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28/04/04 - Youngsters have their say

Youngsters have been telling Cumbria county councillors about the issues that affect them as the citizenship part of their curriculum is brought alive in their classroom. Members of the county council’s local committee for Barrow visited Dowdales School in Dalton-in-Furness today and yesterday as part of the committee’s Forum For Youth programme.   

Councillor Alan Nicholson, chair of the Barrow local committee, said:   

"This is an extremely valuable event. We are picking up the matters that concern young people in the area and also we hope we are bringing local government alive to them and fostering an interest which they will maintain into adulthood.   

"We believe that our Forum For Youth programme may be unique by sending councillors out into the schools in the area to listen to what young people have to say. It fits in with the citizenship element of the national curriculum and we hope it will help reverse locally the worrying national trend of disengagement with local government, which is shown in poor turnouts in local elections." 

"We were very impressed with the young people we met and shall take their concerns into account."   

Councillor Nicholson, Councillor Peter Phizacklea and Councillor Bill Smith met 240 year seven pupils at the school today and yesterday. Among the issues they raised were graffiti and litter.   

Under the Forum For Youth programme councillors will visit all the schools in the Barrow district. The idea for it arose when a consultation was being carried out in Ormsgill and Parkside. Council officers found young people were enthusiastic about many issues affecting not only themselves, but their community as a whole. The Forum For Youth programme aims to make contact easier between the council and young people, who may find it difficult to use other methods of access such as neighbourhood forums held in the evening.