Young people and the local council at Waltham Forest felt strongly that there should be a formal opportunity to discuss the recent rioting in London with youth groups engaged with the local authority, local councillors and senior members of the police force. Waltham Forest, although affected by the disturbances, wasn't as deeply affected as other London Boroughs - it was felt that this was due to the strong links within the local community

The event, organised by the Youth Involvement officer Jane Brueseke and Councillor Karen Bellamy, was incredibly successful with over 20 councillors and 20 young people attending as well as two senior police inspectors. It was moved to the council chamber because of numbers and the adults present were very impressed with the positive work that young people from the Youth Involvement groups had been doing.

Young Advisor and former Waltham Forest Young MP Abbas co-chaired the meeting with Cllr Karen Bellamy. Young Advisor Oshien gave an overview of the three youth involvement groups actively working with the local authority with members present at the debate; Young Advisors (YAs), Youth Independent Advisory Group (YIAG) and the Press Gang.

Cllr Karen Bellamy asked how the Council can engage young people better and Abbas chaired the debate which included several points:

• Zara talked about police presence in the colleges, the lack of youth clubs and organising events for young people

• Rhian suggested that before organising events, look at offering opportunities for young people like employment and training, and give young people a chance to be involved in society.

• Courtney pointed out that when they trained young offenders they told the YIAG they felt people didn’t care about them.

• Wendy made the point that it all starts with education

• Rickisha felt that with stop and search, young black people were stereotyped.

• Simone talked about how some rap and associated young people’s websites (Spiff TV) were negative

• Shehnaz said that the people at the event today showed that young people can be mature and resilient and want to move forward from the riots.

• Chief Inspector Andy Norfolk, the Met’s lead on children and young people said that the adults in the room were very proud of the young people at the meeting and the work they do which resulted in a large round of applause from everyone in the room. He would like young people to be more involved in police training and would like a two-way dialogue working for improvement. He would also like to meet with young people once a month.

• Cllr Laurence Wedderburn said he would like more police links in schools, so young people start to see the person rather than the uniform.

• Zara explained that the YIAG had monitored their training of the TSG and the stop and searches - they had initially found a lack of communication and stereotypes of young people. Discussions after training with the YIAG said it had created more understanding between young people and the police.

• Inspector Andy Bovingdon, who is in charge of the Met’s schools officers and Youth Offending team officers, said he had very positive feedback from the training of his officers – they had said it was one of the most valuable things they’d done and it made them understand young people more. He also highlighted initiatives like the Kickz project, supported by the Met, Leyton Orient and Tottenham Hotspur which he felt needed to be publicised more. He wondered how young people could communicate their ideas more with the Met? Perhaps we could we all meet regularly?

• The Mayor, Cllr Geofffrey Walker, recorded his thanks and said well done to the young people and suggested possibly making use of the council chamber for future meetings.

• Cllr Claire Coghill said we should think about how to engage more young people on Safer Neighbourhood Team ward panels, she also said ward walks with young people are really useful.

• YIAG member Gemma asked a question to the councillors in the room; “How are you going to go forward and communicate all the good work we have been doing?”

• Cllr Bellamy said all councillors who participated in the YA councillor training signed pledge cards (to engage more with young people, go into schools, etc.) which could be followed up. There was also the suggestion from the police of regular meetings with young people. Cllr Bellamy and Cllr Vincent pledged to take all issues forward.

Young Advisors Rickisha and Katy gave an introduction to the work of the Young Advisors.Young Advisors are aged between 13 and 21 and trained, qualified and paid as consultants to Waltham Forest Council on how to make services better and engage with other young people and communities.
Tasneem spoke about the Big-Clean up project: Every year the Young Advisors carry out a piece of work that they decide on together with the Council Leader. They decided to organise an intergenerational ‘Big Clean Up’ as part of the ‘Wipe it Out’ enviro-crime campaign. The Young Advisors recruited 34 people from friends, family, and the community of all ages and chose Ive Farm Lane to do a mixture of path clearing, mural painting and weed cutting. This brought people of different ages together in a positive way. A local area was significantly improved and it was a good exercise to build community cohesion.

Danyal spoke about councillor training; ward forums provide an opportunity to develop the way that young people are engaged in decision making in their local area. Cllr Bellamy, Cllr Vincent, the Young Advisors team and the Youth Engagement Officer worked to design a workshop that would explore this issue. The workshops were delivered by the Young Advisors. All councillors that attended the event designed a personal action plan for engaging with young people in their local area and the feedback from the training will inform the overall action planning for ward forums.

Shehnaz spoke about the mystery shopping for sexual health services for the PCT. Young Advisors ‘mystery-shopped’ sexual health services for young people at the Oliver Road polyclinic. They found clinic times not compatible with young people, i.e: clinic times were 9-11am so young people would have to ‘bunk’ from school or college or share something personal and there were also issues with reception arrangements, including a lack of privacy. However, once young people got through to the nurse or doctor they received a good service. This was presented to LBWF scrutiny panel and recommendations were made back to the PCT.

Shebaz spoke about the census project: the Young Advisors supported democratic services to promote completion of the census. Training was delivered to 20 Young Advisors and 20 young people from targeted schools (i.e. those with large communities historically less likely to fill in the census) to become ‘Census Ambassadors’. Outreach work from the Census Ambassadors was extremely varied. It included talks at mosques and churches; conversations with neighbours; awareness-raising with parents at parents’ evenings; discussions at parents’ work places and engagement with friends and extended families. Over 800 households were engaged as part of this project. As there are 89,788 households in Waltham Forest, the ambassadors directly engaged with just under 1% of the total population. It is clear from these results that this project had a large impact on our local communities. Of the people spoken to, only 60% initially intended to complete the census. However, after engaging with these people, 97% intended to complete it. This means that an additional 290 families/households (0.3% of the population) intended to fill out the census as a result of this project. However, this does not include any ‘snowballing’ effect from people telling others about the census, and we would therefore expect the actual result to be much higher.

Oshien spoke about meeting with the minister Andrew Stunell MP. The young Advisors hosted a visit from Andrew Stunnell MP who was exploring how young people were making the ‘Big Society’ a reality in their borough. The minister said at the event: "There is nothing 'big' about a society that doesn't include young people, and Waltham Forest's Young Advisors are showing the value of their voice and a real appetite for making an active contribution. The team are an inspiration for other young people to speak up and have their say in their local communities."