Where no YMCA shows
This is a map, not a service, and nobody here can arrange a place or a referral. If you have nowhere safe to stay tonight, contact your local council: its housing team, or children’s services if you are under 18. The YMCAs under Find a YMCA are where many young people start.
In 70 of the 174 counties and unitary authorities of England and Wales, neither record shows a YMCA. 1,314,715 young people aged 13 to 19 live in them. Before either sentence is quoted anywhere, read the next one.
It does not mean young people there have no youth service. Councils, schools, other charities and faith groups all run youth work, and neither record here would show them. What it means is narrow: no location on YMCA England & Wales’s public list gives an address there, and no YMCA charity records the area as one it works in. Both records can miss a YMCA that is really there.
How presence was counted
- An address — a YMCA on the list gives one in the area: 60 areas.
- The register — a YMCA charity tells the Charity Commission it operates there: 97 areas.
Either one counts. A charity that records a whole region or country is not counted as present in any one area of it, because a charity that says it works everywhere says nothing about a particular place.
Every area where neither record shows a YMCA
Largest number of young people first. Spending is what the council reported for 2024-25. Councils file youth work under different headings, and a council reporting little or nothing here may pay for youth work from another budget line; this shows the line, not the service.
| Area | Young people aged 13–19 | Council spending on services for young people, 2024-25 | Real-terms change since 2015-16 | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Warwickshire | 45,642 | £2.0m | -34.0% | |
| Buckinghamshire | 45,224 | £371,864 | -94.8% | |
| Liverpool | 43,808 | £2.6m | -52.2% | |
| Kirklees | 38,121 | £2.1m | -76.6% | |
| Coventry | 34,033 | £1.4m | -57.5% | |
| Croydon | 32,493 | £4.6m | 22.7% | |
| Newham | 31,416 | £6.0m | 462.9% | |
| Ealing | 31,221 | £2.4m | -10.9% | |
| Enfield | 30,882 | £1.5m | -70.2% | |
| Brent | 28,954 | £2.2m | -25.7% | |
| Redbridge | 27,811 | £1.6m | -33.1% | |
| Cheshire West and Chester | 26,815 | £1.8m | 18.3% | |
| Bolton | 26,471 | £2.1m | -64.0% | |
| Hillingdon | 26,428 | £3.5m | 67.5% | |
| Bromley | 25,303 | £911,729 | 17.2% | |
| Tower Hamlets | 25,226 | £4.5m | -21.4% | |
| Shropshire | 23,827 | £237,022 | -92.1% | |
| Hounslow | 23,507 | £1.6m | -60.3% | |
| Oldham | 23,458 | £2.7m | -52.0% | |
| Medway | 23,261 | £5.2m | 214.0% | |
| South Gloucestershire | 22,723 | £1.3m | -52.4% | |
| Southwark | 22,567 | £3.0m | -21.9% | |
| Lewisham | 22,462 | £2.5m | -34.9% | |
| Stockport | 21,808 | £1.6m | -48.4% | |
| Luton | 21,721 | £1.1m | -44.2% | |
| Central Bedfordshire | 21,711 | £2.8m | -34.8% | |
| Salford | 21,685 | £2.3m | 17.7% | |
| Harrow | 21,668 | £1.7m | -60.3% | |
| Waltham Forest | 21,571 | £3.7m | 62.1% | |
| Lambeth | 21,144 | £3.2m | -49.1% | |
| Sefton | 20,046 | £1.1m | -41.8% | |
| Rochdale | 19,655 | £840,758 | -69.3% | |
| Trafford | 19,550 | £1.4m | 379.7% | |
| York | 19,315 | £350,177 | -84.8% | |
| Wandsworth | 19,145 | – | not comparable | |
| Rhondda Cynon Taff | 19,052 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Swindon | 18,011 | £319,071 | -74.8% | |
| Solihull | 17,239 | £323,586 | -86.7% | |
| Sutton | 16,850 | £244,890 | -87.7% | Named by “YMCA Sutton Coldfield” |
| Bury | 16,268 | £1.5m | 9.1% | |
| Merton | 15,862 | £2.8m | -8.3% | |
| Richmond upon Thames | 15,193 | £4.4m | 62.0% | |
| Bedford | 14,940 | £1.5m | 225.6% | |
| Wokingham | 14,878 | £117,808 | -66.5% | |
| Carmarthenshire | 14,387 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Westminster | 14,159 | £815,979 | -77.4% | |
| Windsor and Maidenhead | 13,326 | £537,708 | -67.3% | |
| Herefordshire, County of | 13,048 | £0 | -100.0% | |
| Newport | 12,538 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Knowsley | 12,032 | £1.2m | -33.4% | |
| Flintshire | 11,940 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Hammersmith and Fulham | 11,712 | £878,697 | -54.5% | |
| Wrexham | 10,489 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Blackpool | 10,468 | £2.0m | 127.9% | |
| Halton | 10,404 | £0 | -100.0% | |
| Bracknell Forest | 10,355 | £1.5m | -20.7% | |
| Gwynedd | 9,627 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Powys | 9,299 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Kensington and Chelsea | 9,253 | £1.6m | -74.6% | |
| Pembrokeshire | 9,115 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Conwy | 7,982 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Denbighshire | 7,393 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Torfaen | 7,079 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Monmouthshire | 6,663 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Ceredigion | 6,142 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Isle of Anglesey | 4,972 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Blaenau Gwent | 4,740 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Merthyr Tydfil | 4,548 | – | – | Wales — see below |
| Rutland | 3,984 | £327,338 | -35.5% | |
| Isles of Scilly | 95 | £20,513 | -88.0% |
Wales
A YMCA shows in 6 of Wales’s 22 areas, where 41.1% of Welsh young people aged 13 to 19 live. Welsh councils report their spending to the Welsh Government, so Wales is in every count here except the spending and the deprivation comparison.
What else to know
- The count of young people is from census day, 21 March 2021. The spending is from 2024-25. Both are the latest there are.
- Some councils cannot be compared across the years. Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset were redrawn in 2019, and North and West Northamptonshire were one county until 2021. Their spending is in the totals for England, but no change is shown for them alone.
- Area figures add up to slightly more or less than the national figure (4,812,591 against 4,812,590), because the statistics office adjusts small numbers to protect people’s privacy.