Agenda item

Objective: To update O&S on progress being made by No Child Left Behind to deliver a year of youth action

Infprmation/Discussion Paper : Head of Communities, Wellbeing and Partnerships - Richard Gibson

The Head of Communities, Wellbeing and Partnerships thanked the committee for inviting him to address them. 

He thanked them for their interest in No Child Left Behind.  The paper was to update the committee on youth engagement findings.  He explained that there had been lots of engagement with young people giving crucial information.  There is currently a pilot running at Smoky Joes Café town, this is running as a youth café.  It launched and has been running 3 weeks (one day a week) with an average of 30 young people attending.  It is a project that they wish to sustain.    It was also explained that there is an activity pass being worked on in partnership with Gloucestershire College, it is hoped that this will be launched soon, the feedback that was received was that young people want to be more active and the main barrier preventing them to be more active is financial.  He also stated how pleased they are that the Council are the lead for the 2026-27 HAF programme.

The Cabinet Member then addressed the committee and reiterated how positive it was to launch the youth café.  Young people didn’t feel that they had a safe space in the town centre, the youth café offers this and it was important that the young people felt that they had a safe space.  The activity pass will be piloted across a number of  schools. During the year of youth engagement it has become more apparent that there is a national crisis re school attendance, parents and young people are feeling pressures.  There are some very good organisations that CBC work with along with schools and youth centres.

The Chair thanked the committee for their submitted questions and asked if there were any further questions.  The responses to the questions were as follows:

-       At the time of the meeting is was not known if the amount of children that are in poverty in Cheltenham (approx. 300) was below or above the national average.

-       There has been a year of action in 2025 centred around youth engagement and the current year is linked to the year of youth engagement but it is around education.

-       A session was hosted in 2025 in the Municipal Offices with schools to build relationships with regard to behaviour and attendance.  The NCLB meets every 2 months and are very aware of the challenges of children moving from years 6-7 and the senior school years.

-       The team are working with the Police and Gloucestershire County Council to see how they can support young people.

-       There can be broader support provided to the early stages age group.

-       There is a relationship between us and South Yorkshire as a result of the Golden Valley Project and their work on the social value partnership, they have a good relationship with HBD and HBD do a lot of similar work in Sheffield (where they are based) and we are keen to build on that with the NCLB team[AM1] .

-       Springbank Community Group are included in lots of conversations.

-       The youth café was awarded funding from the OPCC to launch the pilot, other funding opportunities are being considered and they are trying to evidence its needs.  Existing networks will be used to secure funding.

-       NCLB team will reach out to the Friends of Montpellier Skate Park as there might be something that can be done to work together with them.

The Chair thanked the Head of Communities, Wellbeing and Partnerships and the Cabinet Member for their update.