Revealed, the staggering scale of Britain's underclass: Half a million problem families cost the taxpayer £30BILLION every year
- Dysfunctional behaviour of some households draining public resources
- Size of the country's 'underclass' is four times larger than first thought
- Troubled families programme set up by PM in wake of 2011 summer riots
Britain’s problem families are costing taxpayers a whopping £30billion a year, it was claimed today.
The dysfunctional behaviour of half a million households in the country is resulting in a major drain on public resources, with the size of our ‘underclass’ four times larger than first thought.
Ministers have demanded an end to the ‘it’s not my fault’ culture which has allowed up to 120,000 problem families to avoid taking responsibility for their own lives.
Problem families: The dysfunctional behaviour of half a million households in the country is resulting in a major drain on public resources. The characters from TV comedy drama Shameless are pictured
Louise Casey, head of the government’s troubled families programme, has been in charge of trying to get the families back into mainstream society since the 2011 riots in London and elsewhere.
The 49-year-old told The Sunday Times: ‘These families are off the barometer in the number of problems they have. This is the first time we have been able to evidence the extent of the problems.’
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Households that qualify for the £448million programme must have three serious problems, including domestic violence, youth crime, truancy, anti-social behaviour or long-term unemployment.
One of the most extreme problem families experienced by the programme’s case workers generated an astonishing 90 police call-outs to their home over six months.
Trying to change things: Louise Casey (left) is head of the government’s troubled families programme, which was launched by Prime Minister David Cameron (right) in the wake of the 2011 riots in London and elsewhere
And a morbidly obese mother in one house visited her GP on 226 occasions following the birth of her youngest child, aged seven.
TROUBLED FAMILIES PROFILED
On entry to the troubled families programme, these proportions of households were found to have the following characteristics:
- 83%: Adult receiving out-of-work benefit
- 82%: Problem related to education
- 74%: Nobody in work
- 71%: Health problem
- 70%: Living in social housing
- 54%: Involved in crime or anti-social behaviour
- 49%: Lone parent households
- 42%: Police called to their address in last six months
- 40%: Three or more children
- 29%: Experiencing domestic violence
- 21%: At risk of eviction in last six months
But last November MailOnline reported on the Government’s claims 22,000 of the so-called ‘Shameless’ families had been released from a ‘cycle of despair’ thanks to the programme.
Now, The Sunday Times says some 53,000 of the families have shown improvements in key markers such as better school attendance, finding work and no longer committing crimes.
Some 417 families have had their lives turned around in Wandsworth, south-west London, where £442,000 a year has been saved from a fall in the number of under-18s involved in crime.
In a Government report published last month, Ms Casey said: ‘Having so many different problems within a household unit is very likely to make each individual problem more difficult to tackle.
‘Individuals within families do not operate in isolation and the problems of one will affect another, reinforcing each other and therefore likely to build up and lead to a family becoming dysfunctional.’
But she added: ‘We are seeing results - 111,000 families have so far been identified as needing help, and 97,000 are being worked with.
Benefits culture: Households that qualify for the £448million programme must have three serious problems, including domestic violence, youth crime, truancy, anti-social behaviour or long-term unemployment
‘Almost 53,000 families have made significant progress so that they now have their kids back in school, crime and anti-social behaviour is stopping or they are getting back to work.’
'Individuals within families do not operate in isolation and the problems of one will affect another, reinforcing each other and therefore likely to build up and lead to a family becoming dysfunctional'
Louise Casey, troubled families tsar
Meanwhile, it was revealed that more than 60,000 children live with former heroin addicts.
Public Health England figures show 61,918 parents or guardians are being prescribed methadone - a heroin substitute which can help people beat the addiction.
Some 5,984 of these are in London, 2,100 in Birmingham, 1,755 in Lancashire, 1,343 in Bristol and 1,273 in Nottingham, according toThe Sun on Sunday.
At least 17 children have died or been seriously harmed after consuming their parents’ methadone over the past five years.
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