Live webchat with Big Society Minister Nick Hurd MP

[KatieMumsnet]

Hi

We're pleased to welcome Nick Hurd MP, Minister for Civil Society, for a webchat on the government's National Citizen Service on Thursday 8th March from 1pm- 2pm. Also joining us will be 16-year-old Kiran Dhingra-Smith from Stratford, London, who recently completed the programme with National Citizen Service Provider the Football League Trust.

The National Citizen Service aims to aims to encourage integration of young people from diverse backgrounds helping them learn new life skills - and both our guests are looking forward to answering your questions on the programme.

Do post your question live on Thursday, but as ever, if you're not able to join us - please do post away below.

Best

MNHQ

@thebestisyettocome

Hi Nick and Kiran.

I wonder what you both think of the idea of National Service for young people? What if there was a compulsary programme for young people to do things they were interested in whether it's military training or community work. Is this something that's been mooted at Government level Nick?

Good luck with your A levels Kiran

Hi thebestisyettocome

This whole thing started from a challenge that David Cameron posed back in 2005. He said ( and I paraphrase) " We are not very good in this country at helping young people make the transition to adulthood . Can we design a modern version of national service that has no military aspect but which invites young people from very different backgrounds to share a common experience that stretches and challenges them and helps them develop skills they will need? " That is what we are trying to do. No plans to make it compulsory. We want to make it so good that everyone wants to do it.

@thebestisyettocome

Hi Nick and Kiran.

I wonder what you both think of the idea of National Service for young people? What if there was a compulsary programme for young people to do things they were interested in whether it's military training or community work. Is this something that's been mooted at Government level Nick?

Good luck with your A levels Kiran

Personally I loved NCS , I've made friends from the summer who i still keep in touch with now and are actually some of my good friends. It gives you oppurtunities that you would never think were there. E.g one of my friends now does journalism thanks to NCS.
Thanks for wishing me good luck

Will you be supporting other similar programmes, such as the Guide and Scout movements, the DofE scheme etc. ?

@JugglingWithTangentialOranges

As it's International Women's Day today (and this is a web-chat on Mumsnet) can you tell us how the scheme specifically helps young women ?

Hi JugglingwithTangentialOranges

Happy International Women's day to all. Kiran , sitting next to me, is well placed to give you a personal answer. All I will say is some of the most positive voices I have heard have come from young women who took part last year.

This all sounds lovely and great for the young people involved, I'm all for boosting confidence BUT at a time when more young people are volunteering than ever before what is the real worth of this scheme? How do you plan to engage those kids who have no motivation or desire to be part of their community?

Hi - Yes, she did give me a great personal answer, thanks !

Thanks for the answers. I was wondering if this was some sort of way of the Government wanting to head towards compulsary National Service...

It's lovely to hear your enthusiasm Kiran.

@Merrylegs

Yikes, hope I am not too late to this and have only skimmed thread but ..

My son did this NCS last summer after his GCSEs. Or rather - he tried to. Here in Norfolk it was called One Big Summer and it sounded really good. A bit of fun, some community work, a graduation - something structured yet useful in the downtime after GCSEs and before the holdays 'proper' started.

In reality it was a massive letdown.

Because it wasn't delivered properly.

Here the Youth Service has been cut, there are no Youth Workers, so the very people who had the infrastucture, the peer group contacts, the understanding of young people weren't around to deliver it.

It was handed over to a football club who are great at summer schools and fun but were beyond useless at recruiting and engaging with the very group they were trying to reach. My 16 year old was really up for the volunteering side of things and not so interested in the PGL adventure camp (kind of too old now) but all the time the emphasis was on the fun and they really played down the community side as a 'boring' add on. It was woeful actually. It seemed as if they just didn't believe in the whole thing and as a concsequence found it really hard to recruit any young people.

My point is, you can't have the 'big ideas' and the 'big society' without an understanding of who is actually going to facilitate and deliver these ideas.

Hi Merrylegs

That is really interesting feedback and i will take it up with that particular provider. The honest truth is that last year we were piloting it and predictably some providers and some experiences were better than others. Overall we are delighted with the positive feedback we had , but we know that we have to berelentless in quality standards. The point you make about people delivering it is crucial: it is always people that make the difference.

I think it's more of a positive alternative to bringing back National Service - as many older people suggest that would be a good idea, but younger people have misgivings about the military aspect (as would I)

@dollymixtures

This all sounds lovely and great for the young people involved, I'm all for boosting confidence BUT at a time when more young people are volunteering than ever before what is the real worth of this scheme? How do you plan to engage those kids who have no motivation or desire to be part of their community?

