300,000 young people missing out on youth work services, analysis finds
Fiona Simpson
Wednesday, June 17, 2020
At least 300,000 young people are missing out on vital youth services due to the impact of lockdown on organisations, results from the national data standard for youth work in the UK show.
The standard, which launched last month, has so-far garnered responses from 177 youth organisations across the UK.
It is being coordinated by The Centre for Youth Impact with key stakeholders across the sector, including the National Youth Agency (NYA), UK Youth, the Network of Regional Youth Work Units - England, Young People’s Foundations Trust, John Lyon’s Charity, the National Lottery Community Fund, and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
The aim of the initiative is to provide a simple process for youth work organisations to provide information about their situation, and develop a national picture of the current challenges faced by the sector as a whole.
The most recent results of the survey show that at least 300,000 young people have not been reached by services since coronavirus lockdown measures were imposed in March.
However, a report on the findings by the Centre for Youth Impact warns this figure could be much higher across all youth organisations.
It states: “Scaled up to encompass the sector as a whole, this number is likely to be over seven figures.”
More than two thirds (68 per cent) of respondents to the survey said that more than half of their provision had stopped or paused since lockdown - for 40 per cent, this was ‘most’ or ‘all’.
Similarly, 68 per cent of respondents reported that they were engaging less than half of the young people they had been prior to lockdown, the results show.
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The standard also found that organisations working with young people disproportionately affected by Covid-19 including those from black, Asian and ethnic minority backgrounds, young people with disabilities or underlying health issues and those who are homeless are more likely to have concerns over the medium and long-term future of their services.
The report states: “The degree of concern over stability was registered in the 70 per cent of respondents who felt the level of risk to their reserves is ‘medium’ or ‘high’. This figure is nearly 80 per cent for the sub-set of organisations who report working with young people that are disproportionately affected by Covid-19.
“While this is clearly a subjective assessment, it is indicative of a broad uncertainty and anxiety about the medium to long term.”
Bethia McNeil, chief executive of the Centre for Youth Impact, said: “We, along with our colleagues across the youth sector, are extremely concerned by the picture emerging from these data, which indicates that significant numbers of young people across the UK are not being reached during this crisis.
"We are also worried that the impact of the crisis appears to be more severe for organisations supporting young people most likely to be affected by Covid-19. We will continue to work with our partners and networks to develop the data standard further, in order to build a clear picture of the ongoing impact of the pandemic on young people and the organisations that exist to support them.”
