This is the second of two articles about the transition from the British Youth Council’s to the launch of Youth Council UK (YCUK) in the new year. The first was ‘The Journey so Far. In this follow up my aim is to explore some of the recommendations of the National Youth Association’s (NYA) consultation report ‘What the Future Holds’ (WTFH). The aim of these articles is to stimulate debate on new membership categories, governance and management arrangements, as we await the publication of the Government’s response (Youth Strategy) to its own #youthvoice consultation.
‘What the Future Holds’: Recommendations reviewed
The 18 recommendations are clustered around nine topic headings and summarised below on the NYA website. which is what I’ve used below for brevity, but you can read the full text of the recommendations in the WTFH report here. Some were a continuation of the existing principles and practice. I’ve tried to highlight only those areas where proposed changes merit some reflection, and when I refer to previous practice at BYC, this is from my experience between 2008-2016, not more recently.
Most of the recommendations start with a call to “Establish” or “Develop” models, frameworks, terms of reference, policies, procedures, which a future working group or first wave of members would need to take forward with more detailed proposals for a reborn structure to consider. NYA’s team are currently taking these forward. The old BYC had a Rule Book, Constitution (Mem and Arts), Code of Conduct, Annual Reviews, Policies, and Procedures that could still serve as a starting point, but taking into account more specific recommendations. (NYA acquired BYC assets from the liquidators, and publicly available copies, along with BYC’s last Manifesto, and Youth Select Committee reports, are still available on the YVH website , Companies House, and the Charity Commission.
1/ Governance – “Establish a strong governance model; facilitate the election of a youth-led executive board; and develop a UK-wide advisory expert board, representing all four nations”.
This recommendation represents an innovative departure from the British Youth Council model, which previously had one charity board with the main executive function carried out by a CEO and staff team, who also acted as its advisors. The structure of the Board (formerly Management Committee) changed over the decades as BYC evolved, so the idea of another reset is not new. At the time of its closure the Board was exclusively made up of 13 young trustees aged 16-25 ( 6 were elected by members and 7 recruited by the board itself). None had to be from the membership, though there was a time when all members of the Management Board were elected from membership organisations). Expertise and advice were provided to the Board by a Secretary General/Director/ or CEO and the team, with discretion to invite external ad hoc attendance on input on legal and financial issues when required.
It’s worth remembering that the board was accountable to the Youth Council itself, ie, the membership as a whole, which once upon a time met twice a year, though this became an annual event – the Annual Council Meeting.
How will the advisory board advise? Will it join the board? Act as one to one mentors? Will they be recruited or allocated?
I suspect the first steps on this journey to good governance will involve co-production between older-led and youth-led stakeholders. However, this comes with an inherent power imbalance that will need mitigation, or as the ‘What the Future Holds’ report puts it, “An authentic youth-led organisation has to acknowledge the power dynamic issues that exist. A governance model needs to recognise this, address this and install mechanisms to respond appropriately”. This was one of my favourite parts of the report. It appears in the Governance section, but doesn’t feature in its recommendations. However, it represents a significant check and balance to reassure young leaders and perhaps should be treated as a recommendation, and will result in something being built into the new structure.
Elections by and from the membership would strengthen the relationship between young people and their Executive and Board. Independent non-voting advisors, which could, in my view, usefully include young alumni with board experience, would also strengthen the capacity of the board. The National Union of Students (itself a former member of BYC) has a mixed governance board of elected (young) and appointed (specialist) trustees. The Scottish Youth Parliament still elects all eight of its board from its membership aged 16-25, but has spaces for approximately 4-5 expert non-voting advisors, which are advertised and recruited by the board.
2/ Membership model – “Develop a structured UK-wide membership framework, involving a transparent membership fee structure; and create a network that amplifies youth voice”.
The basic youth representation membership appears to be the same as the previous BYC model. It had an Associate membership for non-voting supporters, and BYC provided support services and facilitated best practice sharing to strengthen the supporting network and quality of that support so as to better “amplify” youth voice. However, there is scope for proposals to refine the definitions of membership to capitalise on the wave of support for a rebuilt youth council, certainly in the first year, and I wouldnt be surprised to see new opportunities opening up – particularly in relation to the idea of recruiting an Expert Advisory board.
However, there is no proposed membership category for individual membership, something that previous reviews had frequently visited. My CEO job-interview task was to write and proposal to introduce it. Campaigners, or those that don’t have or want to be part of an organisation, or dont want or need to have a youth worker, or supporter, also want to have their voice be heard and seek other opportunities to do so, some they have initiated themselves.
The recent co-produced youthled consultation for the Govt Youth Strategy recognised the need to reach young people who were not in organisation, through focus groups, cafes, and surveys, and UKYP strengthened its mandate and lobbying power when it mobilised the Make Your Mark Poll to get the views of over a million individual young people across the UK, many of whom would not be a member of an organised group. Indeed any individual could step up to be elected as individual MYPs.
