Meeting of the Parliament 21 January 2016
Members will know how keen I always am to find opportunities to celebrate the success of Scottish Government initiatives. On many occasions I struggle to find such an opportunity, but not today, because the youth awards are a huge success, as the numbers tell us. As the minister said, there has been a 273 per cent increase in five years, and there were 73,000 youth awards last year. The initiative’s success has been described by members of all parties—as far as I could see, given that most of the debate has taken place in the dark.
Most members took the opportunity to give examples of youth work in their constituencies—Cara Hilton, Linda Fabiani, Tavish Scott and Graeme Dey did so. That is to be expected, and I think that I am entitled to do that myself, because I am pleased to say that East Lothian is singled out in the report “A review of youth awards in Scotland”. It says on page 13:
“In East Lothian there is an effective level of leadership in the development of youth awards. A good range of opportunities are available in all six secondary schools in the authority and within community groups and uniformed organisations.”
I think that that entitles me to mention one or two organisations. Recharge, in Tranent, recently celebrated 10 years of working with youth in the town. Its origins are in the social inclusion partnerships of 10 to 12 years ago, which were funded by the previous Labour-Liberal Democrat Scottish Executive, and it is still going strong. Indeed, last year, there were 5,000 visits by 500 young people to Recharge’s drop-in and other evening sessions. That means that almost all young people in Tranent engage with Recharge. The secret of its success is the youth manager system, whereby young people who have been attending the youth work of Recharge become managers of the programme themselves. Many of them go on to become adult volunteers thereafter.
East Lothian Council can claim some credit because it runs a successful youth council, which is currently scripting, filming and producing a documentary on the impact of poverty in East Lothian. I take this opportunity to tell colleagues that the documentary will be shown in Parliament at a reception on 10 February; I hope that all colleagues will try to attend.
I feel obliged to speak about the other awards that Jackson Carlaw just mentioned—the John Muir awards—which are very successful and have seen 68 per cent growth in five years. They were, of course, inspired by the life and example of John Muir from Dunbar in East Lothian. Not surprisingly, one of the most enthusiastic participants in the awards is Dunbar primary school.
I want to take a couple of minutes to say a little bit more about our amendment. Although the minister’s response has not been entirely negative, I am slightly disappointed. Our amendment is an attempt to look at the success of the youth awards and at what the next step should be. The review itself says that such work is required:
“The Awards Network has limited capacity in its current form and funding model to improve and increase its scope further.”
Here is a success, but the review states that the awards will need some support to move on.