With the support of the leading national youth homelessness charity Centrepoint, on November 1, 2010, North East Lincolnshire Council is to launch a new way of joint working to support homeless young people in the area and prevent young people from becoming homeless.
Representatives from the council’s children and family services and strategic housing departments have been working together, with voluntary sector agencies, across the borough. Facilitated by Centrepoint, they have developed a joint protocol for agencies supporting homeless 16 and 17 year olds. With training supported by a group of formerly homeless young people, this protocol will help agencies work together more closely to ensure homeless young people receive the right support at the right time, and to help prevent young people becoming homeless.
EVENTS:
The launch of the joint protocol will follow three training sessions facilitated by Centrepoint and representatives from North East Lincolnshire Council . The training will be held on:
October 21 at 9.30am at the GCYMCA on Orwell Street, Grimsby
October 25 at 1.00pm at the Town Hall in Grimsby
October 27 at 1.00pm at the Town Hall in Grimsby
These sessions will provide information and guidance to staff from agencies that support homeless young people on:
* the joint protocol document
* agency roles and responsibilities towards homeless 16 and 17 year olds
* the legal framework
A group of formerly homeless young people will be supporting the training to help to ensure that the sessions are as interactive as possible while also demonstrating how services could have better supported them when they were homeless.
Councillor Geoff Lowis, portfolio holder for regeneration and housing for North East Lincolnshire Council, said: “The council and Centrepoint have been doing some fantastic and worthwhile work on this particularly difficult area.
“I would urge anyone who is involved with homeless young people to attend one of these sessions. It is important that the protocol is understood and that people are helped in a timely and appropriate manner which will work towards giving homeless young people a brighter future.”