3/ Stakeholder engagement – develop a structured framework for youth representation across the UK, implement clear criteria for national organisations seeking representation, and create a five-year strategic plan
The report doesn’t distinguish the difference between these ‘stakeholders’ are from ‘members’. Are these stakeholders anyone or any organisations who works with young people? And do they include organisation who don’t work directly with young people but is part of the eco-system around it – funders, service providers, staff training organisations, decision-makers (Govt?/Local Govt?). Whilst these networks could be usefully brought together to share good practice, is this recommedation opening the door to supporters to be represented within the Council itself – or is these part of the network that supplies advisor. My own view is that this overlaps with the role of the Centre for Youth Voice, or a Back Youth Voice Alliance, which as allies and potential partners, could work alongside the youth led council. co-producing events, conferences and tools for good practice
4/ Service delivery – align all service delivery areas with a comprehensive business plan to keep focus on strategic priorities
This is the same as the previous BYC model. It’s what any charity/organisation should aspire to. The key takeway for me is who decides the strategic priorities (the Board proposes them to the Membership to prioritise in debate, the Board itself?) and who does the executive (team /management exec committee?) report back to, is accountable to for delivery and impact? (to the membership at its council meetings?)
5/ Funding – secure a five-year blended funding model incorporating grants, corporate partnerships, membership fees, and government funding
This statement is what Id expect many organisations to have as part of their fundraising strategy. The challenge is in the first word, “secure,” and who and how is best placed to achieve it. In a startup/restart scenario, there may be a need for extra investment to respond to the need for development and growth, recruitment, training, and support, perhaps including social and philanthropic investment. Other funding models, such as a semi-autonomous body or a cooperative, or not for profit social enterprise are potential options for the future.
6/ Equality, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging (EEDIB) – develop a comprehensive EEDIB strategy which aligns with the National Youth Council’s core values
Is there a connection between core values and membership criteria? I would expect any member to sign up for these. It might be worth revisiting the core values at an early stage, prior to the first round of recruitment of founding members.
7/ International work – “Ensure the successful delivery of the UK Young Ambassador (UKYA) programme and continued membership in the European Youth Forum and Commonwealth Youth Council”
Noting that NYA has been hosting this programme, so there are existing networks and support to build on. The original terms of office and mandate from BYC members for the current wave of UK Young Ambassadors may have passed, but fresh elections from the membership could be an easy win/first step.
8/ Academic research and higher education collaborations – “Create opportunities for young researchers and investigate youth engagement in constitutional democracy and their influence on devolved policy decisions”
This was a surprise recommendation to me. But it followed a round table of some academics as part of the consultation and may very well be a be an area to explore. Im again reminded of the work of the Centre for Youth Voice, and other collaborations with academics and research – eg Votes at 16.
Matters arising/Any Other Business?
By way of rounding off this brief review of the recommendations I’d like to draw attention to a couple of other points that might be relevant going forward.
A new age for youthvoice?
When working as a consultant to organisations that want to mobilise their #youthvoice, I will usually want to clarity two key points: ‘what is your purpose?’ and ‘whose young voices are we talking about?’ and by that I mean what’s the age range. The WTFH report reaffirms the purpose and benefits of having a national youth council which I’m sure new members will reference in setting their priorities when developing a business plan. The recommendations don’t appear to propose a change to the age-range of young people (BYCs was previously up to and including 25, for both those in its membership, participating in activities and representing them in elected roles ).
However, the majority of young people participating in its activities were generally clustered around the traditional youth work target group of 16-19, but were open and attracted some younger and older. This wasnt just those aged up to 25 with particular needs, but all young people up to 25, and delegations to full Council meetings frequently included those in their early 20’s, depending on the age range of the youth organisation they were representing, and whether it continued to have roles for volunteers in their 20s. Those elected to governance roles were still their peers but starting from 16, which is the age you must be to qualify as a trustee/director, up to 25.
Manifesto and Mandate.
As well as recruiting a membership to give an elected mandate to a management committee/governance board, we mustn’t delay the process for giving a mandate for a youthvoice manifesto and priority campaigns/social action. Although there has been no national forum for 18 months, we do have information on their issues. There was a BYC manifesto 2023/24. Other Youthled structures have manifestos (UKYP, SYP ) – and when the Government publishes its Youth Strategy consultation, we will have a wish list that the Youth Council can continue to hold the Government to account, on behalf of those consulted. And surely it will be one of the first items on the Youth Council agenda is to convene a debate and vote on its priority issues.
Conclusion
The challenge going forward is huge! Funding, staffing, convening… and there will other things to consider after the end of the first couple of year. Review, evaluation, impact. A massive ammount of time and energy has already gone into this over the last 18 months, and the current team will have lots more to do going forward. But the potential is also huge and the social dividend hard to imagine, to not only restore but to build back better and to a higher level of youth participation, representation and influence in public life – with young leaders leading their national youth council.
ENDS236
ik