In 2012/13 this Committee had requested an annual presentation from the Youth Council giving an update on the developing Youth Council programme.
Members of the Youth Council will attend the meeting to outline:
(i) achievements from the last year;
(ii) the plans for the Youth Council for the coming year; and
(iii) new youth engagement and volunteer initiatives for 2014-15.
Minutes:
The Committee welcomed members of the Youth Council who were there at the request of the Committee to give their annual presentation, updating members on the work carried out over the last year and their developing Youth Council Programme.
Ten members of the Youth Council were in attendance. They noted that Youth Volunteering had been a big theme for them this year. They were passionate about encouraging young people to volunteer and were behind the Council’s Youth Volunteer Programme which was being taken up by all secondary schools in the District. Many of the young people who had participated in the Council’s volunteer days enjoyed it so much; they have asked to do more in their spare time. They also discovered that it was not so easy for young people to volunteer if they were under 18, there being all sort of issues with insurance, health and safety etc. This led them to produce a Young person’s Guide to Volunteering. The guide contained helpful tips and advice for young people interested in voluntary work. The guide was funded by successfully securing funding from the O2 Think Big Fund and the Jack Petchey Foundation. They also obtained funding from the Council, with Councillor Whitbread agreeing to fund enough guides for all pupils aged 14+ in the district.
They developed an inter-generational project to tackle the barrier between older residents and the young people. Another high profile event this year was their Youth Conference here in the Council Chamber, with 71 pupils from years 8, 9 and 10 representing ten secondary schools from in and around the Epping Forest District. They consulted about the main issues affecting the lives of local young people, possible solutions and also gathered innovative ideas on how to improve the local community. Additionally they were keen to promote the importance of local democracy to pupils. They identified three main concerns which were the negative stereotyping of young people; concerns about alcohol and drug misuse and thirdly, bullying. They asked the members to consider what they do to help the youth councillors lobby for these issues to be addressed. Their finding would be sent to the LSP and they hoped that the people holding the purse strings would take notice of what local young people were saying. Also at the Youth Conference they facilitated a debate on whether the voting age should be reduced to 16. The ‘Yes’ vote won.
The Youth Council had also contributed to 13 different consultations this year and they also have a representative on the Epping Forest Youth Strategy Group.
By far the most successful project this year had been the planning and delivery of their Celebration of Youth Groups event last month. One of their aims was to try and transform the Council Chamber into more of a youth friendly space. On the night they had entertainment from some fantastic local young artists and welcomed organisers and teenagers from 18 different youth groups across the district. They set up a market stalls made up of over 24 tables which provided information on funding opportunities for youth groups, training and information about volunteering. The purpose of this whole project was to identify all the youth clubs and activity groups in the Epping Forest district and to help promote them. They noted that the majority of youth groups were now provided by Third Sector organisations supported by the District Council. Having approached the Leader of the Council they were delighted to be given a pot of money that had enabled them to allocate each of the groups that came along on the night a small sum of money towards the running of their group.
As they were now in their last year of office, the Youth Councillors were committed to ensuring the next cohort of Youth Councillors was the best it could be, so their main focus in the coming months was to promote the forthcoming Youth Council elections. Candidate Nomination Packs have already been produced and these were now being distributed. There will also be additional places for Independent Youth Councillors who live in the District but who go to school or college outside the area. The elections will be held in schools over a two week period from Monday 10th March.
Various members of the Committee thanked the Youth Councillors for their presentation and good work that they were doing.
Councillor Philip asked how they communicated their various events and news to children who lived in the district but who went to school outside the district. He was told that they sent out leaflets to the various schools. They also have a distribution list and a database which enabled them to target various groups.
Councillor Murray said he was glad that they now had secure funding from the council. He noted that the Celebration of Youth groups was a very good event which challenged our negative stereotypes on youths.
Councillor Girling was impressed with their work and asked how they contributed to the Essex Youth Consultation exercise. The youth councillors replied that they did a lot of work on the Youth Assembly side as they were represented on it.
The Assistant to the Chief Executive, Mr Willett asked what had the Youth Council done to follow up on their mandate to lower the voting age. The Youth Councillors noted that they were represented on the Youth Parliament where they debated the lowering of the voting age and there was now a national campaign that they were running on this subject.
The Chairman thanked the Youth Councillors for their informative and interesting presentation and wished them well for the future.