Speaking from a kids view and seeing people I know have no motivation I'd say to get them engaged do something they actually want to do!
Your group decides on what they want to do for the community side and if the kids choose it all they're in charge of their own doings, but ofcourse being overseen to it aswell. Also there's more sides to the community then people imagine and guranteed they won't know every part. So if some things were to be chucked at them (verbally) and they brainstorm it, they'd hopefully be able to find something they may enjoy doing.

@Jenski

Great delegation of responsibility above to Boffinmum!

Unfortunately, the government has the overall responsibility and are 'in the know' long before the tax payer. The average tax payer faces many challenges caused by decisions made by the government. There is much talk of 'different' backgrounds, but surely that is because there are so many rich public school Tories who haven't got a clue what life is like for a large percentage of the population.

Hi Jenski

Yes Government has a big responsibility but we should not delegate all responsibility to them . Everyone has the power to make a difference.

In my experience , the ' rich public school' kids get as much out of NCS as anyone. They need to see the wider world and be connected with their social responsibility. It's for everyone

Do you think the money for this project would be better handed to schools, who know their pupils and therefore can provide opportunities for all?

Thanks Kiran, I have to say you sound very motivated already and I suspect would be doing great things regardless of this opportunity

I'm wondering how you get people even interested in applying - you said you were the only one from your school to get involved. How do you think that could be changed?

Juggling.
See my last post. I too would also have problems with the military aspect which is why I wanted to know if this was going to be some sort of forerunner to NS...

@JugglingWithTangentialOranges

Will you be supporting other similar programmes, such as the Guide and Scout movements, the DofE scheme etc. ?

Hi JugglingWithTangentialOranges

Good point. Interestingly very few of the young people who took part last year had got involved with any of the other programmes. So I think there is an opportunity here. NCS can light a spark in a young person which then needs nurturing. I am very keen that we connect NCS graduates with the opportunity to get involved in other programmes. So for example there are 30,000 kids waiting to get onto Scouts : they cant because there are not enough leaders. I hope that some NCS graduates will be motivated to become young Scout leaders

By the way if anyone wants more information on NCS , the new website is www.nationalcitizenservice.direct.gov.uk

Please do take it up! Norfolk was divided into four areas -(North, South, East and West actually!) Only one area was half way interested - the rest were useless. There were meant to be four different schemes - in the end they were amalgamated into one, and most of the kids came from one particular high school - they obviously had a good liason person.

Interestingly enough, when I dropped my son off for the first week of the scheme, the organiser said they had just had a phone call from a NCS in East London asking if they could send a group of their young people to Norfolk for the week as their scheme had collapsed somehow. They were going to put these kids on a train to Norwich that day! It was a real mess tbh.

(I am glad you had a good experience, Kiran. That's exactly the kind of thing my 16 year old was looking for but it didn't happen here.)

@Jenski

Do you think the money for this project would be better handed to schools, who know their pupils and therefore can provide opportunities for all?

Personally I dont think so, as you want to get away from school!
And if you've just finished your GCSE exams there's nothing keeping you there anymore , the summer holidays are yours! Because until college you can't really do anything that much, thats why i think this is good because it gives you different oppurtunities which frankly a secondary school wouldnt be able to give you and definitly wouldn't give the same impact as from a new place.

I'm sure it's a similar situation within the Guide movement - my daughter's group is currently looking for new leaders in order to continue for example.

I definitely agree with Kiran on that one. My daughter's school is not a place she's want to spend a summer at age 16.

We need Kate Middleton to champion the Guides and not just the Scouts !!

I've got to admit to not being wild about my tax being used to enable 'rich public school kids' to see the wider world . I might be wrong but I would think they have enough access to opportunity without being handed more at a time when libraries are being shut, elderly people are choosing between heat and food, etc, etc

Hi again guys,
I'm actually writing this here now to say bye, its been really fun being on mumsnet and well thank you for having me and giving me questions to answer

Take care

I have run out of time!. Very conscious that I have not answered all the questions which is partly down to my slow typing. I will do my best to answer the other questions later on and Mumsnet have kindly offered to post them.

Thanks for having me and for your interest in NCS: it is still at pilot stage but we are very excited about it , and the vast majority of the young people and parents I spoke to said it was a great use of time post GCSEs.

Signing off

Or should that be The duchess of Cambridge !