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5. Empowering and Engaging Young People
It is vital that young people are fully involved in planning services, including youth work opportunities. Meaningful youth participation in decision-making is clearly important if we want to develop policies that work at local and national levels. Many local, regional and national organisations have structures in place to encourage young people to represent the views of their peers in shaping their work. We have seen excellent examples of increased involvement of young people in decision-making across the country. We recognise that youth work has an important role in supporting this involvement.
Almost all the services provided by local authorities and their community planning partners have some impact on young people. So it is vital to include them, along with others in their communities, in decisions made on the public services which affect them.
The statutory guidance for community planning recognises this and mentions young people and youth work
bodies as examples of groups who should be engaged in community planning. The Scottish Executive will shortly publish an advice note on engaging children and young people in community planning. Also, Communities Scotland has produced National Standards for Community Engagement, which apply to work with young people, as well as wider communities. These developments can help build on some of the promising examples already being developed by community planning partnerships across Scotland.
Q24: What more can be done at national, local and organisational levels to make sure that young people can participate in decisions that affect them?
Youth empowerment is another vital part of developing confident and contributing citizens. Scotland is also already recognised internationally as a supporter of youth empowerment, hosting the World Youth Congress in 2005. We have developed unique opportunities for young people's voices to be heard, such as the Scottish Youth Parliament ( SYP). We have seen a recent example of the SYP working in more innovative ways by piloting online elections for Members of the Scottish Youth Parliament ( MSYPs). This type of election increases the number of young people voting and helps to make the SYP more representative. We know that these online elections involved considerable input from community learning and development workers locally and we are very pleased to see that level of commitment.
At national level, we want to build on these efforts. The Scottish Executive agreed last year to make extra funding available to the SYP to help them become more representative. We are also keen that the SYP continues to be led by young people. We have encouraged them to resolve their complex governance arrangements to ensure that decisions are made by people elected by their members. The SYP is rising to that challenge and is now focusing on active engagement with young people across Scotland. It is turning its attention to working more with young people individually and through local representative structures, such as pupil councils and youth forums.
The SYP says it wants to focus on consulting with young people in Scotland and representing their views at national level. We strongly support that and would be interested to hear any views on how best to support them to achieve these aims.
Q25: What more can be done at local or national level to support the Scottish Youth Parliament ( SYP) to engage with and represent young people in Scotland?
Case Study: Respected & Responsible Ruchazie, Easterhouse 
Youth work opportunities can give young people the chance to get involved in their own communities. Instead of hanging around getting bored, they can get involved in projects that actively support other young people and make their communities a better place to live. By taking responsibility they can become highly respected in their own communities and great role models for younger kids.
The Ruchazie Conservation Project in Easterhouse, Glasgow, has shown how young people can change the culture in their community. Ruchazie has a history of multiple indicators of deprivation with territorial problems resulting in gang fighting and community disruption. Staff working with the youth group in the local community centre aim to divert young people's interest into positive activities, sparking their enthusiasm and giving them a sense of pride in their community.
During the school holiday week in October 2005, a conservation project brought together young people from all three areas of Ruchazie. They worked with adult volunteers to create a green space from waste ground round the community centre. They also redesigned and redecorated the outside of the building, using vibrant colours and murals. Now the local community can make more use of the centre, because it looks more welcoming and feels safer.
Having a stake in the programme has given the young people more pride in their local environment and has made them more tolerant of others from different areas.
John (16) said:
"We've all had a laugh and it will make us respect the centre more and will stop us from vandalising it."
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