The next item on the agenda is the debate on the Children, Young People and Education Committee’s report on its inquiry into youth work, and I call on the committee Chair to move the motion—Lynne Neagle.

Motion NDM6230 Lynne Neagle

To propose that the National Assembly for Wales:

Notes the report of the Children, Young People and Education Committee ‘What type of youth service does Wales want? Report of the inquiry into Youth Work’ which was laid in the Table Office on 15 December 2016.

Motion moved.

Thank you, Llywydd. I’m very pleased to open this debate on the first report of the Children, Young People and Education Committee’s inquiry into youth work in Wales. I’d like to place on record my thanks to the 1,500 young people from across Wales who gave their views to the committee. Their evidence was very clear that youth services are very important to many young people and can make a significant difference to their lives.

I was also delighted to see the positive response that this inquiry received from stakeholders across Wales. We were very grateful for their honesty in helping us, as a committee, understand what the challenges are, and for their enthusiasm in engaging with the committee’s work.

I’d particularly like to thank the Council for Wales of Voluntary Youth Services for their support in bringing so many of those people together at our excellent round table event with stakeholders. The commitment and enthusiasm of those who attended made a real impression on me, and I’m sure that the same is true of other committee members.

Youth work is genuinely life-changing, not just for the children and young people but for the countless staff and volunteers who make it happen every day across Wales. Members will be familiar with services in their own constituencies and know how they can shape young citizens of Wales and set them up with skills for life.

Through the course of our inquiry, we had evidence of young people who have benefited from youth services, and also those who have had them removed. One young person who had previously accessed services said:

‘Without youth workers I wouldn’t be the person I am today… it is a young person’s right to a safe space and somewhere to have fun, play and participate.’

Another told us that ‘I feel like they’—youth services—

‘are really good for people with fewer friends as it gives a chance to make friends.’

And another said that it has:

‘Given me so much confidence, experiences and life skills that I would not have been able to gain anywhere else.’

These were just some of the positive experiences that were shared with us. When youth services are in place, they can really change lives.

I want to thank the Minister for Lifelong Learning and Welsh Language for his consideration of our findings. It was very welcome to see the Minister broadly accept all 10 recommendations made by the committee. Our findings were very clear: when youth work disappears from a young person’s life, the impact is considerable. Whilst cuts in funding are not exclusive to youth services, in a difficult financial climate for local authorities it can often be youth services first to bear the brunt. The total amount of expenditure on youth services by local authorities, including funding through the revenue support grant, has reduced by almost 25 per cent over the last four years. Evidence from the voluntary sector suggested they had also faced severe reductions in funding, and that this has had a considerable impact, with intensified competition for scarce resource.

The committee recognised the difficult decisions faced by local authorities. However, we feel that developing youth services is an essential investment in the future of the nation’s young people. These services are often a catalyst to help young people develop skills and confidence and make better choices in their lives. Whilst their impact may not often be apparent in the short term, young people told us of the longer term impact services can have to help them achieve their potential.

The Deputy Presiding Officer (Ann Jones) took the Chair.

During the course of the inquiry, the committee identified several key issues that needed urgent and radical action by the Welsh Government. These were a lack of strategic direction and leadership from the Welsh Government, the sector and young people not being sufficiently involved in developing policies, and the need for greater collaboration between the statutory and voluntary sectors to make the most of scarce resource. Deputy Presiding Officer, an area of major concern was in the balancing act that local authorities faced funding open-access services and targeted interventions for specific groups who require additional support. We were told that the diversion of funding to target young people who are not in education, employment or training has posed a serious risk to open-access services. We also heard that this shift fundamentally undermines the principle that young people’s engagement with youth services must be based on their own choice rather than a requirement that is placed upon them.

Contributors to our inquiry also expressed concern that the impact of the reduction in funding is being felt disproportionately by certain groups of young people. One example that was cited by many contributors was the impact on Welsh language provision. We felt strongly that the Minister must address the need for more strategic and joint working between the statutory and voluntary sectors. We feel this is a significant barrier to delivering a universal youth work offer. It is also preventing the best use of increasingly scarce resources.

I was pleased to see that the Minister has already committed to refreshing the statutory guidance in place and, in doing so, undertaking a review of the current strategy. It is also welcome that the Welsh Government will develop and publish a detailed action plan by March 2017. The committee was clear that an action plan is necessary to translate the high-level policy ambitions into reality. Deputy Presiding Officer, an updated youth work strategy is a step in the right direction, and I hope it will create the much-needed framework for local authorities and the third sector to work together effectively. This will be a major step towards creating the service that our young people are entitled to.

