Agenda item

To provide a follow-up to the previous scrutiny on poverty and cost-of-living issues in Brent, providing a detailed, evidence-based update on Brent’s progress and challenges in implementing commitments related to poverty reduction, cost-of-living support, housing and child poverty alleviation.

Councillor Gwen Grahl (as Cabinet Member for Children’s Services, Employment and Education) introduced the report, which provided an update on Brent Council’s progress and challenges in implementing commitments relating to poverty reduction, cost-of-living support, housing and child poverty alleviation. In introducing the report from a children’s services perspective, she advised that child poverty was a key priority within the department as it affected everything the service delivered, and officers spent a lot of time thinking about the issue and what more could be done in the area. The Council had recently made a submission to the Government’s Child Poverty Task Force who were looking for recommendations. She highlighted that giving every child the best start in life needed to include tackling the root causes of poverty and equip children with the resources they needed to thrive. She drew members attention to the report, which outlined some of the department’s significant initiatives to do that, including Family Wellbeing Centres which she described as vital hubs where families could access an array of support including benefits advice, healthcare advice and parental guidance, which had reached over 18,000 families the previous year. She also listed Free School Meals (FSMs) as a cornerstone of addressing child poverty, with 25.1% of children in Brent eligible to receive FSMs. She felt that the Mayor’s commitment to providing FSMs to all primary school pupils in London had also been hugely impactful. Alongside FSMs, pupils were also eligible for pupil premium, which was money provided to schools to enhance those children’s education, and the Council had now set up auto-enrolment for that to ensure none of those children slipped through the net. She advised members of the holiday, activities and food (HAF) programme which she was proud of and felt acted as a lifeline for families during school holidays, as well as the voucher scheme for food which would be protected until 2027. Looking ahead, priorities would include the implementation of the National Strategy on Child Poverty, which would involve developing free breakfast clubs, extension of childcare entitlements, and expanding FSMs for all households on Universal Credit from September 2026. In detailing the steps being taken to alleviate child poverty, she added that these measures could not happen alone, as housing issues were now the main mechanism through which young people’s lives became uncertain, with one child in every class in Temporary Accommodation, statistically. The scale of this was outlined in section 7.1 of the report, which detailed that Brent child poverty rates were at an average of 41%, compared to the London average of 35%, considering housing costs within that calculation. If housing costs were removed, the poverty rate sat at 20%, showing the impact of housing costs on poverty. She concluded her introduction by expressing her desire for a national strategy to build a new generation of social housing and solutions to ending the crisis of Temporary Accommodation.

Nigel Chapman (Corporate Director Children, Young People and Community Development, Brent Council) added that one of the Council’s protective factors against poverty for future generations was improved education for young people across the borough to equip them with good jobs for the future, emphasising the strong performance of schools in the borough, with all secondary schools in Brent rated as good or outstanding by Ofsted. Children from more deprived backgrounds in Brent were shown to perform better than the national average, showing that the services in place and the work of schools was helping to mitigate the effects of poverty on young people’s achievements.

Tom Cattermole (Corporate Director, Housing and Residents Services, Brent Council) provided an introduction from a resident services perspective. He reminded members that the Poverty Commission that was undertaken in 2020 gave Brent Council a clear framework for tackling poverty in the borough, but added that the landscape had changed significantly since then. He advised that the report outlined the pressures being faced, including the rise in demand for Temporary Accommodation and the number of families struggling with essentials including food, fuel and rent. The support provided by Resident Services had been focused on alleviating those pressures, providing improved employment support, early help for families through strengthening financial assistance, and investing in affordable homes. He highlighted that the approach being taken was compassionate and practical and combined immediate support, such as through Brent Hubs, the Resident Support Fund and Emergency Grants, with long term actions on skills, housing and prevention.

In drawing the introduction to close, Andrew Phillips (Strategy Lead – Policy, Brent Council) drew members’ attention to the Social Progress Index (SPI) tool which had been recently published and supported the monitoring of data, enabling the Council to identify gaps in the poverty offer, which was further supported by the government’s recently published Multiple Indices of Deprivation which now considered housing.

