Councils Waste Billions Fighting Troubled Families

Councils are wasting billions of pounds by not intervening with anti-social families more effectively, a government report has found. The CLG has produced a report to persuade local agencies to look at how they spend money on tackling troubled families. It gives some extreme examples of where councils are incurring high costs in dealing with anti-social behaviour. Barnet Council is spending almost £100,000 on average every year on each of its troubled families. The report, The cost of troubled families, shows one family in that borough cost the local authority, prison and probation services, police and health service £345,718 in a year. CLG says it can cost £10,000 a year for local services to successfully intervene and turn around a troubled family. Download a copy of the report from the CLG website.