National Youth Work Strategy
The next item of business is a debate on motion S4M-09915, in the name of Aileen Campbell, on the national youth work strategy, “Our ambitions for improving the life chances of young people in Scotland”.
The Presiding Officers can be fairly generous in relation to the amount of time that members take. If members wish to take interventions, we will support them in doing so by ensuring that they get the time back.
14:12
Today’s debate is primarily about welcoming the publication of the national youth work strategy. Importantly, it also gives us an opportunity to recognise and celebrate the contribution that youth work and community learning and development make to young people’s lives and to meeting the Scottish Government’s broader aim of making Scotland the best place in the world to grow up in.
The strategy, which is called, “Our ambitions for improving the life chances of young people in Scotland”, was developed in deep collaboration and partnership with YouthLink Scotland and Education Scotland, in particular, but its development also involved input from a variety of youth work organisations the length and breadth of Scotland. That process culminated in the strategy’s publication on 3 April. I put on record my thanks to all those who worked tirelessly to develop the strategy, who will have a key role to play in shaping and delivering its implementation.
We developed a strategy because, as a Government, we attach great value to the significant contribution that youth work and community learning and development make in helping us to realise our ambition and our vision for our country: we want to improve outcomes and to build a nation that is full of opportunity and aspiration for our young people.
Youth work is going on everywhere. Translated into real life, that means that youth work and community learning and development are under way across all our communities, in almost every village, town and city. Such work is helping young people to make positive choices as they emerge into adulthood and is building their confidence, their skills and their capacity for further learning and employability. It is empowering young people to take control of their lives by building on their assets, helping them to deal with the challenges and the adverse circumstances that they can often face in their lives, and enabling them to build on what is positive to make their lives better.
All that is being delivered thanks to the talents and skills of thousands of youth workers, many of whom are volunteers who give up their time to support and nurture our young people. Indeed, some of those volunteers are young people themselves. By helping their peers to be all that they can be, they are giving back to their communities.
I have said many times before, but it is well worth repeating, that youth work represents the ultimate form of preventative spend. As Professor Howard Sercombe suggests, it provides the scaffolding of support for young people as they prepare to enter the adult world and it allows that entry to be positive and fulfilling.
One of the fantastic parts of my post is getting to see examples of youth work in action up and down the country. Over the past few months, I have been privileged to attend a number of youth work projects and events across the country. I have seen real-life examples that better capture the importance of youth work and its transformative abilities.
I have been impressed and humbled by the commitment, passion and dedication that many youth workers show. Each is motivated by the desire to improve our young people’s wellbeing and life chances. I acknowledge that Kezia Dugdale’s amendment tries to recognise that in the debate.
Earlier today, I visited the green shoots programme, which works with young people in East Lothian. On top of meeting modern apprentices, seeing primary 7s building dens and doing environmental art, and clearing ditches with a young guy called Anthony, we announced that YouthLink Scotland will administer more than £2 million of cashback for communities funding to support the life-changing work that youth work delivers through organisations across Scotland. There is a lovely, nice and neat narrative to the cashback scheme. It seizes the proceeds of crime and reinvests them in opportunities for our young people.
At the recent youth work awards, the stories of all the finalists were an inspiration. Many people do tireless work to support our young people. Youth work includes intergenerational work, volunteering, music, arts and drama—the variety that is on offer is phenomenal. It is right to celebrate youth work at YouthLink’s annual awards.
At the 25th anniversary celebration of LGBT Youth Scotland, I listened to young people’s emotional stories about how LGBT youth workers had positively impacted on their lives over the years and provided them with the support and the nurture that they required when coming out or just looking for a helping hand to cope.
I am aware of the breadth of activities for young people in my constituency. I was pleased to see in this weekend’s Sunday Herald a positive story about the scouting movement, whose membership numbers and diversity are growing. If members have not had a chance to read that article, I thoroughly recommend that they do.
I did not read the Sunday Herald this week.
Ken Macintosh seems to have missed the Sunday Herald; I have no idea how he could have done that. I think that the publication was sold out across the country, which I am sure was because of the scouting article that he—unfortunately—missed.
I have had various conversations with scout groups in my constituency of Orkney. They are active and they are grateful for the funding that is available, but most of it concentrates on providing equipment and less is available for travel costs, which can be considerable in getting from Orkney to national events in the central belt or going overseas to meet scout groups from across Europe. Can the Government look at opportunities for expanding access to such events to scouts in my constituency?
We support the uniformed groups through the strategic funding partnerships. I am happy to meet Liam McArthur to discuss the issue that he raises for groups in his constituency.
The minister mentioned strategic funding partnerships. Will she comment on the funding arrangements for youth work? I understand that, in 2013, she operated two pots of money, which caused some confusion in the sector. Does she have any plans to bring together those pots in the next financial year?
We have held a number of events to support groups further, whether they are funded through the third sector early intervention fund or through the strategic funding partnerships. Those events have been welcomed by groups that receive funding from both sources. We will have a period of review, and the funds include a period of self-evaluation of support. We will listen carefully to the groups that have been involved in both funding mechanisms.
In my constituency, Biggar Youth Project, the universal connections programme and the Duke of Edinburgh’s award scheme are some of the services that are delivered in a positive way to contribute to young people’s wellbeing, confidence and life chances.
At the launch of the youth strategy, we heard articulate and confident young people talk about how they had been supported through youth work. One young man described how his confidence had grown, how he had avoided a negative path and how he now wanted to work in youth work. A girl described how her confidence had increased through being a member of the guides. The words that she used when she told us that she joined the guides as a girl and would leave as a woman were incredibly powerful.
The common thread in all the young people’s stories that I heard that day and have witnessed through my visits is that youth work provides young people with opportunities to be with friends and peers and to have fun while learning and being active. Whatever the activity, the purpose of youth work is to build young people’s self-esteem, confidence and sense of wellbeing; to develop their ability to manage relationships; to help them to learn new skills and solve problems; and to improve their life chances. In thousands of instances, young people themselves are youth work volunteers who take the lead, think creatively and support their peers to be all that they can be and make positive life choices.
Through our funding for youth work and community learning and development, we have invested tens of millions of pounds in projects and facilities for young people and the communities in which they live. We also continue to work with the youth work sector to deliver programmes such as active girls, stand up to sectarianism and no knives, better lives, and activity agreements. Through those projects, the Government seeks to empower young people as well as improve their life chances and wellbeing. That all fits with our aim of recognising, respecting and promoting children’s rights and of getting it right for every child.
Youth work at its best recognises young people as equal partners in a learning process. It links them to their communities and engages them in local and national activities and decision-making processes. It helps young people to navigate the challenges of adolescence and recognises that some young people might need more help than others at particular times in their lives. Ultimately, youth work empowers young people, widens their horizons and builds their resilience and capacity to make the transition into further learning.
To return to the theme of partnership working, the Christie commission challenged Government to deliver services that people and communities deserve. It challenged us to do so by working in partnership and with mutual respect. The development of the strategy is very much in keeping with the Christie principles. It is very easy to talk about partnership working; it is much harder to work in partnership effectively. Quite simply, the youth work strategy would not have been possible without everyone involved having a shared commitment to making it a reality. That includes the strategic partners, YouthLink Scotland, the Government, which facilitated the national discussions that took place throughout the country, and the hundreds of people who are involved in voluntary and third sector organisations and who took part in the national discussion that shaped the final strategy document.
I am pleased that the youth work strategy has been very well received across the sector. The feedback from the workshops and discussions that took place across the country has been incredibly positive.
