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Problem families scheme launched by David Cameron

[gallery] Prime Minister David Cameron was in Oldbury today to announce plans to set up a national network of "trouble-shooters" to tackle the country's hard core of 120,000 problem families.

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Prime Minister David Cameron was in Oldbury today to announce plans to set up a national network of "trouble-shooters" to tackle the country's hard core of 120,000 problem families.

Councils in the West Midlands were today given two months to identify thousands of problem families as part of a £448m project to tackle neighbours from hell.

He revealed that there were 1,000 such families in Sandwell living on benefits and costing the tax payer more than £75,000 a year each. The scheme will see individuals responsible for each family.

They will go into homes in the morning, making sure children are going to school, parents are able to work and insuring drug and alcohol addicts get treatment.

He said the funding would lead to greater savings by tackling the estimated £9bn a year that troubled families cost nationally.

Speaking at the Sandwell Christian Centre today Mr Cameron said: "Families see the system as faceless, intrusive and unhelpful.

"We can only act if we know where troubled families live.

"By February we want local authorities to identify who troubled families are, where they live and the services they use.

"The next step is to get in there to help."

Mr Cameron said, however, that councils would have to fund 60 percent of the costs themselves.

It comes despite huge cuts in local government funding.

But the Prime Minister said he was determined to "get to grips" with the problems that families face and that the project would "make a real difference in homes and neighbourhoods across the city".

Mr Cameron added: "We're not prescribing a single response. But we are demanding results from councils in return for support. For many of the most troubled families, there will be a family worker – a single point of contact for the first time for particular families."

Dudley South Conservative MP Chris Kelly was in the audience today and said: "I am very much looking forward to seeing this begin in Dudley."

However West Bromwich East MP Tom Watson said: "Never mind problem families, what about the ordinary decent families who have to see their children attend dilapidated schools because David Cameron cut the Building Schools of the Future programme?"

By Daniel Wainwright

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