The Chair thanked presenters for their introduction and invited comments and questions from those present, with the following issues raised:

The Chair invited Brent Youth Parliament to lead the discussion. Brent Youth Parliament was pleased that the report recognised the lack of vocational outcomes and opportunities for well paid local work for residents, which they identified as very important to young people right now. They asked what action was taking place specifically for young people, aside from workshops or careers fairs which most young people felt did not directly cater to their needs, to help young people into opportunities, how many people were able to secure jobs from those fares, and how young people were being consulted in these processes. They advocated for more local or borough specific degree apprenticeships for young people, adding that many young people were interested in the Council’s audit service. Councillor Grahl agreed that there was a need for more opportunities in the borough, particularly apprenticeships. In her new portfolio role she had undertaken a review of jobs and skills in Brent with an external consultant who had made a number of recommendations, including to set up a local Skills and Employment Board made up of different stakeholders from across the borough to look carefully at the offer and contribute to it, which was being worked towards. She also wanted to look at the different Key Performance Indicators which she did not feel had been done consistently in the past. In terms of opportunities for work experience, Nigel Chapman added that it had been the responsibility of schools for the past 10 years to organise careers advice and work experience for young people, but he felt that the effectiveness of this varied between schools. As part of the review, he would be making an offer to local schools to co-ordinate work experience opportunities across Brent so that a more consistent offer could be provided.

The Chair asked officers to elaborate on how the Council used its links with other stakeholders to drive opportunities in order to offer a more holistic offer, such as through the Mayor’s Academy, Wembley Stadium, University of West London and NHS providers. Nigel Chapman advised that the Council’s employment service, Brent Works, had good links to those partners and delivered a high number of work placements for Brent’s population. This offer was not specific to young people, but there were good connections with NHS and other medium sized local employers. He agreed to provide data on how many young people who attended jobs fairs had subsequently secured employment.

Brent Youth Parliament also highlighted the barriers of Temporary Accommodation, particularly as people were being moved large distances away from Brent. They highlighted that this had an impact on young people during their crucial school years, with many not taking their GCSEs as a result or not continuing on to post-16 education due to the distances they needed to travel to continue their education. They asked whether the Council would consult young people experiencing long term Temporary Accommodation on its impact, and whether the Council would publicise the number of young people moved beyond Brent, London and the M25 circle during their GCSE and A-Level period. Tom Cattermole assured members that the Council did attempt to place families as close to Brent as possible, but were not always successful because the level of demand did not match the level of supply. He highlighted that the ultimate success story for the Council would be for every family on the Temporary Accommodation (TA) list to have a permanent residence. The Council had learned from families in TA that the most unsettling type of accommodation was bed and breakfast, so the Council did prioritise single units as opposed to B&B, and, given the demand and cost, those units were not always available in Brent. There were around 800 social housing units coming on stream for the Council in the upcoming financial year, but he highlighted that housing supply was a London crisis with every borough facing similar challenges. The Council continued to try to minimise the impact to families by prioritising local places, including taking into account if there were school aged children due to undertake exams, but the main priority was to get people into safe and suitable accommodation. Palvinder Kudhail (Director of Early Help and Social Care, Brent Council) added that Family Wellbeing Centres provided advice and information, including debt advice, and advocated on behalf of the families by speaking to the housing department about location and schooling to try to maintain continuity for young people where they were at exam stages.

Brent Youth Parliament recognised the challenges outlined and that the long term solution was for increased supply of affordable housing, but highlighted that in the shorter term young people should have their voices directly represented in order for the Council to understand the unique impact TA had on young people. For example, young people in TA advocated for receiving travel vouchers so that they could afford travelling to and from school and needed a place to voice that proposal. Brent Youth Parliament also asked the Council to consider moving people around to maintain young people in crucial moments of their education specifically, formalising an obligation to prioritise local places for those types of young people.

Brent Youth Parliament further commented, highlighting a gap in provision in relation to Free School Meals for young people aged 16-19, particularly with the loss of Educational Maintenance Allowance packages. They urged the Council to release frameworks or advice about how FSMs should be implemented across schools. They added that Tower Hamlets Council had reinstated EMA and reported a decreased burden on the Council as a result. They suggested that FSMs could be redirected to young people who had lost that EMA in Brent. Nigel Chapman advised that the FSM provision was funded through the GLA for primary schools, and the Council was not in a position to extend that to secondary schools or beyond. If the financial situation changed then this could be looked into.

