OXFORDSHIRE County Council’s new youth hubs opened their doors yesterday, as funding came to an end for 13 youth centres around the county.

Seven new early intervention hubs, focused on tackling problems including drug and alcohol abuse, unemployment, and truancy, will now form the core of the service, alongside satellite centres at Blackbird Leys, Rose Hill, Barton and Kidlington.

Thirteen others will now rely on community projects to keep them open.

But the Oxford Mail can reveal no youth work will take place at the council-funded centres until Monday, September 12, while staff adapt to the new structure.

City councillor Antonia Bance said not enough information had been given to young people or their families.

She said: “There is still no information about what they are going to provide.

“At no point has the county council given any assurance about what will be provided at a hub, for how many hours, and for how many people. It is completely unclear. There has been no communication with councillors, young people, or their families.”

She added: “It is youth work, alongside the police, that has brought down the crime rate in areas like Rose Hill.

“Yet when people turned up to go to the youth centre on Wednesday evening, it was closed.”

Of the 13 youth centres that will no longer be run by the council, four have yet to have any community rescue packages finalised to save them. They are in Henley, Wallingford, Chilten Edge and Thame.

The county councillor responsible for the service, Louise Chapman said: “With the four left, we are still working on communities to try to find solutions. For the others, some are in place so there won’t be any delay in youth work continuing. Elsewhere, there may will be some delays.”

And she said ‘Big Society’ initiatives meant the county could get more youth clubs than before the cuts.

She said: “In Oxfordshire, we may be in a better position than we were before.

“The new hubs will take a while to be embedded fully, but we will have the early intervention service targeting the most vulnerable young people, which will be a major factor for us.”

Six of the seven new early intervention hubs – Banbury, Bicester, Didcot, Abingdon, East Oxford and Littlemore – opened yesterday, with major building work in Witney to be complete in January.

They will hold open days in October to explain their new role.

The Thame and Chiltern Edge buildings are on school sites, but no agreement to continue their operations has been reached, while Henley Youth Club operates from a building not owned by the county council.

In Wallingford, plans have been drawn up for the town council and children’s charity Pact to buy an abandoned Pentecostal Church in Wigod Way to convert into a youth centre.

The town council’s recruitment of a new youth worker will not be completed until October.