Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of acronyms
- Acknowledgements
- One Introduction: ‘Looking for trouble’
- Two The ‘long and undistinguished pedigree’
- Three The opening of a policy window
- Four The evolution of the Troubled Families Programme
- Five ‘The responsibility deficit’
- Six ‘This thing called family intervention …’
- Seven Street-level perspectives
- Eight Research: ‘help or hindrance’?
- Nine ‘Nothing to hide’: the structural duplicity of the Troubled Families Programme
- References
- Index
Four - The evolution of the Troubled Families Programme
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 April 2022
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of acronyms
- Acknowledgements
- One Introduction: ‘Looking for trouble’
- Two The ‘long and undistinguished pedigree’
- Three The opening of a policy window
- Four The evolution of the Troubled Families Programme
- Five ‘The responsibility deficit’
- Six ‘This thing called family intervention …’
- Seven Street-level perspectives
- Eight Research: ‘help or hindrance’?
- Nine ‘Nothing to hide’: the structural duplicity of the Troubled Families Programme
- References
- Index
Summary
When the general cueing effect produced by the sensitisation is combined with the type of free association in the ‘It’s Not Only This’ theme, the result is that a number of other deviants are drawn into the same sensitising net. In the phase after the inventory, other targets became more visible and, hence, candidates for social control. These targets are not, of course, chosen randomly but from groups already structurally vulnerable to social control (Cohen, 2002: 64).
Introduction
The TFP was established specifically to ‘turn around’ the lives of the 120,000 troublesome and anti-social families that could be identified using the government's official criteria, with the government promoting the family intervention model as the best way of doing this. It was not long, however, before slippages from this original narrative began to emerge and it became clear during Phase 1 that many local authorities were struggling to find the requisite number of ‘troubled families’ in their area (Wiggins, 2012). Many were also choosing to work with families using existing universal services, and not necessarily rushing to adopt an intensive family intervention approach. It also was not long before it was announced that the programme would seek to work with an additional 400,000 families, once the original 120,000 had been dealt with. These families had been identified using new research and the ‘massive expansion’ (DCLG, 2013b) of the programme would also see new and expanded criteria introduced for the 400,000 extra families. A new approach to the PbR element of the programme was also announced for the second phase, one that required families to demonstrate ‘significant and sustained progress’ in order for local authorities to receive additional funding. Following intense criticism of the claims of success surrounding the TFP, the second phase of the programme operated out of the public limelight in its early stages before, in early 2017, it was announced that the programme was in line for a ‘reboot’ (Savage, 2017). In April 2017, the ‘next phase’ of the ‘evolution’ of TFP was announced, including a new focus on ‘workless families’ within the TFP and a further review of the PbR mechanism.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- TroublemakersThe Construction of ‘Troubled Families’ as a Social Problem, pp. 63 - 82Publisher: Bristol University PressPrint publication year: 2018