In concluding their challenge, Brent Youth Parliament asked how the Council would respond to the youth policies outlined in the National Youth Strategy, which included providing youth services to tackle poverty. Nigel Chapman advised that the National Youth Strategy had been published the previous month, with Brent children’s services currently reviewing the strategy alongside the Council’s own Youth Strategy which had been published in 2025. One practical thing that the Council had committed to was spending £4-5m towards improving youth facilities across the borough, with 5 centres set to benefit over the next two years to help provide young people with a space for activities. The Council was working with the voluntary sector on the delivery of that.

The Chair then invited Councillor Rita Conneely, as Chair of the Resources and Public Realm Scrutiny Committee, to contribute to the discussion. In opening her remarks, Councillor Conneely thanked Brent Youth Parliament for keeping a focus on Temporary Accommodation, which she highlighted as one of the greatest financial risks to the Council and to Councils across the country. In relation to children’s services as a whole, she recognised some of the work being done, particularly the father’s residential programme at the Gordon Brown Centre, and commended the Council for using those assets, but highlighted that these types of offers were highly dependent on grants. She asked where the Council’s ability to bring in grants lay to address some of the issues outlined in the poverty commission, and where there were gaps that the Council recognised as local need, but which were not recognised nationally as requiring investment. Nigel Chapman responded that the local government finance settlement had been announced just before Christmas and was still being worked through, but he was happy to see there had been an increase in the Council’s grant funded position for 2026-27 and over a longer, three-year period to support early intervention and prevention. He hoped to use that to introduce new provision not already in place, for example support for children and young people outside of the home at risk of harm through gang related activity, or family therapy for children and young people struggling with parental relationships. The Council had not yet set the budget for 2026-27, so the department was working at pace with finance colleagues to put a three-year programme in place.

Noting that the Community and Wellbeing Scrutiny Committee had previously made recommendations in relation to the poverty commission, including to work with food banks to develop a food strategy and the implementation of breakfast and afterschool clubs, the Committee asked what had been developed following those recommendations. Nigel Chapman advised that the government had released new funding for the provision of breakfast and afterschool clubs. In relation to the food strategy, Tom Pickup advised that the programme had moved to the Public Health Team, who were not present at the meeting, but he confirmed that they had dedicated resource to drive that work forward. He agreed to reach out to the Public Health Team to provide an update on that work.

In relation to young people not in education, employment and training, the Committee asked whether the Council had looked into developing an education business partnership with secondary schools and local businesses, similar to what was done in Hounslow and Tower Hamlets. Councillor Grahl advised that there were a number of different supported pathways, outlined in paragraph 4.2 of the report, helping people back into work, including young people. Brent Start and Brent Works were the two main employment programmes directly funded by the Council for jobs and skills, and she was looking into setting up a local Board for stakeholders around this. Noting that Brent Youth Parliament had advocated for more apprenticeships for young people, she asked Brent Youth Parliament to be involved in that local Board once it was set up. Nigel Chapman added that there was greater levels of economic inactivity amongst females in Brent, so a strand of this work was to attempt to improve greater female economic activity.

Noting that there were many facets contributing to poverty, the Committee asked how intersectional the Council’s approach was to understanding and dealing with poverty in Brent. Nigel Chapman responded that the data available to the Council now did provide a rich source of information, with the latest Indices of Multiple Deprivation by super output areas published before Christmas providing a good sense of where things had changed over the years. This included an understanding and breakdown by ethnicity and gender as well. He added that now that the data was available, the next step was to analyse, utilise and target that data to improve outcomes. It was clear that those areas requiring most attention and support were still the areas that the Council would expect, in Harlesden, Stonebridge and Dollis Hill. Tom Pickup added that, whilst the Indices of Multiple Deprivation provided one layer of data, the Council had also developed its Social Progress Index (SPI) looking at advantage and disadvantage in different ways across different communities. There was also work through the Radical Place Leadership (RPL) Programme looking at providing support and solutions at a neighbourhood level. That work was currently focused in Harlesden, an area of greater social deprivation, and used data to understand the demographics of those most disadvantaged and what the different facets contributing to that disadvantage was, in order to come up with solutions through Integrated Neighbourhood Teams made up of both Council departments and partner organisations. He highlighted that this was emerging work starting in Harlesden that would then be broadened out following learning. Palvinder Kudhail added that children’s services work around intersectionality was often done when working with families. For example, Family Wellbeing Centres offered a triage service, conducting assessments for every family to inform the approach to responded to that family based on their individual need and how they wanted to receive services.

