Pilot Proposals
Pilot proposals
London’s communities are in a precarious position where, if a change of approach towards coordinated community-driven solutions isn’t trialled, then this situation will likely deteriorate for us all.
Our campaign coalition proposes to trial this during a localised, two- year long pilot based at a ‘ground zero’ location in a London Borough starting in 2025: delivered through a collaborative framework; powered by a cross-industry, local network of frontline community stakeholders. The pilot will focus on 54 main areas
- Offering supplementary educational programmes
- Introducing Community Awareness and Action Groups (CAAGSs)
- Building co-ordinated local networks
- Providing community hubs and youth centres tools and guidance
- Helping and galvanising the wider network
Supplementary educational programmes
To create a supplementary educational programme between local youth support work charities and educators, offering a range of ‘real-world skills’ to students – this will be supplementary to the traditional academic curriculum at schools, colleges, and pupil referral units. Training must be opportunity- and awareness focused, helping students to navigate life with ‘real- world skills’, such as basic financial acumen (e.g., how to create and build savings), conflict resolution, key legal rights (with police), avoiding gang exploitation, and communication skills (for the streets and professional world).
The programmes we will deliver are tailored to the audience’s age demographic, so not to inadvertently induce fear and be irrelevant to their current needs. It will be led by personnel who children can relate to from their local area, who understand community dynamics and the challenges of that environment teaching through fun, interactive role-playing scenarios from relatable, lived experiences.
Community Awareness and Action Groups (CAAGs)
To introduce outcome-focused Community Awareness & Action Groups (CAAGs) – we share the passion and desire of frontline personnel within the Metropolitan Police to build public trust: through enhanced engagement and feedback channels, in addition to developing more accountability with measurable community goals (read Real Views case study).
During a pilot, we’d like to establish Community Awareness & Action Groups (CAAGs) – meeting monthly, comprising a handful of nominated key community representatives, Safer Neighbourhoods’ police sergeants, and local council officials to share regular progress updates on pre- determined goals.
We’d also like to establish fresh dialogue with a pilot area’s BCU (Basic Command Units) Commander to explore potential mechanisms where collective decisions from CAAGs, that introduce modest changes impacting local police operations, can be given effect.
Building a coordinated local network
We will look to implement a framework that creates local networks, uniting like-minded charities and youth support service providers, to produce coordinated projects – there is a lot of incredible work being done behind the scenes to help combat youth violence and knife crime by addressing their root causes. However, by working in isolation, the potential of these essential prevention and intervention methods is restricted due to challenges with funding, resources, and coordination.
Our coalition will offer local community hubs and youth centres guidance and tools for their operations to become more self-sufficient – so they aren’t solely reliant on funding from local authorities and complex government tenders. Youth centres continue to close at an alarming rate as local authorities do not have the funds to support them. But evidence shows the work they facilitate offers significant value. Research by UK Youth and Frontier Economics found that for every £1 government invests in youth work, the benefit to the taxpayer is between £3.20-£6.40.
Providing community hubs and youth centres tools and guidance
Youth centres continue to close at an alarming rate as local authorities do not have the funds to support them. Evidence shows the work they facilitate offers significant value. Research by UK Youth and Frontier Economics found that for every £1 government invests in youth work, the benefit to the taxpayer is between £3.20- £6.40.
We will offer local community hubs and youth centres guidance and tools for their operations to become more self-sufficient – so they aren’t solely reliant on funding from local authorities and complex government tenders.
We will create this guidance with campaign partners who have succeeded in this area, to help increase commercial awareness. This will include how to better use features, resources, and even local youths’ entrepreneurial skills and services nurtured at the hubs – with a focus on how to maximise commercial opportunities via local partnerships, sponsorship, fundraising, and advertising.
Helping the wider network
We will offer professionalised training in gang grooming and county lines exploitation to more public services’ outreach personnel and parents – our partners want to expand their current training operations to help more frontline public services to better identify youth at high risk of violence, drug exploitation, and gang grooming. Currently, there is a lack of standardised training available for GPs, district nurses, social workers, and educators across these areas.
There are many cases across London where parents have been unable to seek help once they have learned their child has entered gang life, due to a lack of recognised support channels. Parents would benefit from regular opportunities to discuss one- on-one with trained professionals the dangers associated with gang affiliation, drug dealing, and carrying weapons – as well as ways to spot if their child has joined a gang and how to get support if this happen
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Focus Groups Insight
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