The Campaign Company Blog

Pobjeda 2007 - Part 2

David Evans and I were back in Croatia over the weekend to work with our friends in the Croatian SDP to review the training we had done with them in January.

The original plan was to train the trainers to train 1,500 members. I'm pleased to report it was so popular it led to 2,800 members being trained - a significant proportion of their activist base.

The Policy discussion tools we worked with them on additionally assisted them in the production of a recent key policy document for members.

The weekend was also an opportunity to discuss further co-operation between the SDP and TCC which no doubt we will report on in future postings.

Towards the end of the trip we held further discussions with senior SDP HQ staff to continue to review the training and they showed us press coverage of our visit.

All in all a productive opportunity for those concerned as we now move to within a few months of the Croatian General Election where the SDP hope for victory or as they say in Croatian: Pobjeda!

The Governance of Britain - discuss

The Green Paper on the Governance of Britain was launched last week and aims to start a national debate on constitutional reform. It seeks to address two fundamental questions:  how should we hold power accountable, and how should we uphold and enhance the rights and responsibilities of the citizen? Included in the paper are proposals for the government to launch a Youth Citizenship Commission, looking at citizenship education, ceremonies and the possibility of reducing the voting age. The Government wants to engage people around the country in a discussion on citizenship and British values and will be conducting a series of events around the UK to gain as much input as possible. It will be interesting to see what shape these events take. What do people think? Read the green paper here 

Lily says Make Space for Youth

Lily Allen joined campaigners calling on Gordon Brown to invest more in youth projects today.

4 Children’s ‘Make Space Youth Review’, launched today, involved surveying over 7,000 young people in roadshows around the country. It reports that a majority of young people in the UK are fearful of their personal safety, and are concerned about a lack of safe places to go, and recommends investment in more new style youth centres and youth hubs. It also recommends young mayors to be elected in every area to give teenagers representation and a Youth Fund for every area to offer young people the opportunity to shape and influence contributions to the communities around them. This South Kilburn NDC Youth Board is a fine example of exactly how these such initiatives can help young people to help themselves and their local community. Check out this year’s candidates at www.skfreshsay.co.uk

Read the summary of the Make Space Youth Review here

Polishing for a Pittance

The Campaign Company has been working with YWCA on their ‘More than one rung’ campaign which is highlighting the barriers young disadvantaged women are facing in the employment choices they are given and the poor pay that characterises traditional female dominated apprenticeships. ‘More than one rung’ calls for the career ladder to be opened up to young women and stop them being faced with a life in which they are kept on the bottom rung of the career ladder. We are delighted to have worked with the YWCA and are currently creating a short film to highlight the campaign.

The day was a busy and varied one and started bright and early with a crowd of young women from YWCA projects across the country converging at Westminster station all dressed in vivid yellow.  The aim was to hand out dusters to bemused commuters at Westminster station bearing the slogan ‘Polishing for a Pittance!’ The dusters were a great symbolic gesture and certainly caught the attention of the commuters who took a great interest in what the young women were doing.

After the large supply of dusters had been quickly depleted, attention moved towards Parliament where the young women had the opportunity to lobby MPs and share their own personal experiences.  The MPs being lobbied included Jenny Willot, Nia Griffith, Dawn Butler and Sally Keeble. Baroness Estelle Morris also was present and took questions from the floor. The questions were both interesting and shocking and highlighted the plight that many young women face when they enter the world of work and they limited choices which young women from disadvantaged backgrounds face. However the event was very much a positive one with young women passionate and determined to bring about change.

Many of the young women from the YWCA projects across the country also gave interviews to publicise the problems they have faced and how these barriers could be removed.  Their stories were both moving and inspiring to other young disadvantaged women. The footage is in the process of being produced into a DVD which will be used at Rise to create awareness of the campaign.

From Porto Alegre to Salford - Go Local!

It's been a busy week under the new government with a host or announcements. The key highlights so far have were undoubtedly been the Prime Minister's statement on the constitution and the the press coverage today on Hazel Blear's impending speech on developing participatory budgeting in local communities.

This approach to more localism through "double devolution" from government to local authorities and from local authorities to communities seems to be obtaining all-party backing with the two main opposition parties broadly supporting this agenda too.

What is significant is that instead of just warm words for this in principle, we now seem to be seeing serious proposals backed up by funding to implement the policy following a number of pilots. I am sure we will all watch them with interest.

TCC is currently working on projects for East Sussex County Council in enabling young people to have a say on how money is spent in specific localities. This is just one example of many projects we are working on for a range of organisations to assist with the engagement with communities to help them determine local priorities.