However, the launch is only the beginning. In a sense, the real work starts now; indeed, it has already started. Our ambitions for young people in Scotland are to
“Put young people at the heart of policy ... Recognise the value of youth work ... Build workforce capacity ... Ensure we measure our impact”
and
“Ensure Scotland is the best place to be young and grow up in”.
To realise those ambitions, YouthLink Scotland, working in partnership with Education Scotland, the Government and key partners, including the Standards Council for Community Learning and Development for Scotland, will implement the action plan that underpins the strategy, which includes raising the profile and promoting the benefits of youth work; developing strategies in which young people’s voices are heard and listened to; developing the youth work workforce to build a sustainable learning culture; and improving performance to demonstrate more effectively how youth work improves young people’s wellbeing and life chances.
There is a lot to do, but, together, we can properly articulate the importance of the sector and illustrate the benefits that it brings not only to young people but to wider society, our communities and, of course, our country.
Again, I thank everyone who has been involved in the strategy’s development, and I look forward to continuing the open relationship. I look forward to working with each and every MSP across the chamber—I know that members equally value the contribution of youth work—to drive further forward our youth work and our youth workers to help more young people to emerge into adulthood with confidence and the ability to contribute to the future of our country.
I move,
That the Parliament recognises the contribution of youth work and community learning and development to making Scotland the best place to grow up and learn; agrees that early intervention assists young people in making positive choices in their lives; acknowledges the publication of the new national youth work strategy, Our ambitions for improving the life chances of young people in Scotland, and endorses the collaborative and partnership approach at the heart of the youth work strategy and its implementation plan in taking forward youth work in Scotland.
14:23
I welcome the strategy, the opportunity to debate it and the cash announcement from the minister. That is three welcomes right at the outset. We are looking forward to a positive afternoon.
I chair the cross-party group on children and young people with Marco Biagi, and we are very reliant on the help and support of YouthLink Scotland to operate the group’s secretariat. The advantage of having YouthLink so involved in that work is that that enables us to get youth work’s perspective on the whole education and children and young people agenda at all stages. I make that important point to get across to the minister the fact that perhaps the youth work sector’s contribution to public policy does not always get the recognition that it deserves. At least today, we can mark that contribution ourselves.
What does youth work mean? What does it deliver? What does it do? It delivers four things: skills, self-confidence, resilience and a sense of community. Every day, I see all those in practice in the part of east Edinburgh where I live, such as at the youth bus group. Known locally in Lochend and Restalrig as the buzz, it is a mobile youth work bus that goes around different parts of the east of Edinburgh. I encourage the minister to see its work, because there is a direct correlation between where the youth bus is and a dip in antisocial behaviour calls to the police—wherever the youth bus is, whether it is in Lochend, Restalrig or other parts of the east end of Edinburgh, calls to the police dip because young people are actively engaged. The bus provides not only Xboxes and computer games, but employability support, with young people helped to develop their CVs, and access to sexual health advice and a number of other services that I will come on to shortly.
I move on to discuss projects elsewhere in the east end of Edinburgh. The work of kids in the street, which is a project that is run by Kevin Finlay and the team in Craigmillar, is worthy of recognition. When they take out their mobile football unit, they provide other services to the community at the same time. Sport plays a particularly valuable role in youth work—I am sure that we will hear more about that from Liz Smith.
Those are just two examples of the tremendous dedication that the staff and volunteers who are involved in youth work show every day—hence the wording of the Labour amendment, which I sense the minister is looking to accept.
Yes, I am.
That is good to hear; I thank the minister for that.
It is worth recognising that volunteers—obviously—but staff, in particular, are not motivated by pay but by a much higher reward. The individuals I know in the east end of Edinburgh have a driving passion for their community, but they also see the good in every single young person—they see that young people have the ability to fulfil their potential with help and support. We underestimate youth workers’ contribution to our communities at our peril.
I say that youth workers are not motivated by money, but that does not mean that we should disregard pay as an issue. I have come across a lot of youth workers who are very reliant on sessional pay, but who do not know how many hours they will get from one week to the next and who do not have a tremendous amount of job security, with much of their work tied to the funding bids on which youth work organisations rely. That short-term funding can come from multiple sources, which means that even the smallest organisations need the brightest of accountants and the best people working on the books to ensure that they get enough money, year in, year out.
This takes me back a bit, but when I was involved in such work, I recall that it was possible for those involved to spend far too much of their time raising money. Indeed, that could almost become a separate activity at the cost of working with the youngsters. Has anything changed in the past few years?
Progress has been made, but not enough. Charities and third sector organisations right across different policy portfolios look to the Government to address the funding challenges and to find mechanisms through which long-term funding can be provided. Increasingly, I hear people talk about wanting not three-year but five-year funding, so that they have at least one year in the middle when they can get on with the business that they should be doing, rather than setting up or closing down accounts. All Government ministers face the challenge of providing more sustainable funding options for groups that do such critical work.
The Government’s motion focuses on positive choices, which is the issue that I will focus on during my remaining time. Liam McArthur mentioned the scouts, and I will talk about the particular campaigning work that the girl guides have done over the past couple of years. The guides have developed a campaigning badge and are doing some tremendous work on the no more page 3 campaign. I am particularly drawn to their work on body confidence and their body confidence revolution.
A recent girl guides attitude survey pointed to the fact that one in five primary school kids has been on a diet; 38 per cent of all 11 to 21-year-olds have skipped a meal to lose weight; and 87 per cent of young women think that they are judged more on their looks than on their abilities. We must recognise the work that youth work, the girl guides and other organisations play in tackling those endemic issues by promoting a better sense of wellbeing and a more positive body image outlook. That would go a long way towards addressing our country’s body image crisis.
Sexual health is another part of that agenda and I encourage the minister to look very carefully at the relationship between youth work and sexual health services. I am quite disturbed by what is happening in Edinburgh, where dedicated sexual health services for young people are being removed—or at least the funding for them is being removed by the national health service because it is looking to mainstream those services into its core services. I think that, if we are not careful, that will put young people off accessing sexual health services and advice, which might lead to an increase in sexually transmitted infection.
We need to recognise the importance of dedicated services for young people. As I said, youth work services often integrate sexual health services into all the work that they do. I ask the minister to consider how she and her Government department can work with the health department to ensure that young people can access the services that they need.
Organisations such as Caledonia Youth also receive money to provide sex education in schools. That money is under threat as local authorities look to save the cash and deliver the work themselves. I do not know whether the minister remembers her experience of sex education in school—I think that getting it from the teacher was not the greatest thing and it is probably better if someone from outwith the school environment who has the expertise comes in to talk about sex and relationships in the way that young people do. If such services were lost, they would be sorely missed. I encourage the minister to look at trends in that direction.
We need to be careful that we do not turn people off accessing sexual health services. We must value the work that youth work plays in that regard, because ultimately it is the duty of youth workers to minimise risk-taking behaviour.
I see the Presiding Officer giving me the nod, so I will keep talking.
Although Caledonia Youth is losing out on core services in health and in education, it continues to do important work in our prisons. I do not know whether the minister is aware of the education work that it does in a number of prisons across the country. It provides one-to-one dedicated advice for young people who have experience of the criminal justice system. Such intensive work can substantially change lives.
Will the member give way?
Caledonia Youth would like to roll that work out; perhaps the minister can comment on that.
I am not aware of the specifics, but I am interested in considering what more we can do for young people who are in prison. The work on parenting that Families Outside, the Scottish Pre-school Play Association and others have done has had similar outcomes, in that it has built confidence and ensured that when people leave prison they can lead much more positive lives and are much less likely to go back to prison. Such work can end the vicious cycle of reoffending.