As part of developing that common purpose for youth service delivery, the committee recommended the Minister develop a national model for youth work. We heard compelling evidence making the case for a national model to drive forward youth work policy and implementation. This is something we believe would create greater collaboration, reduce duplication and enable better workforce development opportunities. The Minister has responded positively to this key recommendation, and we look forward to hearing further detail as plans develop as part of the refresh of the national guidance.

Members recognised the importance of localism in designing services around the needs of communities, and we are confident this would achievable while striving for greater consistency. In the vein of driving greater collaboration, the committee were eager to see an effective mapping exercise taking place to understand where gaps in provision occur. We hope Welsh Government will further consider the use of local sufficiency assessments taking place at local authority level and informing the national approach. Making sure that all young people in Wales are able to access well-resourced youth services is crucial to support them to reach their full potential.

I want to conclude with a striking comment from a young person, who told us:

‘There should be more of them across Wales. Need more money to grow more services—too many being cut by councils. Not all my friends can attend them as they live in the sticks. Youth workers are amazing and they really help us—they are life-savers.’

I think you will agree that this makes the need for radical change all the more real. In closing my statement today, I would just like to thank again the huge numbers of young people who took the time to respond to our survey. Members were so moved by the enormous contribution made by people who work in youth services across Wales. I very much look forward to Members’ contributions this afternoon and to revisiting this vital issue regularly with the committee in the course of this Assembly. Thank you.

I’m pleased to take part in this debate, and I want to commend the Chair and the committee clerks for all the work that they have done in helping to produce what I think has been a very robust report, with a list of very clear recommendations directed at the Government. I was very pleased to see the Minister’s response to the report. I think it is fair to say that we had a few tussles with the Minister during the course of the inquiry, and we were a little surprised by some of the actions that were taken while we were still receiving evidence as part of the inquiry. Notwithstanding that, there has been a positive outcome from the inquiry, and I’m very pleased that we’ve managed to establish that.

Like the Chair, I, too, was impressed at the engagement that we received from the voluntary sector, in particular, and the way in which they provided some access to the direct views of young people. I am very much hoping that the establishment of a youth parliament in Wales will help to facilitate the views of young people, not just to our committee but to other committees in the future. I think we ought to put on record our thanks to the campaign for the youth parliament, which, of course, has again been here in the Assembly today.

We know that statutory youth services have been pressure, under some financial pressure, but what has impressed me, I think, during the course of the inquiry, is to see the different ways that local authorities have been helping to meet their statutory obligations. It’s quite clear that some local authorities have focused very much on local authority directly provided youth services, whilst others have used their limited resources, and their shrinking resources, to invest in the capacity of the voluntary sector in order to aid them in the provision of youth work. Clearly, some local authorities have done a good job in helping to grow the capacity of the voluntary sector, whilst others appear to have pretty much ignored the voluntary sector to a large extent, and I think that that’s been quite disappointing. I think this issue of trying to map the services that are available was a critical issue that we identified. It was very clear from all of the evidence that we received that there was no detailed understanding of the services that were available around the country, particularly from the many voluntary organisations such as the Scouts, faith groups and even sports organisations, which may be delivering aspects of statutory youth work that we’re not always able to see. I think that the key recommendation in the report is that one that seeks to ensure that local authorities have a very clear understanding on the ground in their local areas as to the youth services that are available for young people to engage in.

The other big concern I think that I had in receiving the evidence was that it was very clear that, because of the diminished budgets, there’s an increased focus on small groups of young people with particular problems, and that that was causing the other young people to suffer, because there was no universal offer available to them in their localities. I’m very pleased that the Minister has given a very clear commitment to wanting to ensure that there is a universal offer available and that all young people can access youth services that they might be able to benefit from.

I know that we had a debate within the committee on this, but I don’t think that the level of spending on youth services necessarily reflects the quality of the youth service and the availability of the youth services within each local authority. So, whilst there were arguments around whether there should be hypothecation of the RSG in relation to youth services to local councils, I’m not sure—I think that was a bit of a red herring, to be honest, because I know that, in the two local authorities that my constituency straddles, we’ve got excellent provision, but quite low levels of spending compared to the amount allocated in the RSG. That’s because of the way those two local authorities worked in partnership with the voluntary sector and with the third sector to provide high-quality youth services.

