Local London Assembly Member, Unmesh Desai AM, visited the charity, StreetGames, on Friday evening to see first-hand how their early intervention initiatives are helping some of the most vulnerable local children. Based at Newham Leisure Centre, StreetGames previously received £120,000 from the Mayor’s Young Londoners Fund to support its engagement work with young refugees and migrants. Mr Desai has praised the organisation’s approach which revolves around harnessing “the power of sport to offer a constructive and engaging diversion away from crime”.
During the visit, Mr Desai met participants in the scheme and heard how StreetGames works in conjunction with the Dost Centre for Young Refugees and Migrants to deliver three diversionary ‘doorstep’ sports activities for around 75 children and young adults at the Centre, per week. This year, the programme has attracted 225 new attendees so far.
Akin to hundreds of other early intervention and youth engagement projects across the capital, StreetGames has directly benefitted from City Hall funding. Last week, the Mayor of London announced an extra £55.5 million of investment to be targeted at tackling the complex causes of violent crime and to bolster City Hall’s existing Young Londoners Fund and Violence Reduction Unit.
This comes in the wake of a decade of Government cuts to local authority budgets, which have led to youth services being slashed across London. The latest Government figures have shown that funding for youth services in Newham fell by 81% between 2010/11 and 2018/19. Within this period, local authority budgets across London for youth service provision decreased by a total of £132 million.
Since its inception in 2007, StreetGames has engaged more than half a million young people from disadvantaged backgrounds in sporting activities across the country. The charity has also spearheaded initiatives as ‘Us Girls’, which focuses on bringing more young women into sport, and ‘Fit and Fed’, a scheme that aims to tackle the issues of holiday-time hunger, inactivity and isolation amongst some of Britain's poorest children.
Local London Assembly Member, Unmesh Desai AM, said:
“It’s been truly inspiring to visit StreetGames tonight and see them working with some of the poorest and most disadvantaged young people in our community. We often hear about how important early intervention is, but it was great to see it put into practice.
“Getting a grip on the rise in youth violence in our borough remains an urgent priority, so it has been very positive to see how StreetGames is working with the Dost Centre to harness the power of sport to offer a constructive and engaging diversion away from crime.
“A decade of Government austerity has had a severe impact on the funding available for vital youth services across our capital. This is why I am pleased that City Hall is stepping in to invest in the future of the next generation, supporting hundreds of projects like StreetGames through his Young Londoners Fund and the Violence Reduction Unit”.
Notes to editors
- More information about StreetGames and the Dost Centre can be found here and here;
- More information about the Mayor’s Young Londoners Fund and the Violence Reduction Unit can be found here and here;
- Last week, the Mayor of London announced an extra £55 million of investment to be targeted at tackling the complex causes of violent crime and to bolster City Hall’s existing Young Londoners Fund and Violence Reduction Unit;
- London Council’s report, London’s local services: investing in the future, outlines the scale of Government cuts to local authorities in the capital over the last decade;
- The latest Government figures have shown that funding for youth services in Newham fell by 81% between 2010/11 and 2018/19. Within this period, local authority budgets across London for youth service provision decreased by a total of £132 million;
- Unmesh Desai AM is the London Assembly Member for City and East (covering Barking and Dagenham, Newham, Tower Hamlets and the City of London).