Equal Opportunities

CWU Youth Advisory Committee: Action Plan

1 February 2007

At the National Youth Education Event held in Bristol in October, the Deputy General Secretary (T&FS) lead a round table discussion with young activists from branches represented by the T&FS Executive.

The T&FSE has considered how to take forward these four action points generated from that discussion.

1. How the T&FSE edition of "Voice" could speak more effectively to young members:
   In discussion with the editor of the CWU Voice, Simon Alford, and Head of Communications, Kevin Slocombe there is no principled objection to regular coverage of youth related activity in the T&FSE sector, and for this coverage to be designed in an attractive, distinctive format. However, there is only a finite amount of space and that to accord priority to some issues may mean that others are not covered.
2. A young person's section on the T&FSE part of the website:
   There are already YAC pages on the CWU website. There is no problem about also having youth pages on the T&FSE part of the site. The question is how these pages are populated.
3. How the T&FSE could contribute to supporting young members and activists including branches to support social activities young people enjoy:
   There have been a wide range of initiatives that young activists have organised either independently, through their branches or through the Union as a whole. The influx of skills and experiences represented by the new Academy Organisers we have recently recruited greatly adds to this pool. In principle the T&FSE has agreed to set aside a sum of money from its budget specifically to sponsor or contribute to the cost of events that are being organised by RDAs, branches or groups of young activists.
4. How T&FSE communications could be made more effective for young members:
   The key issue here is to ensure that we actually manage to communicate with our young members. This means that we need to identify who they are and have reliable methods of communication.

To address this, the T&FSE has agreed the following strategy:

1. That a dedicated resource within the T&FS department is identified to be the focal point for communications with young T&FSE members.
2. That the T&FSE actively monitor and support the roll-out of branch youth officers across all branches represented by the T&FSE.
3. That dedicated briefing material and training is provided for T&FSE branch youth officers.
4. That the T&FSE liaise with branches to encourage commitments from branches to home-mail relevant material to each individual young member they have in membership.
5. To encourage relevant copy in YAC publications (which in line with (d) above would then reach recipients more effectively).
6. To liaise with young T&FSE activists to consider what other forms of communication would be appropriate, and to report back to the Pay, Resource and Strategy Committee (PRSC) within three months.

In addition to the steps out-lined above there are four over-arching recommendations that the T&FSE has endorsed:

1. That the DGS (T&FS) convene a meeting of the T&FSE members of the National Youth Advisory Committee to discuss practical steps that can be taken in respect of the four headings above.
2. That a report on youth activity becomes a standing item on the PRSC agenda.
3. That communications be asked to commence the measurement/feedback work at the earliest opportunity.
4. That consideration be given to senior young activists having the opportunity to meet with senior managers.