So, in summary, Deputy Presiding Officer, I’m very pleased with the outcome of the report. I think it gets the Government onto the right page in terms of its approach to youth services, and hopefully we’ll see a universal offer across Wales and we’ll have a better understanding in future years of the services that are available from those other partners that are providing them across the country.

I do think that it’s about time that we as an Assembly discussed this sector of youth services, because the sector has told us that they do feel isolated and undervalued, and have done over these past few years. When you ask people, everyone agrees that youth work is a positive thing, but maybe they don’t understand the real importance of the sector and the feeling that that isn’t perhaps reflected necessarily in the work that the Government and local authorities and others do.

Now, we know that youth work is there to empower young people, to give them participative experiences and expressive experiences, and educational experiences. At its best, youth work creates better citizens, more confident citizens, who are prepared with life skills and are more resilient individuals—much of what is discussed in the context of Donaldson and curriculum reform within formal education. Youth work does much of that. Certainly, it adds value to formal education and also engages with some who have turned their back on formal education, and that is an extremely important service in and of itself.

It’s an excellent example of preventative spend; investing at an early stage to avoid costs later on, from a social perspective, a health perspective, and from the perspective of the justice system, and so on and so forth. As we heard from the Chair, one of the most significant findings in this report, as far as I can see, is that we have opened the door on the serious decline that there’s been in terms of funding and staffing provision in Wales over the past few years. The expenditure budgeted from the RSG to local authorities for youth services has reduced by almost 25 per cent over the past four years. Now, that’s not the only area where there have been reductions, but that, in my view, it’s one of the most significant. It isn’t unique to youth work, but the impact of that on young people is inevitably going to be very substantial indeed.

There’s been a decline of 20 per cent in staffing capacity in just a year, and a fall in registered members for the provision of local authority youth work—from 20 per cent of young people down to 17 per cent in the two years since 2013. And CWVYS, of course, the Council for Wales of Voluntary Youth Services—and I should declare an interest as one of the honorary presidents of that organisation—say that some 30 per cent of their members don’t anticipate continuing beyond the next financial year in the current climate.

So, given statistics of that kind, we must realise that the youth service is at a precipice, and that we need urgent action. And this report is very timely indeed. We have a relatively new Government now, certainly a new Minister, and the committee is now providing guidance and recommendations in terms of some the reforms that we believe are needed in developing the sector. We certainly need to restate the importance of youth services and give the recognition of its important and central contribution to Welsh life, and to reflect that in Government priorities, the priorities of local government and society more widely.

There is a commitment from the Minister, of course, to open-access bilingual provision that should be universally available. It’s a statement of intent that is encouraging. It’s a very promising starting point, but extremely ambitious, and delivering that will be extremely challenging. But, as we’ve heard as a committee, there is a postcode lottery in terms of provision. The access that you have to services is too often dependent upon your postcode, and in order to overturn that, we certainly need to take action on some of the recommendations made by the committee, as outlined by the committee Chair.

We certainly need to bring the maintained sector and the voluntary sector closer together. There needs to be more collaboration, not just on the ground, but also at a strategic level, regionally and nationally.As we’ve already heard, we need to review the national youth work strategy. We need to reform the statutory plans and have a detailed action plan. We need better engagement between Government and the sector, particularly through the youth work reference group, and certainly, there is talk about having an accountability framework for local authority use of funding for youth work through the revenue support grant. And through all of this, of course, we must ensure, too, that the voice of young people is central to this discussion in all aspects of the provision of youth services.

There is far more in the report, of course, and there will be opportunities over the next few months to start to tackle some of these most important challenges and create a foundation to build a national youth service of the highest quality that will be accessible to all in all parts of the country and in whatever language they choose. The young people of Wales and wider society should insist on that and deserve no less.

Thank you very much. Julie Morgan.

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. Thank you for calling me to speak in this very important debate about the report from the Children, Young People and Education Committee into youth work.

I found it very concerning indeed to hear from people in the youth work field about how the provisions for young people have diminished so much. I personally believe, and I think it was the belief of all the committee, that youth work is absolutely vital because it does reach people outside the formal school setting. I think we all know that, particularly, the teenage years are very stressful and difficult times for young people.

I was reminded of that when we noted that this week is Children’s Mental Health Week. There have been figures from the NSPCC that show the growth of mental health problems amongst young people, which have been shown in the number of calls to Childline. It seems children and teenagers aged 12 to 15 make up a third of the calls that are received, and girls are almost seven times more likely to seek help than boys. I think we’ve all heard about the great concerns that many girls have about body image in particular. Those are just illustrative of the difficult issues that children and young people have to grapple with at this time.

