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BACT WORKING WITH  PROJECT 'MET-TRACK'

Project 'METRACK' is the brainchild of Superintendent John Powell who is also an international athletics coach.  It was set up in 2005 to involve young offenders in sport and was piloted in that year in the Borough of Greenwich and supported by amongst others, the British Athletic Charitable Trust.

ANNUAL REPORT

 Introduction 

Met-Track was piloted in the London Borough of Bexley in 2005, expanded to Greenwich in 2006, and has developed since then, having launched in 22 London boroughs by the end of 2009.  The scheme’s mission statement has remained the same throughout: “Offering sport as the healthy alternative in life to those young people who might not necessarily otherwise get the opportunity.  It’s overarching aims, having been born within the Metropolitan Police Service, are to reduce youth offending and anti-social behaviour, and reduce the number of young people who fall victim to crime.

As the scheme developed, the Metropolitan Police Service supported it as the initial lead agency.  This took the form of appointing a temporary part-time member of staff to assist manage the scheme, donate a part of a senior manager’s role as ‘Scheme Director’, and ultimately ‘donate’ a significant sum of money from the youth programme which incorporated all youth diversion work around London.

In November 2008, funding was transferred to a specially allocated second BACT bank account, which has been used to manage the funds for the scheme ever since.  A memorandum of understanding was agreed and signed by BACT, which covered the way Met-Track would be run under its banner.  The Metropolitan Police Service became the lead partner as opposed to the lead agency from then on.

 Development

 Met-Track has vastly developed and diversified its activities during 2009.  While continuing to deliver coaching by current or former international athletes who are also qualified UKA level 2 (minimum) coaches, the scheme has recognised that being tied to a local athletics track is a significant constraint in attracting the interest of the audience it seeks to engage. 

On April 1st 2009 the Mayor of London attended the first non-track venue launch of Met-Track at Sidcup Rugby Club, where weekly squad sessions have taken place ever since.  And other boroughs with tracks in remote locations are now opting to change tac and take Met-Track to the community rather than wait for young people to come to us.

Barnet Borough are setting up local estate sessions, and Bromley have two schools academies being set up in Biggin Hill and Beckenham.  In all cases, extensive background partnership work continues to ensure that the scheme attracts those young people most likely to benefit.

Expansion and diversification

The biggest event by far during 2009 was the Met-Track website being emblazoned across every athlete’s competition bib at the Crystal palace Grand Prix.  This was financed by a generous donation of £23,000 from the residual Metropolitan Police Service youth contingency fund (now spent and extinct).  The deal was negotiated through Fast-track, and included over 300 free tickets for the event, a stand on the main concourse, and a full page advertisement in the programme.  Website hits sky-rocketed as a result, but sadly no potential sponsor has surfaced yet.  

The political agenda has seen young people emerge as a high profile target audience on a number of fronts.  Met-Track has therefore taken the lead in integrating delivery of police topics as well as sports coaching at sessions.  The Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA) have agreed for the scheme to lead on engaging young people around the thorny subject of stop-search.

This last year has seen many new features appear within Met-Track’s remit, and these are summarised here:

·         Talks have begun with America-based scheme ‘In The Arena’ (ITA) whose national scheme in the USA mirrors that of Met-Track.  The founder is very interested in a potential project that would see sports camps for challenged young people on both sides of the Atlantic;

·         The Met-Track website has had added a pro-forma that people can complete and submit direct to the Scheme Manager asking for details of their local scheme;

·         New leaflets have been circulated to every London police station custody office on active boroughs.  These will be issued to any young person arrested;

·         A partnership with the ‘Let Me Play’ organisation has seen both schemes share coaching resources at local events in London;

·         Establishing a partnership agreement with Her Majesty’s Prison Service (HMPS) has proved difficult this year.  The aim is to develop the concept of mentoring by serving prisoners of challenged young people taking part in Met-Track.  A meeting has now, however, been confirmed for early January.