I agree entirely with the minister on that. It is about the transition to adulthood and the roles and responsibilities that go with it, whether we are talking about sexual health, parenting or drug taking and other risky behaviour, all of which can be affected if the right approach is taken. I repeat my call to the minister to work with her colleagues in justice, health and other departments to ensure that the approach is joined up.
Members will hear from three Labour members this afternoon. Graeme Pearson will talk more about youth work and the link with youth justice; Ken Macintosh will ask hard questions about the strategy and the degree to which there is a framework for monitoring and evaluation; and Siobhan McMahon will ask hard questions about whether the money matches the mission that has been set out today. That said, we very much welcome the strategy and look forward to the rest of the debate.
I move amendment S4M-09915.1, to insert at end:
“, and recognises the dedication of countless volunteers and hardworking but often low-paid staff who deliver youth work services across the country”.
I call Mary Scanlon. Ms Scanlon, you have at least five minutes.
14:32
Thank you, Presiding Officer.
During a discussion about a petition at this morning’s meeting of the Education and Culture Committee, I said that I supported the Government, and Scottish National Party members said that they agreed with something that I had said. Such consensus is very unusual in the run-up to 18 September, but this afternoon’s debate is also consensual and I thank the two previous speakers for their positive and constructive approach. We will support the Government’s motion and the amendment from the Labour Party, which is valuable and worth while.
I am pleased to have the opportunity to put on record the Scottish Conservatives’ support for the national youth work strategy that was recently published by the Scottish Government, along with Education Scotland, YouthLink Scotland and many others. There can be no disagreement with the aims and objectives that are set out in the strategy. Youth work has a hugely important role to play in improving social and health outcomes, understanding communities, deepening community involvement and developing core skills.
As I said in December during George Adam’s members’ business debate on YouthLink Scotland, the terms “youth worker” and “unsung hero” have gone hand in hand for too long. We had a good debate, in which we put on record the value that we place on youth work. I therefore particularly welcome the strategy’s emphasis on promoting the value of youth work and developing the skills of the workforce.
We often get caught up in thinking about skills in terms of qualifications. However, I think that one of the great benefits of youth work for young people is that it is about working in a team; it is about timekeeping; it is about getting on with people who are older than they are; and it is about work experience. It is much simpler than saying that there has to be a tick box and a qualification at the end of the experience. A national communications strategy would not only boost the appeal of the sector but alert more young people to the range of opportunities that are on offer.
The national youth worker awards are a good example of alerting people to the opportunities in the sector but—as the strategy recognises—we can and we should do more to extol the virtues of the sector and make clear its potential to develop and benefit our young people. Liam McArthur made a very good point about young people from the Highlands and Islands. If we want members of the scouts or the Boys Brigade from that area to meet people in other areas, additional costs are involved. A stronger evidence base would certainly help to show the value of youth work so I fully support the ambition that is articulated in the strategy for a research project that would establish how youth work helps to deliver strategic policy objectives.
As I listened to the minister, I thought about the importance of aligning youth work as much as possible to the Government economic strategy, given the concerns that were raised in the Auditor General for Scotland’s recent report on modern apprenticeships, which noted that modern apprenticeships were not aligned to the Government economic strategy. I make that point as a positive suggestion.
It is particularly true that youth work is valuable when it comes to those who have perhaps begun to disengage from mainstream society. YouthLink Scotland, for instance, provided evidence to the Parliament’s Finance Committee that cited research on the disadvantaged young people who, as others have said, engage with youth work services. The research found that school attendance improved, temporary exclusions reduced and antisocial behaviour fell. Those are hugely encouraging signs, which point to the societal value of youth work initiatives. We are constantly being asked about school exclusions, and youth work is something positive that can be done to bring people back into engagement with society. Of course, to function, such initiatives depend on a large number of volunteers. It is to that group that I now turn.
Volunteers, it seems, are frequently taken for granted, as Kezia Dugdale mentioned, and are not afforded the same opportunities to develop as workers in other sectors. To address that issue, the strategy appears to envisage a broader role for the Standards Council for Community Learning and Development for Scotland, with particular emphasis on work with YouthLink Scotland to develop support and training for volunteers.
I welcome that focus and the drive towards establishing national standards for youth work. Those standards are due to be developed and implemented over the two years to March 2016, and—if done with due care—there is undoubtedly potential to bring more rigour to the organisation and delivery of youth work. That can only be a good thing, especially if it convinces more young people to give up their time to become involved with youth work projects. Such initiatives form a core part of community learning and development, with the potential to improve life opportunities for young people, their families and the wider communities that they are part of.
Could you draw to a close, please?
In summing up, I welcome the strategy and support its key goals. I look forward to perhaps digging deeper into disengagement and exclusion from school. I trust that we will look at such education issues in future, in particular the attainment gap and the dips in performance—
I really must invite you to close, please.
I will close now.
Thank you. We move to open debate. George Adam has a generous four minutes.
14:39
I welcome the publication of the national youth work strategy, and I agree with the minister when she says that the opportunities that youth work can offer our young people can make a massive difference in their lives. Youth work makes a significant contribution to realising our vision of Scotland being the best place in the world for children to grow up.
Early intervention, which other members have mentioned, is extremely important. If we manage to reach individuals at a certain time, it can make a difference in their lives. I will probably return to that point later.
Many youth workers continue to do fantastic work in all our communities. Members of Paisley & District Boys Brigade made Derek Mackay and me honorary vice-presidents. That is not bad for two boys who were never in the BB to begin with. I was a scout. I was in the Bushes cubs, but only because I was freakishly tall at the time and they needed a centre-half for their football team, which is why I ended up there. That is the kind of activity that draws people into youth organisations. During my time in the scouts, there were people from all sorts of backgrounds, and they have done all types of different things with their lives since then. Thanks to the power of social media, we still manage to keep in touch with one another.
It is important to consider some of the things that have been made available in our own areas. In Paisley, the St Mirren street stuff project has been extremely successful, so much so that I have mentioned it in various previous debates. The project has probably won more trophies than the football club has—although we did manage to win one last year.
St Mirren street stuff attracts more than 15,000 young people each year. It is run in partnership with Renfrewshire Council, Police Scotland, Engage Renfrewshire, St Mirren Football Club and West College Scotland. It works in a similar way to what Kezia Dugdale was describing in Edinburgh. Hotspots for youth disorder have been identified and the project has gone into those areas. In some areas of Paisley, in particular Paisley South, my old council ward, disorder has been reduced by up to 25 per cent. That is an incredible difference.
The community coaches are from St Mirren FC and, when they are talking to young people, they have the credibility that a lot of workers who work for the local authority or other organisations do not have. They can approach the young people and talk to them about various things. The beauty of the programme is that it gives young people access to various other things. A fitness bus is available. The project is all about health and wellbeing. St Mirren has done more than that. It has also facilitated a music partnership, which gives young people an opportunity to get involved in music.
St Mirren has taken the whole idea of being a community football club to the next level. People would rather go to the football club. I heard about another example the other day. There were some fathers in Ferguslie Park in Paisley who could not cook. They went to St Mirren together with their children and while the children played football for a while, the dads were taken up to the hospitality area and taught how to cook a meal. Then the children came back and they all sat together and had a meal. That might seem a strange thing for people to do, but there are record numbers of parents who are unable to cook a fresh meal, so it can make a difference.
How do we take such ideas, which have been developed in local communities, to the next level? If we are working on employability and training, why do we not consider the club as a potential hub? We have the opportunity to use the credibility of that local asset to make a difference in young people’s lives.
Ferguslie Park in my area, where St Mirren FC is located, is an area of multiple deprivation—one of the most deprived in the whole of Scotland. We could work together with the club to take these ideas about access to education, health and wellbeing and employability to the next level.