So, it’s absolutely and vitally important that they have the opportunity to have contact with skilled professionals, really, because that’s what youth workers are, in an informal setting, where these issues can be raised in a non-threatening way. So, I think it’s absolutely essential that we put more impetus into the youth services.

In my own area, I can bear witness to the reduction in services. At one time, there was a full-scale, five-day-a-week youth club operating in the youth buildings in the grounds of Whitchurch High School. This has now been reduced to one evening a week, run by the YMCA in the Ararat church. I’m very grateful to the voluntary sector and to the Ararat church for providing this service, but it’s only one night a week and it’s hugely oversubscribed. There’s no doubt—you have to accept the fact that the service for our young people actually has diminished. When the proposals came to change the service, I had quite a number of meetings with the young people involved and they said they just wanted somewhere where they could go, somewhere where there was no pressure on them and somewhere where they could have fun. I am very concerned, as several Members have mentioned, about the diminishing services for open access, because I think it is the entitlement of every child and every young person to have the opportunity to go somewhere where they aren’t going because they have a particular issue or problem, but is open for everyone to go. Hopefully, in those circumstances, if they do have particular issues or problems, those can be helped to be addressed.

I wanted to mention in particular the Scouts and the Guides, because in the inquiry the Scouts and the Guides were mentioned as providing youth work. I’d like at this point, really, to use the opportunity to pay tribute to the Second Llandaff Scout group who are very strong operators in Cardiff North. They’ve been the occupants of a church hall in Llandaff North for many years. They’re actually under threat of losing their premises because the land is being sold. They’ve just had another three-month extension to try to raise the extra £100,000 to buy the premises. They’ve already—it’s a small group—raised a staggering £150,000 through the efforts of dedicated volunteers, which I think is absolutely amazing. So, I wanted to pay tribute to them during this debate today, but I can say that the work they do with the young people in the area, many of whom come from disadvantaged homes, is really absolutely tremendous.

I think it’s absolutely vital that the Welsh Government gives more direction to the youth service. Looking at the evidence that we received, I do feel that there is a danger that it is withering away in the way that we’ve always known it. I hope that the Minister, as a result of our report, will give a renewed impetus to this service. We certainly need that in this area. I think that the other very important issue is to give young people a voice in the service. Several speakers have already mentioned that. But I hope with the new shaping of the service, if that is what will happen, that young people will be consulted about how the service should turn out and that they should be a pivotal part of developing the service.

In conclusion, I think we all felt it was an absolutely vital service. We can’t let it wither away. We know that there are pressures on all the services within the local authority, but we have got a lot of goodwill in the voluntary sector and it’s absolutely essential that we get the voluntary sector and the statutory sector working together effectively.

I would like to thank and congratulate the organisations and specialists who gave evidence to the committee during the inquiry for their willingness to say it as they see it. Stakeholders in both the statutory and voluntary sectors talk about a lack of leadership and strategic direction from the Welsh Government. The Council for Wales of Voluntary Youth Services—CWVYS—reports that 30 per cent of its members don’t think they will be able to exist beyond this next financial year. The Minister’s response to comments made by CWVYS was to attempt to undermine the credibility of CWVYS and cast their view as a minority one. Well, the organisation’s members include the British Red Cross, Mencap, NUS Wales, Race Council Cymru, Alcohol Concern, Police Youth Volunteers, the Scouts, Shelter and many other brilliant and well-respected organisations. They represent the interests of far more people in the sector than a single AM does. Well, regardless of what the Minister thinks of these organisations, they’re saying that the strategy is wrong.

Sadly, in terms of deciding the future of youth provision, the Minister cannot be dismissed as easily as he will attempt to dismiss the comments of organisations like CWVYS. He says there is a national youth work strategy and funding allocated for its implementation. Well, allocating funding and coming up with a posh document isn’t the same as co-ordinating its implementation in statutory and voluntary sectors across Wales. The views expressed by the Minister and the organisations are so different that it is tempting to assume that either the Minister doesn’t communicate with these stakeholders, hasn’t listened or is in denial. The report recommends that the Minister must harness the expertise and understanding of the principal youth officers group and CWVYS. I would urge him to work with those groups to improve youth work across Wales.

