The family man who is making a difference
The Primrose Valley man who supports children both at work and at home
As the manager of an acclaimed service supporting some of North Yorkshire’s most vulnerable children, former soldier James Cliffe is all too aware how easy it is for young people without aspirations to give up hope. His children’s home, No Wrong Door, with bases in Scarborough and Harrogate, aims to build up relationships with young people aged 12 to 25, many of whom are in care or on the edge of care.
But the 34-year-old has gone one step further than most in his efforts to give the children in his care a good life, and has taken several of them into his own family.
The rugby coach and exprison officer lives in Primrose Valley with his wife Sarah, a teacher, their birth sons Jack, eight, and Sam, six, and four foster sons, James, 19, and Daniel, 17, who are brothers; Dan, 18 and Kyle, 16, who have come through the No Wrong Door service.
The couple took the brothers in when their previous foster carer retired, with older brother James now studying for a degree in nursing.
“They are both incredible young men and doing well and growing as confident adults”, said Mr Cliffe.
Describing 18-year-old foster son Dan, he said: “He got into trouble because he needed to eat and stole food and things like that. Dan was 16 and our outreach team was doing a lot of in-depth work with him but he wasn’t ready to live by himself and on paper he would have been quite a hard child to
‘They are incredible young men’ James Cliffe Manager, dad and foster parent
place. But we knew what we’d got and that was a lovely lad who would fit in with our family and he does fit in with our family.
“Dan’s crazy about rugby and we’d been picking him up at the weekend and giving him lunch as a family and taking him to Scarborough Rugby Club so we decided to foster him.
“He is a very hands-on young man and is training in horticulture and landscaping and that
suits him well – he loves it and works hard.”
After a difficult childhood, Dan admits that if it wasn’t for the couple and the No Wrong Door service, he could be in prison.
“James is an incredible man. He’s just always there for you,” he said. “You don’t cross him, you know where you stand with him, but he’d do anything for you.”
No Wrong Door was created by North Yorkshire County Council and serves the county’s most vulnerable children and young people through two hubs.
In January it was visited by Education Secretary Justine Greening, who said afterwards she was impressed by the passion of all involved.
Mr Cliffe commands a team of hub workers who have both residential and outreach duties; a speech and language therapist; a life coach who is a clinical psychologist; a police liaison officer and specialist foster parents.
Ofsted has rated the No Wrong Door service as outstanding in every category and James as “an outstanding role model for staff, young people and other professionals”.
It said: “Young people are left in no doubt that the registered manager and staff will go all out to help them.”
Mr Cliffe came back to North Yorkshire to work in children’s social care after being a prison officer in Bristol. He was brought up in Scarborough by parents who themselves fostered large numbers of children.
“A lot of the kids who come to us through No Wrong Door have given up hope”, said James.
“When you come from a family background where there is substance misuse or alcohol dependency and poor mental health, the future is too unknown, you don’t have aspirations.
“Our job is to build up relationships and build up their confidenceandwehaveawhole team dedicated to that, doing whatever is necessary to keep them safe and give them a future.”