Just grand – Mentors scheme launched

Published: 18 June 2010
by JOSH LOEB

CONSERVATIVE peer Lord Freud paid tribute to a remarkable relative this week – not his great-grandfather Sigmund Freud, father of psychoanalysis, but his Danish grandfather, who he liked to call his “bedst far” (best father).

He was speaking at the launch of Grandmentors, a project being piloted in Islington and Hackney which matches older mentors with teenagers with the aim of improving their life prospects.

He spoke alongside his boss in the Department for Work and Pensions, former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith, at the launch in the House of Lords on Monday. 

Lord Freud has contributed £200,000 of his own money towards starting up Grandmentors. He said: “There is a huge potential army of older people who want to give something back to society. That means there is a relatively modest cost involved.

“Research is at the heart of this project. We want to establish that this is an approach that does bring real value to society and that there is a cost-benefit analysis.” 

If successful in Islington, Grand­mentors may be rolled out elsewhere in the country.

Joe, 16, a City of London Academy pupil who lives on the Packington estate near Upper Street, said the scheme had helped him to find out about work opportunities. 

“I want to learn a trade and live my life,” he said. “Mum and dad also think it’s great to have someone extra to help me out.”  

Mr Duncan Smith, the new Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, said: “I must say that as I walked into the department the other day, to be told I now have to oversee a budget of £160bn  and 120,000 people, I was figuring out who the hell do I ring for advice and some mentoring. I could have done with some I must say.”