The report goes on to identify a need for Welsh Government to better understand the levels of provision across both sectors in Wales, effectively exposing that the Welsh Government may not be entirely sure as to which youth services are on offer or where. The Welsh Government has overseen a reduction in youth service funding by almost 25 per cent over the last four years, a reduction in registered members of youth work provision, from 20 per cent of young people in 2013-14 to 17 per cent of young people in 2015-16, and local authorities are reporting the loss of 148 full-time equivalent staff across the statutory sector in 2015-16.

The Welsh Government may claim in their own defence that the funds sent over from England aren’t sufficient. But it’s a question of priorities, and I would certainly question whether the Welsh Government has its priorities in the right order here. The report expresses the concern that there is a lack of accountability for the use of funds allocated to local authorities via the revenue support grant, and states that the Minister must ensure that mechanisms are in place to hold local authorities to account for the use of those funds for youth work. I would be interested to hear whether the Minister will implement this, or provide proposals regarding how he will implement it.

The Welsh Local Government Association has called into question whether Welsh Government statistics on the use of funding through the revenue support grant are reliable. This is a particular worry. If the Welsh Government doesn’t ensure that they obtain the right data, what they say about youth work strategies is potentially meaningless. There’s no way of knowing whether local authorities are spending money on other things, and no-one is accountable.

So, to recap, we have a Minister who dismisses much of what the stakeholders have to say, doesn’t seem to know where and what the current provision is, and is possibly using questionable data. We and the people of Wales simply cannot give any credibility to what he says on this important issue. Decent youth provision can transform lives and change young people’s futures. Every youngster should have access to youth services, if they wish to avail themselves of them. My big question is, therefore, whether the Minister will implement the recommendations of this report, or otherwise act upon it. Thank you.

Speaking as the youngest member of the committee—[Laughter.] These things are all relative, you know—I don’t claim to have any special insights, other than what we learned from the inquiry. And I agree with the Chair, with Lynne Neagle, that that stakeholder event was a great thing, a real chance to tap into the thoughts and the experiences of those people delivering those services, and it was a really important part of the whole process.

It was my first inquiry, and I’ve got a copy of the Minister’s response, and he’s accepted—or accepted in principle—all of the recommendations. And I don’t know whether that happens all the time, but it seems like a good thing. Where does it go next?

I’d like to focus on one specific recommendation, which is recommendation 8. And I’m very pleased that the Minister’s accepted that one in principle, which asks the Minister to develop an accountability framework for local authorities’ use of funds for youth work, via the revenue support grant. And it isn’t agreeing to hypothecate funding, as other Members have already noted. But what it does say is that the Government has begun the process to undertake a review of all these youth work funding streams to identify the true impact, and to support future thinking for youth work in Wales.

And my mind turned to youth work in my constituency, and Julie Morgan’s mentioned open access—well, in Senghenydd—where Julie just told me that’s where she’s originally from—the Senghenydd youth drop-in centre, was visited by the Minister, and is an open-access youth group, and it’s massively important, but also facing a very, very uncertain immediate future. And given the changes that are likely to happen with regard to Communities First—and I know there’s been criticisms of Communities First for the funds not going where they’re supposed to go; I understand that there’s been criticism in a minority of cases—I suspect a good deal of youth work, particularly there at SYDIC, has been partly funded by overspill from Communities First.

So, given that the Minister has proposed to consider the changing nature—sorry, to consider the future thinking for youth work in Wales, and the Cabinet Secretary for communities is looking at the changing nature of resilient communities, I’d like the Minister to particularly consider that impact. What will be in that review that is recommended in recommendation 8 and what will be the impact of the Welsh Government’s new resilient communities policy? I think there must be—there must be—an overlap so that youth work doesn’t suffer as a result of any changes that take place.

But what I’d say, from my experience, is that the Minister’s taken a hugely constructive approach, as seems to be expected of this Minister, which is great, and I look forward to seeing what happens next after the recommendations have been made.

Can I first of all thank Lynne Neagle for presenting the report and the committee for the work that they’ve done? It was clearly a very wide-ranging inquiry and the contributions here today, I think, setting out the work that’s been done have been quite exemplary, so thanks everybody for that. In many respects, I guess the whole thrust of the report is probably neatly summed up by the opening paragraph, which you alluded to, Lynne, when you talked about one of the comments from the contributors, talking about youth workers as life-savers. I think that’s probably worth just repeating, because it’s on that particular aspect that I wanted to primary focus my contribution this afternoon.

