Tens of thousands of young people across England will soon benefit from better access to mental health support, employment opportunities and crime prevention services - all working together to offer seamless support - as the government announces the expansion of its Young Futures Hubs programme today.
Young Futures Hubs will help young people tackle some of the biggest challenges they face today, from poor mental health and unemployment, to serious violence, News Cover reports, citing the UK government's official website.
Alongside providing open access to sports, creative activities and trusted youth workers, each hub will bring together mental health support, skills and training, routes into employment, and crime prevention. It will ensure that young people aged 10 to 18 (up to 25 for those with SEND) can receive seamless, holistic support without having to repeat their story to a different service every time they visit.
Today’s announcement made by Lisa Nandy, Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, confirms that local authorities in England will establish 42 new hubs. This builds on the 8 early adopter hubs already up and running. They will each establish a Young Futures Hub, and receive further support through the Local Youth Transformation programme to strengthen leadership, train their workforce and build lasting local partnerships to deliver high quality youth services in their area.
The programme is a key part of the government’s National Youth Strategy, Youth Matters, launched by Lisa Nandy in December 2025 and co-produced with 14,000 young people through a landmark ‘State of the Nation’ survey.
The survey highlighted that many young people have been left without access to safe, supportive environments or a community to belong to, while reliance on online interaction has grown in the absence of face-to-face opportunities. In response the National Youth Strategy set out how young people will benefit from over £500 million of government investment, with an ambitious delivery plan to rebuild youth services over the next decade. The move is designed to hand power back to local communities, and allow young people to design services around the skills and opportunities they need to shape their futures.