Noting the comments about housing being a contributing factor to deprivation in the borough, the Committee raised the prevalence of illegal subletting as an issue, highlighting that those properties were then not available to people in need. They queried how the Council managed existing assets to ensure they were used by the people who needed them. Tom Cattermole advised that the landlord licensing scheme was the main mechanism the Council had to counteract illegal subletting, and that scheme would be going borough wide. The Landlord Licensing Forum aimed to work with landlords on the quality of housing and the legality of what they were renting, and the Council often had whistleblowers informing the Private Rented Sector (PRS) Team of subletting, alongside area tenancy managers and councillors. Every case reported to the PRS Team was investigated by the Audit and Fraud Team. There was also the tenancy verification audit process which audited all tenancies across the borough, starting with vulnerable tenants, which should also identify any illegal subletting.

Raising the issue of quality of accommodation provided by private landlords, the Committee asked how the Council balanced the need to increase private housing against landlords taking advantage. Tom Cattermole advised that the LHA rates dictated what the Council could pay for temporary accommodation, so cautioned against any private landlords using the Council as an excuse to increase rents because the Council could not afford that, which was resulting in the need to source properties outside of the borough. In response to how the Council would deliver the target of 5,000 new Council homes, he agreed to speak with the regeneration team for an update.

The Committee highlighted that the table outlined in section 3.2.6 had a four-year data gap, and asked whether it was comprehensive enough to ascertain the levels of poverty. Andrew Phillips explained that the headline picture from that table, which used data from the national Indices of Multiple Deprivation, was that deprivation had worsened across the borough. He attributed the main driver of that to the inclusion of housing costs in the formula being used nationally, which played a huge role in the increase in poverty numbers. He recognised that the national index did not cover all aspects of poverty, and Brent had an opportunity to use the SPI which held Brent specific data, allowing officers and members of the public to look at more granular indicators affecting poverty.

Members highlighted the inequality amongst wards in terms of Council tax support, noting that those in the south of the borough received substantially more support and asked for further information as to why that was. Tom Cattermole explained that the top 5 wards receiving Council tax support correlated to the top 5 wards receiving 13a hardship awards, suggesting this was an indicator of deprivation.

Noting that Brent child poverty was at 41%, compared to the London average of 35%, which was partly attributed to low income, the Committee asked whether the recommendations from Lord Best’s poverty commission had been fully implemented. Tom Pickup responded that the commission recommendations had all been fully delivered, with a delivery plan published alongside Lord Best’s report in 2021. The report presented to the Committee now presented the activity that had taken place since the poverty commission whilst acknowledging that a lot had changed across the past 5 years. In response to whether the Council was satisfied that the actions taken were adequate, he advised that the Council had done its best to deliver within its gift, and felt that the report demonstrated that the Council took poverty alleviation seriously and focused on this across the board in delivering all of its services.

As no further issues were raised the Chair thanked officers for their time and responses and invited members to make recommendations, with the following RESOLVED:

i)               To recommend that children and young people were consulted in relation to poverty alleviation work the Council was undertaking.

ii)              To recommend engagement with children and young people in Temporary Accommodation to understand the unique challenges they experienced.

iii)             To advocate for increased work experience, skills and training opportunities for children and young people in Brent, including through partnerships with the NHS, Mayor’s Academy and Wembley Stadium.

iv)             To advocate for a TA allocations approach prioritising local places for young people undertaking examinations.

A number of information requests were also made during the course of the discussion, recorded as follows:

i)               For the Committee and Brent Youth Parliament to receive data in relation to how many young people had secured jobs following attendance at jobs fairs.

ii)              For the Committee to receive an update from the Public Health Team on the development of a Food Strategy.

iii)             For the Committee to receive an update from the Regeneration Team on how it would reach it’s target of delivering 5,000 Council homes.