First of all, I’d like to comment on the challenges faced by our youth services, as that has a direct impact on the areas that I want to talk about. While I don’t want to rehearse again the arguments about the impact that Tory austerity policies have had on Wales and on our public services and our communities, the continual reduction in funding to the Welsh Assembly has inevitably had an impact on the way in which these services have been funded.

At this point, can I just take a moment to commend the finance and local government Secretary, Mark Drakeford, for the work that he has done in delivering a settlement for local government this year, which sees an increase in funding for the first time since 2013-14, despite the overall pressures on Welsh Government finances? However, you know, we cannot escape the fact that the overall cuts in funding to local authorities have left them with, not just difficult decisions, but actually sometimes nigh on impossible decisions.

I’m very grateful to the Member for taking the intervention. You weren’t on the inquiry and you didn’t take part in it, but one thing that was absolutely evident was that there was no direct correlation, actually, to the quality of youth services on the ground and the amount that’s being spent on them by local authorities, as I indicated in my remarks earlier. Conwy is a local authority, for example, that has a very low rate of spending, and yet the services are actually very high-quality because they’ve embedded them within the voluntary sector and supported the capacity of that sector to provide them.

And I’m sure that there are examples of that, and I don’t doubt what the Member is saying, but I think, as a general rule, if you keep starving a service of funds, then inevitably it begins to impact, and I would say that there are more examples of the opposite than the kind of examples that the Member refers to. But it is about local authorities having to prioritise, and there’s no getting away from that. Of course, it’s not just about the services that are directly provided by local authorities—as we know, many third sector providers rely heavily on the funding that they also get from local authorities and that’s also been the subject of cuts that they’ve had to face.

If I could just take a moment to talk to you about some of the organisations in my own constituency. We have some incredible originations and schemes, such as the Forsythia Youth Project and the Dowlais Engine House to name but two. As Hefin David has already mentioned, these receive significant amounts of funding through the Communities First programme. That, to a large extent, has plugged the financial gap from local authorities and the money made available to them. So, while I’m not today going to open the debate about Communities First, because I know that the Minister responsible for that is going to be making a statement in the near future, I have to say that, if Communities First funding is to go or is to be phased out, then it’s crucial that we look at ways that youth schemes, like the ones that I’ve mentioned, continue. And I ask myself why that is so crucial. Well, I’m absolutely in no doubt whatsoever that if it were not for the likes of those services, provided by some of the projects like the ones that I’ve mentioned, many of the young people served by them would end up roaming the streets. They’d then be engaging in anti-social behaviour, possibly falling into dependency on drugs and alcohol, or even becoming young offenders. In some of these areas, the closure of those facilities wouldn’t result in their parents just paying them to go and use other facilities because they are generally in areas where those families would not have the money available to do that. So, when the Minister reviews the national strategy for youth services, I hope that recognition will be given to those projects such as Forsythia Youth Project and the Dowlais Engine House that I’ve referred to, and others that provide that early intervention that is so important, particularly in the most deprived areas in our society, and that we will give consideration as to how these schemes can be maintained in the future, regardless of the decisions surrounding the future of Communities First.

So, Llywydd, in conclusion I’m just pleased to be supporting both the motion and the inquiry report, and in doing so trust that the significance of the work done by our youth services and the staff who work in them will be fully recognised going forward.

Thank you very much. I call on the Minister for Lifelong Learning and Welsh Language, Alun Davies.

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer, and I’m grateful to all the Members who’ve contributed to the inquiry and to the debate this afternoon. In many ways, Deputy Presiding Officer, I felt the inquiry was a great example of the Assembly and Government: the correct tension that needs to exist between the two institutions, as referred to—an occasional tussle between us all—but also the committee putting very firmly on the Government’s agenda some issues that are of clear national importance, and the committee reporting in a robust fashion and compelling Government and the Minister to consider the approach that has been taken. And I will say that the response of this committee—Members have generally been quite kind about the response of the Government, but the response, actually, isn’t simply what was written and published in the documentation that we’ve seen and discussed today; the response in many ways was the fact that we were compelled to actually have a debate that probably wouldn’t have taken place without the committee’s investigation, without the committee’s report, without the evidence that the committee took and without the conclusions that the committee made on the basis of that evidence. And compelling Government to actually look hard at its priorities, to look hard at its programme, the way we seek to move forward, has ensured that the words that have been described by Members this afternoon and used by witnesses to the inquiry over the last few months have actually had an impact on changing in policy and in changing the approach and direction of Government. I think it’s right to begin my contribution this afternoon by acknowledging that, and acknowledging the work that the committee’s done over the last few months.

