Councillor Les LawrenceChair of the Children and Young

People’s BoardLocal Government Association

What is good for councils and young people?

• The long term vision • The focus on enhancing the access of

disadvantaged and vulnerable young people• Makes sense for councils to be in strategic lead • Ambition to include and empower young people• Delighted about steps to aligning budgets with

Health and Youth Justice but we need full pooling to support councils in ‘doing prevention’

What are our concerns?

• Resources, especially revenue funding, may not be sufficient to achieve step-change

• Ambition to build more centres needs sufficient capital and a joined up approach with Building Schools for the Future - not there at present

• More detail needed on funding & transport• LGA wants faster progress towards youth-led

services than ‘25% by 2018’• Not enough focus on workforce

Other key points

• The importance of joining up the 14-19 agenda, Aiming High and Government’s proposals to raise the age of leaving education to 18 by 2015

• How to reach young people who don’t want to engage? Have we got the right provision in the right places?

• Councils should build the capacity of 3rd sector providers – their role will be crucial

• Transport issues could be a major barrier to success in rural and remote areas