I am working with all the partner groups and if I can get it all together locally, it is important for all of us to consider how we can do that. This is not all about national Government putting money down the way; it is about us trying to find other ways to make such ideas work and to take them to the next level, as Kezia Dugdale has already said. Some groups are seeking funding on a yearly basis. Why do we not consider how to make local projects larger? It is up to me and other elected members in our area to work together to get to our ideal.
An awful lot of great work is going on, including youth work. Now we must take that to the next level, and we should consider how we can all work together to make a difference to the lives of young people in our communities.
14:44
I congratulate the Government and the minister on being able to bring to the chamber such a positive motion, which has achieved the support of my party, as has the amendment in the name of Kezia Dugdale.
Like others, I think that it is right that we acknowledge YouthLink Scotland, Education Scotland, the Scottish Youth Parliament, together with Caledonia Youth and the many unnamed third sector and voluntary groups that work tirelessly with young people day in, day out; week in, week out; and year in, year out.
I support all that has been said today about the need for youth support in relation to youth work. I do not suggest that the particular issue that I will focus on is more or less significant than the issues that others have mentioned, but my experience in a previous life with Polmont young offenders institution and Cornton Vale prison meant that I thought that it was right that I should focus particularly on the youth work that is done in those establishments.
Only this morning, completely coincidentally, I received a letter from a mother whom I have not seen in seven years. I met her and her son at Polmont. The son was involved in voluntary work at the prison in connection with a drugs education programme called choices for life. Her son and 20 other prisoners organised themselves into three shifts—including a night shift—to organise the provision of goody bags to be given to all the children who attended an event. They created 70,000 packs in three weeks, all elegantly packed and properly delivered. The pride that the young man took in his involvement in that event, along with much other work in the prison, has meant that, in the seven years since our meeting, he has not been involved in crime again, he has not been back in prison again and he has a sense of self.
That example leads me to believe that the outside in service—previously known as the Scottish Prison Service youth work service—is absolutely necessary in adding to the quality of work that can be done in prisons.
Young men and young women in our prisons suffer from low self-esteem and lack confidence, knowledge of where they fit into the world and ideas about how they can have a future. The youth work that is conducted in those establishments helps to deal with issues around skills, confidence, bullying, health and sexual health, peer group pressure, equality, diversity and racism. All of those issues need to be tackled, but particularly when, for any number of reasons, no one else is there to provide that kind of support. The kind of work that those who engage in youth work do is vital in enabling young people to get the opportunity to participate in their future. To that extent, only a fool would want to resist Aileen Campbell’s motion or would fail to acknowledge Kezia Dugdale’s amendment—I hope that I am not a fool.
The stresses that young people face, particularly when the economic environment that we live in makes life tough for us all, are such that we need to invest in the future. To that extent, I acknowledge the key role of youth work. I want all of our young people to be able to access the support of youth workers, because we do not know when or in what circumstances they will need it, no matter their social background or the circumstances that they face.
The strategy is enormously positive but, as members would expect, I want it to be more ambitious so that it provides the bridge to bring young people into the main stream. The issue of long-term funding has been commented on already.
Finally, we need measurable outcomes, so that we know that the money that is invested in these circumstances is used positively.
I am happy to support the motion and the amendment, and I am pleased to have been part of this discussion.
14:49
I thank the Scottish Government for bringing forward this debate. I know that the minister is driven by her ambition to make Scotland the best place in the world in which to grow up, which is surely an ambition that is shared throughout the chamber. The formal structures of the state, and education and health services in particular, have a huge role to play in that regard. Clearly, those bringing up children have the greatest role. The most important role that I have in life is as a father to my children. The Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014 is a hugely important step in the direction of improving the lives of Scotland’s young people, particularly with regard to early intervention to improve outcomes for youngsters.
In that regard, and in light of the ambition to make our country the best that it can be for young people, the work done by those involved in youth work, often through informal and third sector organisations, is vital. We know that the development, learning and experiences that young people gain can have a positive, lifelong impact. Youth work can offer young people the option to make positive changes in their lives, through initiatives such as training; youth award programmes; literacy and numeracy projects; anti-violence initiatives; and information, participation, and citizenship services and programmes.
The publication of the national youth work strategy is very welcome; particularly welcome is its partnership approach and the fact that it has been developed jointly by the Scottish Government, Education Scotland and YouthLink Scotland. Graeme Pearson was right to place on record our thanks to those organisations for having worked together to devise the strategy.
It is vital that organisations involved in youth work are also involved in delivering the strategy. One of those is the Boys Brigade. Unlike George Adam, I was once a member of the BB. Perhaps that is why, unlike George Adam, I have not been offered an honorific role. However, I have been happy to work with the Boys Brigade in sponsoring events here in Parliament to enable the BB to showcase its work. The BB helpfully provided me with a bit of background information in advance of the debate. Akin to the position of scouting organisations, the BB’s membership has increased. Since the beginning of 2013, 10 new groups have started. There is a clear growth in activity and in demand for the services offered by the Boys Brigade.
The BB wants me to place on the record the fact that it has benefited from cashback for communities. Last year, small grants of some £40,000 were awarded to 48 local BB groups. In my area, I have been able to see at first hand the positive role that the BB plays. There are a number of BB companies in Cumbernauld and Kilsyth, with active participation and engagement for young people in schemes such as the King George VI youth leadership training and the young people taking the lead scheme. The BB offers other developmental opportunities and provides the youngsters that it works with locally the ability to make decisions, take responsibility and make a difference to the lives of others through initiatives such as the Queen’s badge. In 2013, some 410 youngsters had their efforts recognised through the award of a Queen’s badge.
I want to mention a few other organisations in my local area that are engaged in youth work. We have a local squadron of the air cadets, led very ably by flight lieutenant Stevie Cairns. I have been very impressed whenever I have been to see the air cadets. They are equipping young people with skills and confidence that will see them through the rest of their lives. They are also very engaged with the local community. There are also Cumbernauld YMCA and YWCA, which undertake a range of good work, including providing decent after-school care, which is invaluable to many families in the area.
Recently, I was privileged to be asked to hand out the awards at the Prince’s Trust award ceremony at New College Lanarkshire’s Cumbernauld campus. It was positively inspirational to see young people who had given so much to bettering themselves and their community having that commitment rewarded. Indeed, there was one really positive case of a youngster having had a placement at a local employer and ending up getting a job out of that placement.
There are many other good examples of local youth work. All of the organisations rely on those who volunteer their time. I place on record my thanks to those who do so in Cumbernauld and Kilsyth and I very much welcome Kezia Dugdale’s amendment in that regard. I hope that the main message that emerges from today’s debate goes back to those who volunteer their time to support youth work. I hope that that can be one of the strongest messages that comes from today’s debate. I very much welcome it.
14:55
I, like Kezia Dugdale, start by welcoming the debate, the strategy and the money. I am happy to confirm that we will support the motion and the amendment, which, as the minister rightly suggested, lays particular emphasis on the role of volunteers and others in supporting youth work.
Every speaker so far has articulated the benefits of youth work—and I would not disagree with any of them. In its briefing, YouthLink Scotland points to the way in which it equips young people to deal with what life throws at them for better or worse. It changes lives overall for the better and it delivers across a wide range of public policy objectives in health, education, culture, youth justice et cetera. The briefing also points to some of the challenges. It suggests that it is necessary to change structures to take account of young people’s needs. I have been told on many occasions by John Loughton, the former chair of the Scottish Youth Parliament and the inspiration behind Dare2Lead, that young people are not the future but the present and that their voices, views and needs must be taken into account now.
YouthLink Scotland also points to the need to link funding to the meeting of objectives. Kezia Dugdale said that the long-term nature of funding helps decisions to be taken about how to develop and sustain youth work over a period.
