Young peoples debate

“It was an act of vandalism” – Cllr Sally Longford on the abolition of the Educational Maintenance Allowance.
Sally has recently retired as an F.E. teacher. Such a simple measure as E.M.A., helping those most in need, but in return for actual attendance transformed her teaching experience and brought a new focus to learning.
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During the full council’s young people debate, Nottingham Conservatives moved an amendment seeking to remove all the elements of the motion that was critical of the ConDem government, but didn’t bother to reply to the debate on their amendment.
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It is a shame that politics isn’t better. As Alexei Sayle said recently, “even politics doesn’t seem able to change politics”.
Already that day, the leader of UKIP had blamed traffic delaying a visit to Port Talbot via the M4 on immigration; go figure.
And a Conservative member of the House of Lords had apologised for suggesting that the poor were poor cos their cooking skills were not good enough.
We deserve better.
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But one of the problems for Councillors is that emphasise how much they, indeed we, try to maximise the opportunities for local youngsters for employment through education and employment services, when the firms are only offering low hours, temporary work.
The lump is back and society is not yet re-learning why we need secure work, and the powerful trade unions that delivered it, back again.
Same too for the working conditions – listening to young people at an event organised by Glenis Willmott MEP, it was clear that they thought some of the conditions in bars etc., were not safe enough.
Exploitation is in the DNA of business – witness Next recruiting in Poland.
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And we need young people to vote in bigger numbers to make the point clear; to lower the age of majority so that the E.M.A. debacle is fixed and never happens again.