Meeting for the Young People Aged 14-17 year olds

Opinion is divided on what caused, fuelled or dampened the riots this summer and both Young Advisors and the Community and Victims Panel are keen to hear from young people.

Communities and Victims Panel (CVP) are asking Young Advisors to run an event targeted at under-represented young people at which one or more CVP panel members will attend. We will be holding two meetings to explore the thoughts and opinions young people have on the issue.  One for 14-17 year olds and the other with 18 -24 year olds. Both meetings are targeted at young people who do not normally engage.

The broad aims of the sessions are:

- To understand from participants why they didn't engage in the riots 
- Why they think young people/their peers did (and perhaps what motivated them)
- What messages should be sent / What we can do to make sure it does not happen again.

Attendance - 15 young people per session. Also one or two members from the CVP to attend. We have a few places for accompanying adults to attend with the young people, but space is limited and the focus of the event will be the young people.

Timing - The events are being run during October half term (Monday 24th) and in sufficient time to inform the publication of their interim report (Please see below).  The event will start at 1pm with lunch with the session starting at 2pm prompt.

Travel expenses -  Reasonable travel expenses will be covered

Event - The attendees will be welcomed by a member of the CVP who will provide an introductory talk detailing the aims of the panel, and the hopes for the meeting that day. Participants will then be broken up into small break out groups to answer specific questions (linked to the broad aims of the session as set out above) before coming together and feeding back to the panel (and other participants). Discussion at these events is likely to inform the publication of the panel's interim and final report which are respectively due for publication in November 2011 and March 2012. 

http://riotspanel.independent.gov.uk/ provides further details of the panel's remit.

For more information, please contact Gary Buxton: gary@youngadvisors.org.uk or call 0161 850 1077