It also points to the need to win hearts and minds, which I have to say I found slightly odd. The tone and content of the debate suggest that there is no need to win hearts and minds, certainly in this chamber. We have heard examples of good work right across the country, all of which echo my experience in Orkney, where volunteering goes from strength to strength.
I was invited to present awards at the Orkney youth awards recently and, like the minister, found it a very humbling experience. The volume, variety and quality of what goes on in my constituency were laid out. I presented 228 Saltire certificates, from challenge certificates right up to certificates for doing 500 hours of volunteering. I also presented summit awards to two young volunteers for outstanding contributions to volunteering. I do not think that there is any need to sell volunteering to young constituents in Orkney.
That is borne out by the Scottish household survey of 2012, which suggests that 55 per cent of people aged between 16 and 39 had volunteered over the past 12 months in Orkney, compared with a Scottish national figure of 29 per cent, which struck me as surprisingly low, not least given what other members have suggested is going on in their constituencies and regions. I certainly take a great deal of encouragement and no little pride from what the Scottish household survey says about what is happening in my constituency.
Voluntary Action Orkney has provided some examples of the work that is going on. The Friday friends project, for example, brings together young people from Kirkwall grammar school with older residents in the Eunson Kloss sheltered housing scheme, pulling together an intergenerational approach, to which other members have alluded, breaking down barriers between young and old and challenging some of their preconceptions. When I visited the project, it was evident to me that the benefits of the project were felt on both sides.
Similarly, the memories project, which involves pupils from Stromness academy, allows young people to interview older members of the community, recording their experience of the war, their work and their family life. The young people record it, edit it and then present a copy to the individual concerned, as well as placing copies in the Orkney Library and Archive, which will be hugely beneficial going forward.
There are other opportunities for volunteering around the Orkney folk festival later this month and the St Magnus festival next month. The strength of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award in Orkney is one of the idiosyncrasies that pop up from time to time.
Kezia Dugdale referred to Girlguiding. Some of its campaigning work in relation to young women and mental health issues has been truly phenomenal. I should declare an interest as a guiding ambassador. Like George Adam, I make it clear that that was not borne out of my membership of the girl guides back in the day.
However, voluntary groups and those who work in the sector in Orkney face issues. The cost of protecting vulnerable groups schemes can act as an obstacle to placing volunteers. I also understand that partnerships need to be developed, so that young people’s achievements are recognised and recorded, and I made the point earlier that funding is needed for the additional costs of travel.
I welcome the debate and I pay tribute to those involved in youth work—both the young people and those who support them—which has undoubted benefits for young people. As other members have said about their areas, it is hard to imagine what Orkney would look like without the work of those people.
15:00
I am delighted to take part in the debate and to recognise, promote and celebrate the value of our fantastic youth workers, who improve young people’s life chances across Scotland.
We have much to learn from each other’s expertise and experience, as we must value not only our achievements, but young people’s achievements too. I want Scotland to be the best place in the world for my children, my grandchildren and all young people to grow up—just like the minister said earlier.
The role of public and voluntary services is pivotal in achieving that and we must ensure that our services for young people are fit for 21st-century Scotland. The youth work strategy is the best way to build a fairer society. We already have a strong youth work sector, which empowers young people to improve their own wellbeing and life chances, although that needs funding, of course—as some members have alluded to.
I welcome the announcement today of the £2.1 million cashback funding for Scotland’s youth projects. YouthLink Scotland administers that fund to build the capacity of young people and the youth work organisations who work to support them.
In North East Scotland, the region that I represent, cashback for communities’ youth work awards made a real difference last year. Aberdeenshire received a total of £30,530, of which Aberdeenshire Youth Council received £2,580. Although the work of Aberdeenshire Youth Council is different from what we are talking about today, a lot of people who joined the youth council started in youth work, in voluntary organisations where they were given great help from youth workers.
In Inverurie on 14 September 2013, a lot of organisations came together to support Aberdeenshire Youth Council’s anti-bullying awareness parade. The parade was very important as it gave the community in Inverurie the opportunity to stand up to bullying and provided an occasion to showcase services that are available to young people for support and advice.
We should always remember that youth work is about empowering young people and making them the focus of what can be done, how it can be done and how it can be delivered.
Cashback for communities’ youth work awards were very important for Aberdeen as well, which won £21,000. Of that money, a sum just short of £3,000 went to the Youth Outreach Bus Trust, which we have talked about. Buses are important and can help youth workers to reach young people. Such trusts are great places for youth workers to work in. I visited one in Aberdeen, which was quite fantastic. I really enjoyed using some of the devices that it had.
Angus received a total of £9,000 last year and Dundee received £13,000.
As a past member of the Westhill community development group, in my community in Aberdeenshire, I witnessed at first hand the invaluable contribution of our youth workers, past and present. I recall how pivotal they were in involving our young people in the making it real planning exercise, which was a community effort to plan for the future of our community. It is important to have young people very much involved in our future, contributing to how we should build up our communities. That effort saw generations working together for the benefit of all.
I welcome the fact that Westhill volunteers, youth workers and young people visited other communities across Aberdeenshire, including in Peterhead, where we visited the Hot Spot, which is a community hub for all. I have just noticed that young people from primary 7 at Peterhead central school have joined us today. I am sure that they know the Hot Spot very well.
The Government’s vision is clear: early intervention and preventative spending deliver better outcomes for our young people, and we want all young people to have the skills for lifelong learning and work.
There is another aspect to the vision: greater integration and partnership at a local level are bringing our communities together. There are many examples of community groups opening up to our young people and helping generations to work together for the common good and the development of individuals, like those that Liam McArthur talked about.
Every day, an army of youth workers and dedicated volunteers throughout Scotland helps our young people to be the successful, confident, effective and responsible individuals that Scotland needs to flourish.
15:05
I welcome the opportunity to participate in the debate on the national youth work strategy 2014 to 2019. Although the strategy has many good examples of youth work in practice and many warm and friendly ambitions for the future—incidentally, I agree with them all—there is very little in it that sets out clear objectives for those ambitions. It does not set out a clear strategy for how they will be achieved and there is no mention of how we will measure the implementation of the strategy or, indeed, success against the ambitions.
For instance, I was surprised that there is not one reference in the 36-page document to the strategy’s financial implications. I am not the only one to be surprised, as YouthLink Scotland stated in its briefing for the debate that there has been some movement on the funding front and that it is working hard with the Scottish Government to make funding more sustainable. YouthLink Scotland wants core funding, as opposed to short-term project funding, to be made available so that the plan’s ambitions and those of other services that meet local needs over the long term can be achieved. I ask the minister in her closing speech to comment on whether funding will be available or whether it is already up to local authorities and their partners to deliver the funding to enable the strategy’s ambitions to be achieved.
The minister will be aware that the first national youth strategy was published in 2007 and the financial package to support it was published at the same time. The money that accompanied that strategy helped to support its ambitions, particularly by supporting those who were in charge of the vision, volunteers and the capital investment projects that were needed for the strategy to be implemented.
The report “Youth Work Sector: Distance Travelled”, which commented on what was done between 2007 and 2011, said that all targets had been met and many of them surpassed. I do not doubt that many of the targets were met due to the hard work and determination of the individuals leading the projects, the volunteers and the communities that wished for the projects to succeed. However, I also do not doubt that the funding that was made available at the start of the process played a major part. Therefore, I repeat my request for the Scottish Government to come up with a financial package and plan to support the ambitions of the current strategy.
