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Sustainability and resourcing The reality is that such discussions are taking place after decades of austerity measures. The investment in youth services has been curtailed throughout the UK and remains inconsistent across different geographical areas. There is a need for a long-term welfare-based approach, as currently resourcing appears to just be responding to, or ‘firefighting’, the widespread and complex problems. There is a severe lack of early intervention and prevention responses that could better protect young people. Further resourcing should be made available for preventative programmes and youth clubs operating in local areas to help tackle structural issues, such as poverty and racism, which make children vulnerable to trafficking and exploitation. At the heart of the issues within policy and governance is the reality that politics works on a short-term cycle. This approach fails to tackle the intergenerational and structural drivers of harm that impact individuals and communities. To create longterm structural change there needs to be a better formalised structure to link policy and practice. Whilst cost-benefit analyses may lack in qualitative insights, investing in a child earlier ultimately reduces the figures we are seeing for police responses to missing children (the current cost quoted at the conference being £18,000 per child). Programmes which work well are reliant on key individuals invoking change, yet when they leave, some organisations can lose the appetite and the learning is quickly forgotten. Change needs to be embedded institutionally, which requires long-term investment and attention.
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