I think there’s broad agreement that high-quality youth work has a crucial role to play in supporting many people to achieve their full potential, and makes a very real difference to the lives of young people, whether it is through different experiences that are opened up to people or the support it offers. It does underpin many of our priorities, from education, health to community regeneration. I’ll decline Dawn’s kind offer to discuss Communities First this afternoon, but we are absolutely clear in our minds that the work of community regeneration and community development is aided and supported by the wider youth work agenda. We recognise that, and we recognise the points that have been made.

I’m pleased to be able to accept or accept in principle all 10 recommendations. I approached the committee report in a way that sought to look at how we can enable these things to happen, not looking for reasons not to accept recommendations, but looking for reasons and ways of accepting those recommendations. I will say to Hefin that that’s not always been the case, I think it’s fair to say, over the years, and I hope that he’s enjoyed his first inquiry, as a member of the committee here. And I certainly hope that he’s found the experience of scrutinising Government in this way as one that’s both been enjoyable and also critical in changing the direction of policy.

Can I respond to some of the concerns that have been raised about the need for a clearer strategic direction? I was very taken by Darren Millar’s contribution in terms of describing the way that the Government does need to establish a far clearer direction of travel. I think that was clear during the evidence session that we had together, and I think I have already committed to refreshing ‘Extending Entitlement’, the statutory guidance that underpins the provision and delivery of youth support services in Wales. A detailed action plan will be developed and published by the end of March 2017. My officials are working with the subgroup of the youth work reference group to develop a plan for the refresh of ‘Extending Entitlement’ and they will meet for the first time in two weeks. This work will cross a number of different ministerial portfolios, and it also includes youth support services more broadly and not simply youth work.

We will also need to review the current national youth work strategy to inform the work of refreshing the statutory guidance. My officials have already begun discussions with members of the youth work reference group on how we will develop this piece of work. I would invite the committee to continue its work and to continue its scrutiny of this refresh, and to play a part and a role in doing so, and that’s something I’d very much welcome if committee members were to do so.

A number of Members have discussed the concerns raised about the lack of engagement with the sector and young people. I recognise the description that Julie Morgan gave in her contribution. I recognise very much the points that you made, Julie, and I think you’re absolutely right to make those points. I met with the youth work reference group on 8 December, and I and my officials will continue to work with the group to shape the future of youth work delivery in Wales. I hope that young people’s participation will always remain central to the work that we undertake, and we will certainly seek to utilise the expertise of stakeholders, including Young Wales, to ensure that we are able to reach some people who are not always a part of these processes. I will certainly be looking at how we can do that and if the committee has further contributions to make as to how we would do that, then I would very much welcome hearing those views.

I understand what is said about a national model, and I know that Llyr Gruffydd has spoken widely on this, in terms of the need to have a national model and the way that we take that forward. I want to give this some further consideration, and I do not, today, wish to pre-empt that consideration. But let me say this: I recognise the comments that have been made. I think Darren made a comment in the debate today about the Government rushing on, taking decisions and implementing decisions whilst the committee is undertaking its inquiry, and I think Llyr has made that point on other occasions as well. There are times when I feel that, as a Minister, I cannot sit back and wait, I have to take decisions and move forward, and there are other occasions—and we’ve discussed the Welsh language in education strategic plans this afternoon—when I feel that it is more important for me to sit back and wait until I am in a position to take a reasoned decision on these matters. This is another example where, at the moment, I wish to take a more reasoned approach and an approach where I would wish to give myself more time to listen to what is said and to understand what the refresh of ‘Extending Entitlement’ and the review of the national strategy tell us before taking a decision on this matter. I hope that Members and the committee will appreciate the reasoning behind that.

But I do listen to and hear the concerns raised by all Members on the closure of open-access provision. Julie Morgan gave us an example in her own constituency, but we’re all familiar with that. It is difficult for local authorities—we know that, and Dawn Bowden has given examples of that, and we’re all familiar with the difficult decisions facing local authorities.

It has a strategic role to play in offering a mechanism to identify potentially vulnerable young people and providing early intervention support. It is clear also that the youth work landscape is changing and open-access provision is also changing. I want to be able to work with local government in order to ensure that we are able to have the sort of provision that we wish to see. Llyr described it, I think, as being overly optimistic, possibly—‘ambitious’ was your word. Very ambitious, yes. I hope that we are able to achieve that, and certainly, what we want to explore is whether sufficiency assessments might be a suitable vehicle to assist local authorities to assess the needs of their local populations and then be able to meet those needs.