The strategy sets out five ambitions with which I agree entirely. However, it does not give a lot of detail on how the ambitions will be achieved. Will the Scottish Government publish an accompanying document that sets out a more detailed plan for how the five key ambitions will be achieved? I understand that some of them will be implemented through curriculum for excellence and getting it right for every child. However, no further details have been given on how that will happen. Who will be responsible for the implementation of the ambitions through those policy areas? Will it be the Government, local authorities, teachers, social workers or all of them, or will a lead person be appointed?
Will Scotland’s Commissioner for Children and Young People have a role in the development of the strategy? I presume that that will be the case but I seek clarification, as there is no mention of him in the document.
I also ask that a more detailed timeframe that measures the strategy’s ambitions be published. There is already a timeframe in the strategy, but it only sets out what the partners aim to do over the next few years. It does not say how the strategy will be measured or how we will know whether the ambitions will be achieved in the timeframe given.
I understand that 2018 will be the year of young people in Scotland. Like many members, I would like the ambitions contained in the strategy to be achieved and surpassed by then. We all want our young people to achieve their potential and want to remove all the barriers that might be in their way at present. The strategy that we are debating will go some way towards achieving that vision, but we should go further than that. I hope that the Scottish Government will address the real concerns that I and others have about the strategy so that we can all work together to achieve the ambitions that are set out before us.
15:09
I start by apologising for missing the first few minutes of the minister’s speech at the start of the debate, and I assure Ms Campbell that I will go back and read every word in the Official Report.
I want to begin by mentioning a local youth group in north Glasgow and some of the good work that it does, and then I will tease out some of the wider issues in relation to youth work.
The minister visited North United Communities in a visit to Wyndford a few years ago. North United Communities also works in Maryhill, Ruchill, Summerston, Cadder, and Milton. Indeed, the group’s name used to be the Ruchill Youth Project, but in order to get away from territorialism and to bring communities together, the group widened out its work across north Glasgow.
Members might ask me whether the group uses football, drama, art or computer games as media for its youth work, and I would answer that it uses none of those. It uses relationships, which are the key to any good youth work. Getting young people to play football is fine, but talking to a young male before and after the game, or noticing that he has a particular problem and having a word with a family member is proper youth work. Youth work is not about activities; it is about relationships. The activities are the media in which to develop relationships and help young people. That needs to be put on the record here today.
I will give a couple of examples. When an issue arose with young people in the lane behind the John Paul academy, which is a large secondary school in Summerston, North United Communities did not get the police to go round and see what was going on. Its approach was to hang out with the young people and chat with them. A few weeks later, the group developed a programme of activities to engage with those young people. The group was not particularly welcomed by the young people in the first few weeks, but it persevered and gained their respect. It did something similar in Milton in Glasgow.
The key is to build relationships with the young people who are hardest to reach and not to give up on them. Local grass-roots organisations are best placed to do that. I am sure that the youth strategy will develop that.
Does Bob Doris agree that what he has said underscores the point about getting whatever long-term funding we can in order to allow those relationships to be built and sustained over time?
There is a bit of a dichotomy around long-term funding. Some organisations apply for grants for long-term funding and are unsuccessful and then sometimes feel that they are locked out of it for a long time. There is a balance to be struck in relation to long-term funding, and it can go awry when discussions are held about it. However, I take on board Liam McArthur’s point.
I will mention a couple of problems that North United Communities has. When it bids for projects in these straitened financial times, the local community planning partnership no longer gives a budget line for management costs for the youth organisation and merely wants to recover costs for youth work hours for sessional work in the community. I understand why the CPP does that, but it is rather short-sighted. I am talking about the local CPP only because I have direct experience of it; I am sure that the themes and issues are replicated in other areas.
Due to the success of North United Communities, in Cadder there have been reduced rates of crime and vandalism, but once a youth group has success in an area it is deprioritised, which means that all the successful activities that were taking the community forward stop. We need long-term commitment to communities after they have seen successes, and not to remove funding for work that has been successful.
I will finish on a positive note. There is a huge opportunity for European funding for youth work in the Erasmus+ programme, of which some members might not be aware. That programme will operate between 2014 and 2020 and will offer €14.7 billion, which represents a 40 per cent increase in Erasmus funding. It is a new way of looking at Erasmus exchanges, which in the past have perhaps wrongly been stereotyped as being for very able middle-class young people from comfortable backgrounds, but
“Erasmus+ grants will more strongly target specific needs ... such as the living cost in the destination country”
and will target those who come from “less privileged backgrounds”. It is long-term funding of billions of euros for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds and it mentions youth work and sport specifically. I wonder whether that is something on which the minister would be keen to engage with me in order to develop a way of maximising the chances of youth groups from deprived areas across Scotland accessing the funding, which would be a major opportunity for our deprived communities.
15:15
As all members so far have, I welcome today’s debate and the launch of the new national youth work strategy. I have no doubt whatever that it is well intentioned. The sector is full of good people who are doing good work—in some cases it is inspirational work—but I have to admit that I find the strategy to be a bit on the vague side and a little lacking in specifics. Without wishing to be overly critical or to break the consensus, it is written in the kind of opaque managementspeak that I find drains any real sense of drive or purpose. Although today’s funding announcement is welcome, there are few challenging targets.
We all want Scotland to be the best place for young people to grow up, and for many it will be. Unfortunately, for too many others it is also the most likely place to get stabbed, to develop a drink problem, to become obese or to start smoking. There are many areas that we should be tackling directly, but in the limited time that is available today, I want to focus on smoking—or, rather, vaping. Vaping is the new term for use of e-cigarettes, which give off a cloud of vapour rather than tarry smoke. It is a term that has been coined by advertisers that are promoting a new and, they hope, attractive product.
I cannot say that I had paid a great deal of attention to e-cigarettes until I had a helpful discussion with the Royal Pharmaceutical Society last week. If anything, I thought that they were a safer alternative to smoking and a way of encouraging smokers to give up the habit. That is probably still true for the majority of adult smokers, but there is also a real danger that e-cigarettes are quite the reverse and could be a way of encouraging young people to take up the habit.
So far, that does not seem to be the case in the United Kingdom, but evidence from the United States, where their use is more widespread, points in that direction. The most recent study of 40,000 young people revealed that e-cigarette use among high school pupils doubled between 2011 and 2012, from about 3.1 per cent to 6.5 per cent.
Some members will have read the briefing from the anti-smoking group, ASH Scotland, which makes the point that the ages that are covered by youth work services are crucial because 90 per cent of adult smokers begin while in their teens or earlier, and only a tiny minority of smokers start after the age of 24. In a separate survey that was published last week, ASH highlights the fact that use of e-cigarettes in the adult population has increased fivefold in the past four years, with an even more dramatic rise in the number of people who have tried them.
However, vaping, unlike smoking, is unregulated and is not covered by the ban on smoking in public places. Perhaps most worrying of all is the fact that there are no age restrictions on the sale of the products. In fact, vaping is now being advertised on the telly, in cinemas and through social media.
I cannot speak for other members, but my main motivation in voting for and supporting the ban on smoking in public places in Scotland was that it would help us to denormalise smoking, so that we would no longer see people smoking in our pubs or cafes or in most other workaday or social situations, and so that we and our children would no longer see smoking as a normal activity. I believe that the ban has been successful in doing exactly that, but I worry that we are about to undo some of that good work.
The Advertising Standards Authority has just finished its consultation on advertising of e-cigarettes, and I hope that it will treat them as it would any other cigarette, but there are steps that we can take here in Scotland. The UK Government has announced that it intends to ban the sale of e-cigarettes to under-18s, and the Welsh Government has said that it will restrict their use in enclosed public spaces. Here in Scotland, the minister is undoubtedly making the right noises, and seems to be indicating her intention to follow suit, but announcements have so far been limited to saying that the Government is considering the next steps.
