Clark said, “It’s important activities happen all year round, not just in summer. We need a co-ordinated approach to keep young people informed – we hope Sheffield Futures can help with this. They will be supporting voluntary organisations by providing training for adults who are working with young people without proper qualifications.”

Futures Respond

Dear Messenger

I would like to respond to the article in your last issue about Sheffield Futures and the youth services in the Burngreave area.

Sheffield Futures delivers a high standard of youth services in Burngreave and we are delighted to say that we may soon be able to increase the number of workers we employ in the area. We are currently negotiating with New Deal for an additional £200,000 of funding, which will be a welcome addition to the £150,000 from our own resources which we already invest in the area.

The proposed project would create quality youth provision via an additional four part-time detached youth workers as well as management support and training for the project and the voluntary sector. The new posts would also create jobs for local people. We are actively working with New Deal to progress this proposal, and have been doing so for the last year or so.

It is important to stress the Burngreave area has not suffered any major ‘cut backs’. Sheffield Futures did sadly make six people redundant this year – a much reduced figure from first estimates, thanks to hard work by Sheffield Futures staff to attract additional funding into the organisation – but none of these redundancies affected staff in the Burngreave area.

We have three centres in Burngreave which cater for young people. These are: the Earl Marshal Connexions Centre, Verdon Street Recreation Centre and The All Saints Centre (Burngreave New Deal help to financially support this project. Here we also run the Catch the Drift project for young people excluded from school).

We also have detached youth workers in the area and during school holidays we run the Positive Activities for Young People project in parts of the city, including Burngreave. This project helps to keep young people busy, involved in positive activities rather than congregating on the streets.

Sheffield Futures works hard for the young people of Burngreave, and will continue to do so.

Yours faithfully Helen Bale, Sheffield Futures’ Area Director for the Burngreave area