HASLEMERE Town Council will foot the bill for a six-month trial to pay for a new professional youth worker at the Wey Centre and is interviewing for the post.

The Haslemere Health Hub will run once a week on Thursdays from 4-7pm.

Surrey County Council cut the overall budget for youth work last year – and in Waverley by 11 per cent – leaving Haslemere the hardest hit town.

The county-owned centre in St Christopher’s Road remained open, but the cuts meant there were no professionals to run sessions and it relied on volunteers.

The town council will now fund the salary of a professional to pay for one three-hour session a week, with around £3,000 available for the rest of the financial year, while the county will take up the employer, training and management costs.

Leigh Middleton, youth work service manager for West Surrey, told a town council meeting last week Surrey had had to decide on which services to provide that were not a statutory requirement, resulting from last year’s across the board cutbacks.

Youth work provision was now “a fairly rare thing” across the country he said, “nevertheless 10,000 teenagers across the county need our support”.

Although Haslemere had not been identified as an area of high need, and was not given funding for an open access programme, one-to-one support was still available through the youth service.

Mr Middleton said: “Surrey bucks the trend in recognising the value of youth work and recognises there are young people who need our support, and who do attend youth clubs and talk to our youth workers.”

Professional youth work was now focused on areas of most need, and the service in Waverley had been reorganised, with the money spent around health and wellbeing projects concentrated in Farnham, Godalming and Cranleigh – the latter had adopted a similar model to Haslemere Town Council, now paying for two extra sessions a week, he said.

Typical problems encountered by the youth service were those of cyber bullying, exam stress, teenage pregnancy and self-harming.

Mayor Sahran Abeysundara, councillors Penny Bradley and Jean Arrick, all said they had heard anecdotal evidence of a rise in girls self-harming.

At an earlier town council meeting in July, councillors had agreed to support the town’s youth service, but the existing worker was not kept on over the summer break.

Mr Abeysundara said in a letter to The Herald this week: “This happy conclusion to many months of meetings with Surrey County Council, and the good people of Haslemere that work in the youth sector, means that there will be a ‘health hub’ at the Wey Centre, which will run a weekly session where young people can attend either alone or with friends.

“They will be able to access information, advice and guidance on all aspects of young people’s health, whether this be physical, intellectual, emotional or social. The session will also be a safe place for young people to discuss everyday pressures such as stress and sexuality.”

Last year, the Surrey youth service went from operating in 31 centres to a “hub” and “spoke” model targeting resources to the areas identified as being most in need.

In Waverley, Farnham was considered a “hub” and received five sessions per week, Godalming was a “spoke” and received four sessions per week, Cranleigh was also a “spoke” with one session, while Haslemere had no professionals.

• Questioning by the Lib Dem members on Surrey County Council revealed cuts to youth centres meant 254 hours a week of youth work is not being provided.

One centre is only open for one hour per week.

In a response to a question by Lib Dem leader Hazel Watson, it was revealed a total of 23 youth centres were open for only five or less hours per week.

The opposition also says a recent council report into the management of the youth service criticised the inadequate use of resources within the service, such as the lack of control of spending on purchase cards and the loss of IT equipment, with 13 “high priority” recommendations for action.

They are asking cabinet member for children and families Clare Curran to review the current arrangements, with a view to “extending opening hours of youth centres wherever possible”.

Mrs Watson said: “The council’s youth centres have a vital role to play in providing positive activities and support for young people to help overcome their problems, as well as a safe space for them to meet and socialise.

“Surrey’s youth centres need to be opened up with a drastic increase in their opening hours so young people can benefit. At the moment, many young people are left on the streets with nothing to do while council-owned youth centres are locked up.

“This doesn’t help our young people and is a complete waste of resources.

“The Tory administration did not spend £200k of the budget allocated for the youth service last year and have allowed IT equipment to go missing and resources, such as purchase cards, to be misused. The running of the service urgently needs to be improved so funding and resources are not wasted and are used for the benefit of Surrey’s young people.

“We need to invest in our youth services so our young people get the best start in life. We need centres with sufficient youth workers to provide a proper service, and that are open for enough hours a week to meet the demands of our young people.”