VRU - Mayor’s Youth Clubs Safety Programme

Indicative Contract Value: £4,300,000 excl VAT

Contract Duration: The contract will commence on 4 January 2027 with a 8 weeks mobilisation period. Delivery of the service will start on the 1 March 2027 and end on 31 March 2029 (‘Initial Period’).The Initial Period is 25 months and the Authority reserves the right to extend the contract for a further period of up to 12 months.

About The VRU

The London Violence Reduction Unit (VRU), hosted within the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC), pioneers a partnership-based public health approach to tackling violence rooted in prevention and early intervention. Since 2019, the VRU has invested in over 550,000 targeted interventions for young people across London.

The VRU invests in interventions at critical moments to keep young people safe in and out of school and at the key touchpoints that influence a young person’s journey; early years and families, education, positive opportunities, youth work, and communities and place.

In London, working in partnership, we bring together services at a local level to better coordinate delivery of prevention. We build and support effective partnerships with government, local authorities, the NHS, education services, and the police. Our strength is in connection to London’s diverse communities and young people. We’ve made embedding the voice of young people, practitioner and communities a critical part of our approach and decision-making.

You can read the VRU's strategy on our website and view the VRU’s outcomes framework, which measures our impact.

Project Background

The Mayor of London has increased investment in London’s Youth Clubs. Across 32 London boroughs and the City of London, a £30 million programme is funding youth clubs to extend and expand their existing offer into weekday evenings, weekends, and school holidays – when young people need safe spaces the most – and provide specialist support to those facing the greatest challenges.

This investment strengthens youth clubs as trusted community spaces – where connections are made, young people feel safe and valued, and opportunities are created, all with support from trusted adults. The programme will help community organisations reach more young people aged 14–24 years old and strengthen the quality and sustainability of their provision. It will do this by delivering an increased universal, open-access provision, and targeted specialised support for young people facing greater challenges.

For more information on this specific Youth Clubs programme, please see The Mayor's investment in youth clubs | London City Hall.

Safety is a core outcome of this Mayoral investment in youth clubs. Whilst it will provide universal youth provision alongside targeted support, some young people will require specialist interventions beyond the expertise and capacity of local delivery partners. Therefore, the Mayor has agreed additional investment to provide a London-wide Safety Offer to sit alongside the core Youth Clubs programme.

Drawing on its regional oversight and networks across London, alongside seven years of experience and expertise in commissioning impactful violence reduction programmes, the VRU is looking to commission a specialist organisation to deliver the Mayor’s Youth Clubs Safety Programme, which will provide additional capacity to connect with the Mayoral funded youth clubs across the 32 boroughs and the City of London to enhance safety of young people.

This programme is to include a network of specialised youth workers for each of the chosen youth clubs, with an expected minimum of 2:1 borough to youth worker ratio.

These specialist youth workers will provide targeted support for young people experiencing or at risk of violence and exploitation, offer support to enhance feelings of safety and boost connections and pathways into wider specialist services.

Description of the service

The aim of the Safety Programme will be to provide a regular, connected and meaningful presence across the Mayor's Youth Clubs programme to support children and young people who are affected by, or vulnerable to, violence and exploitation. Its purpose is to identify those at risk, provide direct support, make referrals into appropriate services and interventions and enhance feelings of safety.

The VRU will commission a specialist organisation to deliver the Safety Programme. This service will provide a network of specialist practitioners who will work alongside funded Youth Club partnerships, providing additional capacity and expertise to identify, engage, and support young people who face higher levels of risk. They will work with local youth club partnerships to build trusted relationships with young people, provide targeted interventions and support, and help young people access wider opportunities and services.

The programme is underpinned by evidence highlighting the important role youth clubs play in engaging children and young people who may be vulnerable to violence and exploitation, particularly those who may be less likely to engage with other forms of support. Research also highlights the importance of trusted adults, specialist youth work and effective safeguarding pathways in identifying need and connecting young people to timely support.

The service will contribute to the Violence Reduction Unit's public health approach to preventing and reducing violence in London, by preventing harm, identifying and addressing risk factors, and improving outcomes for children and young people.

The service is expected to:

• Provide specialised youth workers who build trusted relationships with children and young people who may be at risk of harm, supporting them to access the Mayoral youth club as a safe space.
• Provide a regular presence within the Mayoral youth clubs, working with youth club staff to identify young people with existing or potential risk and need for further support.
• Assess needs and vulnerabilities of children and young people identified as at risk, including those impacted by exploitation, extra familial harm, online and digital harms and domestic abuse.
• Provide targeted support and engagement, including 1-1 support for children and young people at greater risk of harm, holding casework where appropriate.
• Facilitate access to appropriate statutory, community and specialist support services through referrals and where needed building connections and support pathways, including connecting with families /parents /guardians as appropriate to ensure a whole family approach.
• Undertake contextual safeguarding assessments, working with the youth club providers and local authority partners, to assess contextual risk of youth club and surrounding environments, and deliver peer group contextual interventions where appropriate.
• Deliver workshops and group work aimed at increasing safety of young people attending the youth club and support awareness of risk, based on identified local concerns/need.
• Work collaboratively with mayoral youth clubs and wider statutory agencies to strengthen the connections and pathways between the many safety programmes held both by VCS and public authorities; and do so through a place-based approach.
• Strengthen local partnership responses to emerging safeguarding and violence-related issues through sharing understanding of emerging risks, contextual safeguarding and issues impacting children and young people in local areas.
• Operate as a pan-London network, share intelligence and effective practice across London through a connected practitioner network.
• Contribute to reductions in vulnerability and harm and improving outcomes for children and young people.
• Embed trauma-informed practice, lived experience and cultural sensitivity throughout service delivery.

Target Audience

The Mayor’s Investment in Youth Clubs Programme is a programme for children and young people, with delivery expected to expand the reach to the 14–24 years cohort. Whilst the programme does not prescribe a fixed age range, provision should have a strong focus on children and young people during adolescence, when exposure to violence, exploitation and associated risk can become more pronounced. This should not preclude earlier preventative activity with younger children where appropriate.

Scope of Delivery

The Provider will deliver a service with a network of specialist youth workers who will work across the 33 Mayoral funded Youth Clubs on a 2:1 youth club to youth worker ratio, to provide specialist and targeted support to children identified as at greater risk of harm.

This will include engaging young people within and around the youth clubs, building trusted relationships, providing tailored 1-1 support and interventions and facilitating appropriate referrals into local statutory, VCS or specialist support to address their risk, improve their safety and promote positive outcomes.

This will also include delivery of targeted workshops, drop-in sessions and other interventions at the Youth Clubs in response to local needs and emerging issues and to support the building of trusted relationships.

The service is expected to work closely with Mayoral Youth Club Providers, local authorities, safeguarding partnerships, education providers, health services, community organisations, borough violence reduction initiatives and other VRU tertiary programmes.

Timeframe and Budget

The total budget available for the Initial Period is up to £2,900,000 excluding VAT. The Authority may, at its discretion, exercise the option to extend the contract for a further 12 months, with an additional budget of up to £1,400,000 excluding VAT. This would bring the total potential contract value to £4,300,000 excluding VAT.