BIG INTERVIEW: Power to the young people - David Cutler, director, Carnegie Young People Initiative
Wednesday, February 19, 2003
David Cutler, director of the Carnegie Young People Initiative, is talking about youth participation, the shorthand term for getting young people's voices heard and giving them more power in public decision-making. But despite a widespread change in attitude, practice on the ground is still very patchy. And that is where Cutler hopes, through the Carnegie Initiative, to make a difference.
"Since 1999 it has been our ambition to press this agenda, to make youth participation an accepted part of youth work and of social policy," says Cutler, who is also a strong supporter of the Votes at 16 campaign currently gaining momentum.
The Carnegie UK Trust, of which the initiative is a part, is putting its money where its mouth is. Literally. Although not the first, it is among a vanguard of major UK trusts to give young people a real say in grant-making decisions (see news, page 5). For the first time, at its grant-giving meeting in June, where up to 100,000 will be allocated to youth projects around the country, young people will have the same decision-making power as the main board of trustees. Around 250,000 a year in Carnegie grants will be made in this way.
Cutler says that, although participation is now firmly on the agenda at many major organisations, there is still a huge variation in the standards and degree of participation that is actually achieved.
"There is no single model that is right for all situations," he says.
"But there are some common elements of practice emerging. During the next three years, we will be supporting a lot of projects that seek to establish young people's participation as being of a high quality and enduring."
One example of support by the trust is work at the University of York social policy research unit on patient advice and liaison schemes in the NHS.
"These schemes tend to be very adult-oriented, so we will be looking at ways to make them more friendly to young people," says Cutler.
Another theme will be to communicate standards of training for participation workers and for the young people who seek to become involved in public decision-making. This will involve members of the initiative's action group visiting providers around the country to see if the training on offer meets their needs.
"The action group's members are aged 13 to 24, and they take part in youth councils, children's rights and other participation projects," says Cutler.
The trust also plans to set up a network that will organise seminars, an internet message board and a directory of projects to support communication and to help convey best practice (YPN, 12 February).
The trust already supports a similar network in Scotland, which is run by Children in Scotland. Although the Carnegie initiative will initially administer the English network, Cutler hopes he will be able to hand this over to the network's participants in due course.
"Youth participation is evolving very quickly," says Cutler. "More participation workers are being employed and it is becoming more professional. But there are a lot of questions arising from that process. What makes youth participation work distinctive from youth work? Is there a need for a specific qualification in youth participation work? Does it need to become more defined and uniform, with laid-down standards, or is it fine as it is?" Stovin Hayter
FYI
- The Carnegie Young People Initiative started getting involved in the field of young people's participation in 1999
- In June 2001, it published an influential report, Taking the Initiative, promoting the involvement of young people in public decision-making in the UK
- A range of publications, fact sheets and guides is available on the web site, www.carnegie-youth.org.uk
- The first of four seminars organised by the network for youth participation workers will take place in London on 30 April. Others will follow around the country. For information, contact Sandra Mills on 020 7401 5460.