ASH is clear. It says that
“To minimise the risk of drawing the next generation into nicotine addiction, we also want an under-18 age restriction on the sale of e-cigarettes in Scotland, as is already being planned for England and Wales, and we need restrictions on how these products are promoted.”
The Royal Pharmaceutical Society is equally strong. It has said:
“In order not to undermine recent advances in public health policy, e-cigarettes should be treated in exactly the same way as any other form of smoking, including the same age restrictions as applied to tobacco products and restrictions on their use in public spaces, advertising and displays.”
The danger signs are here, and we need to act quickly—as quickly as those who are promoting such products.
I, too, want to conclude on a positive note and on what I consider to be a real success story for young people in Scotland. I am quoting from ASH once more:
“From the high smoking prevalence of around 30% when surveys began in the mid-1990s, there has now been a reduction to around 3% for 13-year-olds and 13% for 15-year-olds now. Among young adults, aged 16-24, there is also a declining trend, with smoker numbers now at a record low of 22%. So past initiatives such as bans on tobacco advertising, smoke-free public places and raising the age for purchasing tobacco to 18 are working.”
Let us build on that progress rather than undermine it.
We come to closing speeches. I call Liz Smith. You have up to five minutes, please.
15:20
I will continue the positive theme by reiterating the Conservatives’ support for the Government motion and the Labour Party’s amendment.
It has been a good debate, and we are supportive of the national youth work strategy and its stated aims of raising the profile of the sector and building workforce capacity, providing that the strategy pays very careful attention to the views of those who are most involved. That point was made very strongly in the excellent briefing that YouthLink Scotland provided us with, which has made us think very carefully about the role of a strategy and the clarity of its objectives. I will pick up on the interesting point that Bob Doris made; it is about building relationships rather than just establishing specific projects. However, although that is true, it makes things even more difficult because that aspect is unmeasurable. We have to be very careful when we are setting the strategy’s objectives. I share the concerns of Siobhan McMahon and Ken Macintosh in that regard; we need to do a little bit more to focus on the strategy’s objectives.
We have heard this afternoon several excellent presentations of members’ constituency work and their personal work. Graeme Pearson, Kezia Dugdale, Bob Doris, Jamie Hepburn and George Adam all spoke about excellent work that is done, and it is very clear that we would not survive without all the volunteers who are involved. Anything that promotes volunteering has to be good.
I want to highlight two of the principles that I think underpin the Scottish Government’s strategy document. The first is about the wider issue of breaking down barriers. We are very conscious in Scottish education of the barriers and the focus that needs to be put on them. Youth work should be integrated much more closely with elements of curriculum for excellence. The second principle, to which I will come in a minute and which the minister mentioned, is preventative spend. Both are laudable objectives.
When it comes to breaking down barriers, the document outlines plans to strengthen the links between volunteers, school staff and youth work practitioners. That has particular resonance for many of the teachers and volunteers who are just now considering development of the senior phase of curriculum for excellence, so it is important in that wider context. As I see it, Scottish education and youth development in Scotland are at an interesting stage; that has been brought up by Ian Wood in his consultations. Perhaps the subject is seen very much in terms of employability skills, but that has to be viewed in connection with a lot of the volunteering that goes on. A lot of what is taught by volunteers, particularly the soft skills, can be helpful and—if we are honest—complements everything else that is required for the labour market.
The clear embodiment of that is the desire for greater flexibility in this country’s institutions that work with young people, because they have a much better interrelationship than ever. We must take cognisance of that when it comes to developing the youth strategy. There is closer collaboration, which commands a lot of support across the Parliament, but YouthLink Scotland has made the point that it is about ensuring that the people on the ground are committed to the strategy and are aware of where and how the financing and timetabling will come into play. We had some interesting debates in Parliament during the progress of the Public Bodies (Joint Working) (Scotland) Bill about the difficulties of integrating health and social care, and I think that there will be similar discussions about issues in education and youth work.
I turn to preventative spend. Policy-wise, it is not a new idea. It is laudable, and the Government has tried hard to bring it to the forefront with many of its policy ideas. However, as my colleague Mary Scanlon noted, there is evidence that suggests that, if there is a risk of young people disengaging from youth work and education, such services can increase school exclusions and affect attendance. Therefore, when it comes to preventative spend, I would like to see the hard and fast evidence on what works. If we are to spend a great deal of money on developing youth work, it would be preferable if hard evidence could be provided of cases in which it works.
I commend the Government for bringing the debate to the chamber. We are fully supportive of the strategy.
15:25
I agree with Liz Smith that it has been a positive and good-natured debate. I think that we have all learned something, whether it is about the dangers of vaping or the fact that Liam McArthur used to be a girl guide.
I acknowledge Jim Sweeney and his colleagues from YouthLink Scotland in the public gallery, and I invite members to read his article in this week’s Third Force News, in which he points to the fact that every £1 that is spent on youth work services saves £13.
We have learned a lot about the requirement for more sustainable funding options. The message has been sent loud and clear to the Government that youth work organisations would very much like to be on a firmer financial footing and that youth workers’ jobs would become considerably easier if that were the case. Many of the youth work organisations that I work with would benefit from that. They do not necessarily all have accountants; it tends to be the case that there is one youth worker who is good at doing the books who gets the job of ensuring that the sums add up, but they would much rather do the day job of being a youth worker than sit in front of an Excel spreadsheet. We could ease their job by giving that just a bit more thought.
Of course, the issue is not just about financial savings. As has been touched on, some young people go on an educational journey through their involvement in youth work. I mentioned earlier the work of the cross-party group on children and young people. Two Prince’s Trust young ambassadors sit on that group on a permanent basis, and they make a valuable contribution week in, week out. Both those young people have extensive experience of youth work services and both are on their way to becoming youth workers. I am surprised by the number of young people I have met who have had a very positive experience of youth work and who want to go on to give back by becoming youth workers. They recognise what a transformational effect youth work has had on their lives and they want others to benefit from that, too. They see it as a career.
However, youth work does not have to be a career. Some members have touched on the peer education that is done through youth work, which is all about giving young people the interpersonal skills to teach what they know to other young people. They appreciate the strength that comes from that.
I thank the minister for highlighting the work of LGBT Youth Scotland. Although it would be possible to highlight a number of groups that provide targeted youth work support, we cannot overstate how important dedicated services for young LGBT people are. They are particularly important for young people who feel extremely isolated when they are coming out and who are desperate to meet more young people who are like them. In many ways, LGBT Youth Scotland provides the sense of community that they need. For some young people, the service that is provided is a lifeline; for others, it is just a place to meet and hang out. We must recognise that a broad spectrum of services are provided, from ones that deal with crisis situations to ones that address the social need of young people to get together in a room.
We must also recognise how often youth work services are on the front line when it comes to some of the big social challenges that we face. In my opening speech, I spoke at length about sexual health services. In addition, it is important to recognise the role that youth work plays in the drugs agenda. I am sure that the minister will be aware of the activities of Crew 2000 in Edinburgh in young people’s attitudes towards drugs. She might also be aware that, at the weekend, a number of music festivals across Scotland, including T in the Park, said that they will not allow legal highs to be sold at their events this summer. That is an important move, which all of us should welcome. However, it does not address the fact that many young people buy legal highs online; that such products will not be sold at T in the Park does not mean that they will not be taken there.
We should acknowledge the role that youth work plays in helping young people to “know the score”, to use the phrase that is often mentioned in that context. It gives young people the skills to enable them to reduce the risk in taking drugs, if that is what they insist on doing. It ensures that they know not to mix drugs with alcohol, that they know how much water to drink and that they think about who they are buying from and the dangers that are associated with that. Youth work is at the front line of that work. That is not the only public health agenda on which it does such work; Ken Macintosh talked about vaping, which is another example.
