helping homeless youngsters for 30 years

Last Friday, the Birchwood Centre in Birch Green celebrated its 30th birthday. Better known as the West Lancashire Crisis Centre, the centre has helped hundreds of homeless young people over the years. I've known and supported the centre for a number of years and became a trustee a couple of years ago.

Below is the short speech I made on Friday which tells you a little more about the great work the centre does. The centre is a registered charity and if you would like to make a donation write to the Birchwood Centre, 64 Heversham, Birch Green, Skelmersdale, WN8 6QQ.

“The Crisis centre helped me so much. If it wasn't for the centre, I don't know what would of become of me . The staff and all the people who sorted me out – they helped me save myself.”

Those are the words of Nyssa, a young woman who used to live here at the Birchwood Centre. Nyssa sums up our work in three short sentences. She explains why I have been a long-term supporter of the work here, and why I am now a trustee.

They helped me save myself. At the Birchwood Centre, we support young people like Nyssa to unlock the potential that is within each of us. We provide the opportunities to homeless young people that their troubled home backgrounds have previously denied them.

Many of the young people we help appear on our doorstep, sometimes in crisis having been thrown out of home or left because of abuse. Sometimes they come to us through referrals from the council's housing department; social services or other agencies.

We are not a hostel as you can see. We work together to provide a stable, safe, homely family environment where young people can stay until they are ready to move on. This can be for up to 12 months. Nyssa had a troubled relationship at home with her mother and stepfather and she abused alcohol and drugs. In contrast, while she lived here, she came off drugs and learned the life skills to cook, eat and drink sensibly and healthily.

The tragedy is that collapsing family structures in society mean that too many young people face a dysfunctional, disturbing and sometimes brutal home life. Regrettably, demand for our places always outstrips supply.

We can provide ten young people with a home at any one time and have to make difficult decisions about who can come to live at the centre. Nevertheless, we interview and arrange help and continued support for each and every young person who comes to our door.

We ensure that our young people take up education and learning. Among current residents, one young man is training to be a gym instructor while one young woman is attending child care training and aspires to become a nurse. Our residents give of their time voluntarily – currently with British Heart Foundation and in the fields of animals in need; sports development and town twinning.

The health and wellbeing of the young people who live in the centre is of crucial importance. Life skills training is central to our work, ensuring that young people learn to budget and cook healthy meals. We have an arrangement whereby young people can access the local council leisure facilities free of charge and two of our residents have recently taken part in the coast to coast cycle ride. An in-house counselling service helps to maintain good mental and emotional well being.

We help our young people to develop into good citizens. Some are involved as mentors of young children who have come into contact with the criminal justice system, while the environment is promoted through the work young people have carried out on the gardens here at the centre, and we have now established an allotment growing vegetables.

The quality of our support and work is underlined by the results of our recent service level review which highly commended us for the level of support and breadth of opportunities we provide to young people.

We stay in touch with very many of the young people we have helped and former residents continue to visit the centre, often helping current residents. Some former residents have helped in today's preparations and are with us today.

None of this would be possible without the support of our partners and friends, and its pleasing to see so many of you here today. Our growth and development over 30 years has been made possible by the support of many agencies and funding bodies. Most recently a Big Lottery Fund grant has enabled us to provide the two move on flats that provide a half-way house as we prepare our young people for independent living.

This is simply one example of the help you have provided to this organization. We are very grateful. You too can be proud of what your support is helping young people to achieve here – because ultimately its not us – the partners, trustees and staff at the Birchwood Centre who bring about transformation, but the young people themselves.

Nyssa went on to move into a flat of her own, gain a job at a children's play centre, achieve a BTEC in IT and study for childcare qualifications. She formed a stable, positive relationship with a young man and relations with her family improved greatly so that they visited her regularly in her flat.

As Nyssa so perceptively said the Birchwood Centre did help her, but ultimately – as she said, "they helped me save myself."

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