The Government’s ‘Troubled Families’ Unit has estimated that Luton has around 525 families that fall into their definition of ‘troubled’.

Luton Borough Council is aiming to put in place a new programme which will such families turn their lives around.

A ‘troubled family’ is one where there is an adult on out of work benefits, children not attending school and family members involved in crime or anti-social behaviour.

The Government funded initiative aims to move these families from crisis to stability through co-ordinated support from a range of professionals.

The council has been given 40 per cent of the costs of intervention measures on a payment by results arrangement over the next three years, and £100,000 per year to fund strategic co-ordination and administration of the programme.

Interface, a social enterprise, is overseeing the collecting and matching of data needed to identify the families the authorities will be working with.

Cllr Waheed Akbar said: “Our goal is to have the programme up and running by September this year, and although we have made a great start there is still a huge amount of work to be done.

“In addition to those families meeting the ‘troubled’ criteria to be included in the programme, we will also be targeting families who have a child on the edge of care, and where there are frequent police call outs, arrests or with adults with proven offences in the past year.”