In the first grant round of the Youth Endowment Fund established with a £200 million endowment from the Home Office and run by Impetus, in partnership with the Early Intervention Foundation and Social Investment Business, 23 projects across England and Wales will share in £17.1m to help prevent youth offending by intervening early to stop children getting dragged into crime.

The Youth Endowment Fund is dedicated to building the evidence base to determine what works and supporting improved outcomes for children and young people. Each project will be evaluated to build and share knowledge of the types of interventions which are most effective at preventing young people from being drawn in to crime and violence.

From intensive family therapy to street-based and school mentoring programmes, 30,000 young people between the ages of 10-14 will directly benefit from ground-breaking interventions that the Youth Endowment Fund will support, evaluate and where they are shown to have impact, grow.

The first grantees include organisations adapting well established programmes with good evidence from other parts of the world, as well as newer community projects testing more innovative approaches.

Further grant rounds will be announced in the coming months.

Sir Kevan Collins, Chair of the Youth Endowment Fund said:

“The safety and wellbeing of young people is our first priority. Our first round of grants is the start of a 10 year programme of work designed to build a better understanding of what works to prevent young people being drawn into crime and violence.”

Andy Ratcliffe from the Youth Endowment Fund said:

“Young people being drawn in to violent crime is an issue of huge concern for communities right across the country. The Youth Endowment Fund is a serious long-term commitment to tackling this problem. We’ll fund, support and evaluate front line interventions to start making a difference now, while building a knowledge base of what works, what doesn’t and where we need to focus our resources.”

Kit Malthouse,  Minister for Crime, Policing and the Fire Service, said:

“I’m delighted that these projects – the first to benefit from our £200 million Youth Endowment Fund administered by Impetus – will help to keep more than 30,000 vulnerable youngsters away from crime and violence.

“It’s vital that we give young people the skills and resilience they need to lead positive, safe and fulfilling lives.

“These projects are part of wide-ranging early intervention work alongside strong law enforcement, boosted by the extra 20,000 police we are recruiting.”