Agenda and draft minutes

Apologies for absence are noted above.

Councillor Members of the Youth Cabinet are asked whether they have any interest in any item on the agenda and if so, to formally declare that interest.

There were no declarations of interest made at the meeting.

The Minutes of the last meeting held on 18 July 2024 are attached.

The minutes of the previous meeting held on the 18 July 2024 were agreed and signed by the Chair.

Scout Stirling gave an update about the vaping sculpture and reported that an artist and the funding for the sculpture has now been sourced. The Youth Service need to source the used vapes for the sculpture.

Samir provided an update on the Student Council Project and reported that they have put together some guidelines and are awaiting approval for these. Kael has been working hard with Bury Church High School to pilot the project as Bury Church High School did not have a student council. They will see how the pilot goes before rolling it out to other high schools.

Jen Mills provided an update around the Co-Production Kite Mark and reported that over the last year the Youth Cabinet have been working on creating the Co-Production Kite Mark and it has now been signed off by the Children’s Strategic Partnership Board. The Youth Cabinet is at a point where we can approach partners around issuing them with a bronze, silver or gold award around how their co-production with young people. There is work to be completed around setting up the panel of young people and working through what the training will look like. It is hoped by the February half term the panel can undertake the first Kite Mark assessment. There have been 3 partners which have put themselves forward for the assessment which are the Corporate Parenting Services, Early Break and the Youth Service.

Councillor Smith suggested that on reflection from the last Circles of Influence Event, the Youth Cabinet should challenge the Police, Community Safety Team and Transport Team to take part in the Co-Production Kite Mark.

Samir advised that he sits of the Greater Manchester Police (GMP) Youth Advisory Panel every month which is linked to Youth Focus North West. Daniel suggested collaborating with the Greater Manchester Youth Combined Authority (GMYCA) around the GMP Youth Advisory Panel. Jen Mills reported that Heather Walton, Youth Service had been attending meetings to look at how the Youth Advisory Board will be shaped across the North West.

Adele Crowshaw reported that a new date has been set for the Circles of Influence event, which had been previously postponed. The invites are currently being sent out to professionals and schools. The chosen circles this year are:-

• Transport
• Education and life skills
• Crime and safety
• Places to go and safe spaces
• Mental health and wellbeing

Adele Crowshaw asked Youth Cabinet members to split up into group and look at questions and themes that they may wish to ask on the day in the circles and share their ideas around these. Each group fed back their ideas and recorded their thoughts on flip chart paper.

Jen Mills, agreed to circulate the action plan from the Circles of Safety Event ahead of the Circles of Influence Event for the young people to look at around feeling safe. 

Jen Mills provided an update in relation to the revitalisation of the Children and Young Persons Plan and Strategy and reported that at the Children’s Strategic Partnership Board a discussion took place around how they can better support young people across the borough as the strategy is due for a re-fresh this year. The Children’s Strategic Partnership Board would like to involve young people in the creation of the new strategy to look at what they can do better, to create the safety plans for young people. The discussion were around creating thematic pieces of information rather than a reporting body, which is a slight shift in approach to the current strategy. The idea would be for Youth Cabinet to look at the strategic plans and break it down in a way that all young people can understand it across the borough.

This update was provided within the Co-production Kite Mark and Revitalisation of the CYP Plan and Strategy items.

Scout Stirling, SEND and Inclusion Ambassador - Youth Service to provide an update.

Link to SEND Improvement and Assurance Board information - Bury’s Improvement Journey Information - Bury Council

Scout Stirling provided an update around the SEN Improvement and Assurance Board. Following the SEND Ofsted inspection there were 6 priority action plans developed and 6 themes that Bury Council had to improve on. Since the inspection, there has been a SEND Improvement and Assurance Board developed and a young people’s working group which sits underneath the Board. There are currently 9 young people who attend the group, they have updated their group name to ‘Bury Change Makers’. At the last Bury Change Makers Group agenda items discussed were around a trip to the GM Combined Offices in Manchester to meet other Young People in GM, planning a visit to all of the high schools in Bury to ensure the voice of all YPs across the borough are being heard. Scout Stirling advised of creating promotional material on behalf of the group.

In response to a Youth Member’s question around the plans to promote the work of Bury Change Makers, Scout advised that she was planning on writing a letter to schools that can be sent home to parents, plans to visit schools and place posters online and across the borough.

The Chair agreed to re-order the agenda.

Daniel provided an update from the September and October GMCA meetings and advised that discussions took place around transport and the Bee Network expansion, crimes and GM reform, good employment and the refresh of the Youth agreement.

Scout Stirling asked youth members if they would like to sign up to develop a training session to be delivered to Police Officers around talking to teenagers and advised them of the dates if they wished to take part.

Youth Cabinet members took part in the debate, there was a side for and against.

It was agreed by a majority vote that more high schools should not be academised.

It was agreed:

The next debate topic is: ‘Is the commercialisation of Christmas a good thing?’.