·         Met-Track has engaged with the Home Office Independent Safeguarding Authority, ensuring compliance with the new Vetting and Barring Scheme for people working with young people or vulnerable adults;

·         Deputy London Mayor with the lead for youth issues, James Cleverley, visited a Met-Track squad in Waltham Forest on July 6th;

·         The quarterly scheme steering group meetings have been renamed ‘Performance Review Group’ meetings.  The focus has been shifted to performance, and boroughs whose schemes are slipping are require to present an action plan at such meetings stating what they intend to do to improve.

Finance

Met-Track is financed by local boroughs identifying available funding sources to support their own scheme each year.  Funds are managed within a separate budget line for each borough.  Central funding has supported the payment of the Scheme manager’s post, purchase of kit and equipment, supplementary coaching in schools, one-off promotional projects, and a significant amount of publicity material.

Income other than local borough support has been almost zero during 2009, and this is of significant concern.  England Athletics signed an agreement promising £14,000 in 2008-9 and 2009-10.  They have since reneged on this agreement, leaving the scheme severely constrained and with a bleak future without further support.

The Institute of Security Professionals raised just over £10,000 through Mr Simon Imbert, son of former MPS Commissioner, Lord Peter Imbert.  This was used to cover smart new corporate uniform for Met-Track coaches, and to launch the new Greenwich borough scheme in association with the Charlton Athletic Community Trust, at the latter’s training ground in Eltham.

An informal agreement with Adidas has seen a lot of kit obtained at cost price, although badging it up with the Security Professionals logo as well as the Met-Track insignia has proved costly.

Applications for funding the scheme have been made to a number of potential sources, not least ‘Prevent’ which is a Home Office scheme aimed at preventing radicalisation and extremism among young Londoners.  The result of a £65,000 bid is expected in January.  This would finance a new programme called ‘SCIP’ - Schools and Community Involvement Programme.  Met-Track would work alongside Police, and education leads to identify appropriate audiences in schools and deliver coaching within schools, adding focus on potential longer-term pathways for a more positive life.

Resourcing

Met-Track exists on a large amount of good will from partners, as tends to be the case with most schemes of its type.  A partnership agreement with Greenwich Leisure was signed in 2009, availing all their facilities in London free of charge to Met-Track events.   Other venues are generally made available free of charge, notably those run by Parkwood Leisure at Lewisham and Bexley.

The scheme need new coaches, and to date England Athletics have refused to set up a level ½ fast-track course for international athletes wanting to join the scheme.  This stance has recently been reversed, however, although it will be at Met-Track’s expense for venue and payment of a tutor over two days.  This will be set up for February.

The Scheme Manager’s post, currently held by Jason Hussain, was a fixed term contract to August 2010 with the MPS.  This has now been replaced with a permanent contract at 28 hours per week on the basis that Met-Track finds the money to pay for him until August 2010.  Without further income, this will strip the budget to the bone post-April 2010 when the current funding runs out.  

A new DVD has been produced to promote the scheme.  This features some of the old footage, but a lot of new material.  This had to be re-made after several key presenters ion the previous edition moved on from high profile roles. 

Looking ahead

The future of Met-Track lies entirely in the hands of potential funding sources.  If no significant source of funding is found to further support the scheme, then there will be no further development, and we will be entirely reliant on boroughs to support their local schemes.

Obviously funding relies on being able to prove performance value, and small incentives are offered to squad coaches to submit testimonies or case studies of success stories on their borough.  These are then added to local evaluation documents and the website to further underline the effectiveness of the scheme. 

Overall, Met-Track boasts very significant success on the majority of the boroughs it operates on, with one or two who have to re-engage with partners to reinvigorate the scheme locally.  There can be little doubt, however, that Met-Track continues to represent remarkable value for money, and makes no small contribution toward making London a safer place in which to live and work.

JOHN POWELL

Superintendent / Met-Track Scheme Director