Having moved a couple of years ago out of the academic work back into
community work with The Salvation Army I'm not surprised to be encountering
fairly significant numbers of people who are on the margins of society,
caught in a web of poverty, homelessness and chaotic lifestyles often
compounded by alcohol and/or drug dependency, mental health and patterns of
offending behaviour and spells in and out of jail, on the streets or in and
out of hostels. We work with the Big Issue in the North and over just over
2 years we have enrolled 130 vendors in the hope that this might help them
out of their problems. The vast majority are male, not in any stable
relationships or families, long term workless and very rarely from an ethnic
minority background.
On a rough check I'm aware of only four of the 130 who have made it back to
anything like mainstream and productive lives, and a handful more who have
settled into a long term pattern of being a Big Issue seller and finding
some prurpose and income through this work. The majority slip back into a
pattern of dependency, begging and drawing on the support services of a
network of agencies include ourselves, other church based hostels, centres
and soup runs, drugs and alcohol agencies, job centre and benefits agencies,
and the police and probation service. None of this seems to be helping these
people very much or making much impact on the problem as a whole. A lot of
us are frustrated and looking for a better way to engage with the people and
the issue and provide interventions which make a difference (though of
course it's hard to see who would want to fund them).
What I'd like to know from the social policy community is who, (if anybody)
is doing serious research and thinking on this area of policy, and or
evaluating interventions as to what approaches (if any) are effective. In
short does anyone know on the basis of evidence what works?
I'd be happy to receive any response either on the list or privately by
email. Soory if there is duplication for people who lurk on more than one
email list. Many thanks.
Greg Smith
34 Broadgate
PRESTON
Lancs. PR1 8DU
e.mail [log in to unmask]
Phone no. 01772 827987
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