Report of Lightup Conference

Programme theme: A new strategy to tackle anti-social behaviour amongst the youth

Programme date: 28th August 2008-09-28 Time: 11am-2pm

Venue: Princess Diana trust, County Hall Westminster Bridge Road London.

Lightup held its conference on “the new strategies to approaching the issue of anti-social behaviour amongst the youths” the conference took place at the Diana Princess of Whales hall within the County hall located on the Westminster bridge road in London.

Stakeholders and participants were invited from various sectors and they include Charles Emeka, Micheal Jervice from the Damilola Taylor trust, Steven Hammond a youth pastor from the Redeem Christian church of God, Debbie Ariyo from Africans unite against child abuse AFRUCA, Margret Fergus a parenting coordinator from the Lambeth council Doctor Sholarin a senior lecturer from the University of Westminster.

The programme started with a brief introduction from the C E O, and a statement of appreciation directed towards the invited guest and speakers.

Debbie Ariyo was later invited to speak on “Tackling anti-social behaviour amongst youths, the root cause and solution”. She stressed the need to safeguard and also creating awareness on endangered children in a bid to tackle the root causes of youth crime in the African community. She addressed the lack of knowledge and awareness of the government on the issues that relates to the African Caribbean community.

She indicated that the level of crime as not changed but the nature has become more dangerous i.e. knife and gun crime, physical assaults and attacks. The reason is not far fetched from the fact that people migrate and find it challenging to fit into a new society, migrant relocate and face depressing situations, they are confronted with the challenges of fitting into the new environment, especially young people relocating from conflict zones (children soldiers) therefore their lives are completely changed and they feel alienated by this new society.

Poverty

The young people try to adopt various means to survive, some become prostitutes, she suggested that there is a need to think of aid and support for parents coming to the U K and also supporting children that live in complete poverty because they are not legal migrant in the country since they were brought in illegally and they live with the fear of facing deportation, when such people seek help there should be a means of supporting such people.

The second speaker Margret Fergus the Parenting Coordinator of Lambeth youth offending team was invited to speak on the topic “Empowering the family to help prevent youth crimes”
Her speech was based on encouraging the government to support parents struggling to look after their children.

Helping parents to work on their self esteem.

She encouraged parents to be more pro-active, by going to visit their children in school, she encouraged parents to communicate more with their children and not give up on their children.

Dr Sholarin was the third speaker, his speech was based on “How the community can engage with the youths to reduce anti-social behaviour in the community”, he suggested that the government should

Fund the black community more. He identified lack of positive role models, joblessness amongst the black community as a result of institutional racism, therefore children are not enthusiastic about education because they will still end up in a dead end job.

Main Suggestions:

Anti-social behaviour amongst the youths can only be tackled when the government take responsibility by sorting out the fundamentals rather treating issues on the surface.

-Awareness on safe guarding children.

-Empowering young people

-Government should do more to encourage education amongst the youth.

-Aid and support for parents.

-Employers should stop discriminating against the ethnic minority group.

Charles Emeka, the fourth speaker addressed “The consequences of youth crime as it relates to his personal experience and how to solve the crisis. He stressed on the various dangers youths are being faced with on a daily bases, shared his personal experience as a youth , he also encouraged the youths present to pursue good education, education he said gives you more choice and advantage and at the end, you value yourself more .

He identified lack of good model; he said youth see rich members of the community as a model, in a bid to get some quick money they join gangs. He said it is very important to make right decisions. Charles spent time discouraging youths from getting involved with anti-social behaviour and finally gave a keynote advice to participants; he said the best way for youths to be successful is to

-Value who you are.

-Write your visions and dreams.

-Hang around the right people.

-Show respect to yourself and others.

-Do not try to be like every one, always try to be yourself.

-Educate yourself, Readers are leaders, he said.

The Fifth Speaker was representing the Damilola Taylor Trust. He was invited to speak on “How to improve the role of the community in combating anti-social behaviour amongst the youths”.

He talked about the need for members of the community to continue to work together to help the youths and create a safe community, he also encouraged parents to get active and try to notice changes in their children’s behaviour.

Stephen Hammond, he spoke on “A new approach to solving anti-social behaviour amongst our youths” being a youth Pastor he tries to address the issue from the religious point of view.

He stressed the negative role of the media and how the youths are being affected by what they see and hear. He advised that the current situation of legislation as regards the power given to parent to discipline their children must be looked into and he talked about encouraging children to stay in school and remain focused.

Participants were divided into two groups were they all had the opportunity to discuss and come up with suggestions. At the end of this session, each group had their presentations find below the recommendations made.

Summary of general Recommendations

1. To encourage more sense of social responsibility amongst the youths
2. Start a national community service for young people.
3. Economic solidarity for families.
4. Organise Youth development trainings
5. Encouraging stronger role models within the home.
6. Trainings for parents to help them with child up bringing
7. Create more awareness on safe guarding children.
8. Empowering young people
9. Government to do more to encourage education amongst the youth.
10. Aid and support for parents.

A representative of Lightup presented the various recommendations suggested at the conference and gave the vote of thanks to mark the end of the conference session.