Youth work is not just about education; it goes into health, justice and communities. The minister mentioned the Christie commission and breaking down silos. I challenge her again to think about how we can break down every barrier to participation and help youth work to fulfil its potential.
As George Adam said, breaking down barriers is not the only issue; we must find mechanisms for youth work organisations to collaborate so that they can widen the types of work that they do. That can reduce costs, but it would also allow them to provide more imaginative and varied services.
Bob Doris nailed it when he said that youth work is about not activities but relationships. I cannot think of any youth worker whom I know in the country who would disagree with that statement. The value of those relationships is critical.
The minister knows that I have a strong interest in care leavers and the care-leaving agenda. In relation to that, we did good work together on the Children and Young People (Scotland) Bill, and we could do a lot more on the agenda. I called Who Cares? Scotland this morning to ask what it thinks of the youth work strategy and whether it wanted to contribute anything. The organisation had a lot of strong and positive words to offer the minister on the strategy. It wishes that many other Government services had at their heart the same principles of partnership, collaboration, co-design and co-production. It believes that, if social work and education departments and the police were to work in the same way, we would all be better off. Who Cares? Scotland had nothing but good words.
I congratulate all the staff who are involved in youth work organisations and all the volunteers on whom the organisations very much rely week in and week out. I thank the minister for the opportunity to debate the issues and I look forward to the cabinet secretary’s closing speech. I am sure that he will address in great depth some of the points that we have made about long-term sustainable funding.
15:31
This has been a debate of reasonable consensus, which is sometimes remarkable in this chamber. We will, of course, accept the Labour Party’s amendment.
MSPs particularly enjoy such debates, which offer an opportunity to blend the local and the national—to talk about their constituencies and their concerns, as well as national concerns. In my constituency of Argyll and Bute, the HELP project in Dunoon, with which I recently sponsored a jobs fair, does a great deal of work with young people who are moving from school or other activities to employment.
I echo Kezia Dugdale’s welcome of Jim Sweeney and his colleagues to the gallery. I am sure that even they realise that they have heard an unusually united chamber—a chamber of positivity about the work that organisations such as theirs do. As Mary Scanlon pointed out, this is not what we do every day or every afternoon, but it is good that we do it sometimes.
I will talk about some of the contributions before widening out my speech to the key issues, including funding. George Adam was right to say that we are talking about making a difference to lives and communities—that is exactly what we are engaged in. There are key roles for volunteering and community support, but there is also a key role for young people, themselves, so the strategy focuses on how young people can lead the process of making a difference to their lives and communities.
I am not a patron of any youth organisation. I was not in the scouts or the BB and I have not even heard of the woodcraft folk, which Labour members talked about and which I also was not in. However, I was active in a number of church groups when I was young. We need to recognise and celebrate the great variety in provision and the many ways in which youth work is undertaken. Bob Doris described how that variety can work in informal and formal settings.
There is a rich landscape and a rich tapestry. It is important to recognise that no single piece of work or help would make all the difference. The strategy must be varied and broad reaching, and it must have an implementation plan attached to it, as ours does.
This is about individuals as well as organisations. As Graeme Pearson’s touching story showed, youth work is about what individuals want to do, and feel that they can do, to make a difference. The issue is therefore not just about resources. In a minute, I will address the resources question that Siobhan McMahon raised, and I will talk about how the Government is bringing forward resources and will continue to do so. Resources are always important, but the strategy is about how we work together. The implementation plan is clear on how we will do that, but we need new ideas, as well. Bob Doris’s idea about Erasmus+ funding is an interesting thought that we can take further.
This is not about what we cannot do. Sometimes in Scotland when we start to talk about money, we end up talking about the things that we feel we cannot do. This is about what we can do and about finding imaginative ways of doing them. Kezia Dugdale was right to link that to the key issues in individual lives, such as legal and illegal highs, sexual health, alcohol and tobacco. It was also right for Mr Macintosh to discuss vaping. I am quite sure that the health ministers will bring forward their plans and will have noted his contribution. His speech illustrated, as other members’ speeches illustrated, that this is about taking an holistic view of individuals and how they learn and change.
The final point that I will make about the speeches that have been made relates to something that Liz Smith said. She linked what we are talking about to the Wood report. Others linked it to the curriculum for excellence. The youth strategy does not stand on its own; it integrates with all other aspects of education and, indeed, with the personal learner journeys that the Government has been keen to support in every part of its legislation and activities in education.
I turn to funding. The Government values the significant role that youth work agencies and organisations play, and has shown that with funding support. Over the years 2013 to 2015, the children’s rights and wellbeing division is providing around £6.9 million directly to national voluntary youth work and youth citizenship organisations through the third sector early intervention fund, through strategic partnership funding, through the national voluntary organisations support fund and through programme grants. Since the inception of cashback for communities, we have invested or committed over £70 million in projects and facilities for young people and the communities that they live in. As Aileen Campbell mentioned in her opening remarks, today we announced that a further £2.1 million has been awarded to YouthLink Scotland for the cashback programme.
The cashback programme has been extraordinarily successful in helping the country’s and the Government’s ambitions. We see the results through programmes such as the Green Team (Edinburgh and Lothians) Ltd project in East Lothian. That project, which is funded by the cashback programme, identifies young people from areas of multiple deprivation who are at risk of becoming involved in antisocial behaviour or of becoming dependent on drugs and alcohol. I refer to the points that Kezia Dugdale raised on the learning experience of avoiding as well as being involved in other things. The project provides opportunities for young people to take part in community-based environmental volunteering and outdoor activities, and to develop new skills. That is just one example of how cashback flows into the system and continues to sustain an enormous variety of activity. That is underpinned by the regular funding from the Government that makes a difference.
There could always be more funding, of course. No organisation in Scotland says that there should not be more, and there are, of course, ways in which it can sometimes be found over time, but we are committed to supporting national youth work agencies, organisations and projects, and we continue to work with strategic funding partnerships, the Big Lottery Fund and YouthLink Scotland to support funded organisations to measure and demonstrate the outcomes from the grants that have been provided—that was a key point in the debate—which allows us to build on best practice.
I return to the point that I raised with the minister earlier on. I think that the complaint from the scout group that I spoke to was not that there is a lack of funding; rather, it was about what it is able to do with the funding that is available. It could buy any number of tents, which it had plenty of, but it could not support sending members of the troop away to events in the central belt or, indeed, further afield.
I think that we and organisations are still sometimes guilty of overprescription. I go back to the start of what I said. If we are encouraging young people to lead their own activities and essentially to be the guides in those activities, they should also be saying what funding would be most useful for, and we should learn from that experience. I have particular sympathy with what Mr McArthur said about travel to the central belt. That is an issue for all of us who represent rural and island constituencies.
There are synergies across Government in these matters. We are bringing together things such as the initial Wood report and activities that include the new statement of ambition for adult learning, which will be launched on 21 May. That sees adult learning as being lifelong, life wide and life centred, just as the curriculum for excellence is personalised, deep, linked and progressive.
All the Government’s initiatives are joined together in the view that learning is not something that we do just once. We want the country to be the best place to grow up; we also want Scotland to be the best place where one goes on learning in various ways and contexts, no matter where one is.
The debate has been a unifying event; it has shown that Parliament at its best can come together and look very carefully at what is best for Scotland. By taking forward the strategy and by agreeing the motion with Labour’s amendment on volunteering, which I hope will be endorsed unanimously, we are doing something that will help young people in Scotland. We will help them even more if we go on—and we will—funding and supporting them to ensure that the strategy becomes reality.