There will be a number of different issues regarding funding and the revenue support grant. We know that the RSG is an unhypothecated funding stream, and it is, therefore, a decision for local authorities as to how this funding is utilised. Hefin has discussed that himself and, as somebody who’s served on a local authority, he knows better than most the difficulties that local authorities face in taking these decisions.

I hope that we will be able to undertake a review of all of our youth work funding streams including the revenue support grant, to identify the true impact and to support future thinking for supporting youth work in Wales. I can see that time is against me, Deputy Presiding Officer, and I won’t test your patience any further. What I would like to say in conclusion is that this is a report that has changed the way that we’re thinking. It’s forced us to think twice, think three times about what we’re doing. We will continue to work with the committee to take these matters forward, and I hope that I’ll be in a position to come to this place to make an oral statement on these matters in the near future. Thank you.

Thank you very much, and I call on the Chair of the Children, Young People and Education Committee, Lynne Neagle, to reply to the debate.

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer, and can I thank all the Members who’ve contributed to an excellent debate on our report this afternoon? I’d like to thank Darren Millar for his positive comments about the outcome of the inquiry, which are very much welcome. I also wholeheartedly endorse what he said about the importance of the youth parliament. I, too, was there today to receive the report from the campaign for the youth parliament. What I think is so important is that the reason these services are being deprioritised at a local level is because young people don’t have a voice, and that youth parliament will be absolutely critical in ensuring that they do have a voice. I hope that that is something that we can push outwards across Wales, so that they are reprioritised, those services.

Can I thank Llyr Gruffydd for his remarks? He’s absolutely right that this isn’t an issue that we’ve focused on before, and I’m very grateful that it was Llyr who made the suggestion to the committee that we undertake this inquiry. It was intended to be a snapshot inquiry, and it was certainly, for me, very much an eye-opener, and I do feel that we opened a bit of a Pandora’s box with it. So, I’m really pleased that we’ve done that. Now that we’ve looked at it, I would just like to assure everyone that I’ve got no intention of letting it go to the side again: we need to keep a focus on that. As you rightly say, this is a key preventative service. We talk a lot about prevention here, but in a whole range of ways, this is a key preventative service for young people and therefore is one that deserves our investment.

Can I thank Julie Morgan for her contribution and her support, as always, for universal services for young people, and also for highlighting the important role that youth work plays in mental health provision? Of course, the committee is also focusing on an ongoing basis on young people’s mental health issues, which is sometimes ironic given that these services are under pressure and these are services that can be preventative if introduced at the right time. So, thank you, Julie, for those comments too.

Michelle Brown highlighted a number of concerns, including issues around local authority funding. I hope that recommendation 8 will make a difference to that and, as Darren Millar has said, it’s not always about the amount of money, but what comes out from the expenditure of that money. And I really hope that, although that recommendation was accepted in principle, we will be able to go forward to develop a proper accountability framework, so, regardless of the amount that is being put in, we have got consistency of provision, and that that is the universal open-access measure that we want to see.

I’d like to thank Hefin David, the youngest member of the committee, for his contribution today, and also for his highlighting of the importance again of that recommendation 8. I’d also like to thank Hefin for highlighting the importance of Communities First funding in supporting youth services. I am very mindful that, should that programme end, then there will be a gap in youth service provision and we need to think very carefully about what we do about that going forward.

Dawn Bowden made very much a similar point, and I know that that’s been a particular concern in your constituency with the projects that you’ve referred to today, who are very worried about Communities First funding. Dawn also reminded us that youth services are life savers, and when I used that in the speech, it wasn’t a loose phrase to use. I genuinely do think that we need to remind ourselves that these services can be life savers, whether it’s mental health, early intervention, stopping young people going into crime—I don’t think that it’s over-egging the custard to say that they do that. I’d like to thank the Minister, again, for his response this afternoon, and also for indicating his willingness to continue to engage with the committee on this very important issue.

Just finally, to thank the members of the committee for their work on this inquiry, to thank the committee team who have also worked really hard behind the scenes to make everything happen and to produce what I think is an excellent report, and to thank, once again, the young people who have contributed, and the stakeholders, and to assure everybody that we aren’t planning on letting this issue go. We’re going to continue to monitor it, and try and drive forward some change. Thank you.

Thank you very much. The proposal is to note the committee’s report. Does any Member object? No. Therefore, the committee’s report is noted and agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.

Motion agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.