We are so happy as Carmarthenshire Youth Councillors have devoted more than 1200 hours to the Participation and Children’s Rights Work on a local, regional and national level during the past 12 months. In celebration and in recognition of our volunteering hours we were presented with National Millennium Volunteers Certificates by Cllr Cefin Campbell, Executive Board Member for Communities and Rural Affairs and Marie Mitchell Chief Officer at CAVS in recognition for the time we have given.

CAVS, Carmarthenshire County Council and the Youth Council have been working in partnership since 2007 to give recognition to the young people of Carmarthenshire through the CAVS Youth Recognition Scheme and the Millennium Volunteers Scheme. Since 2007, 92 Youth Councillors have registered on the CAVS Youth Recognition and Millennium Volunteers Scheme.

Carmarthenshire Youth Councillor Amber Treharne, 14 from Burry Port said “ Since becoming a member of CYC it has allowed me to gain many different experiences through volunteering. I think that volunteering is such a rewarding experience as it really does develop you as a character. Not only does volunteering open up a wealth of experiences, it allows you to gain a variety of skills, such as team-work, that are beneficial to you in day to day life and also as you progress into further study and careers. I would advise anyone who ever receives the chance to get involved with volunteering to go for it because only then will you fully understand how rewarding it is!”

For more photographs of the presentation please visit our instagram

Sarah Powell, Senior Participation and Children’s Rights Officer for Carmarthenshire County Council, Carmarthenshire Youth Council and Fflur Lawlor, Volunteering Officer for CAVS over the years have been working together and listening to our views in order to recognise the work, time and commitment the young people of Carmarthenshire give their local communities in the county. Between them they have developed a Youth Recognition Scheme for 11-14 year olds, lobbied GwirVol the Youth Volunteering initiative for Wales, to lower the Millennium Volunteers age to 14 from 16 – which they succeeded and now more recently have developed a 500 hour certificate.

Sarah said “Words cannot adequately express the gratitude that I wish to convey for all the time, effort and commitment that all members of Carmarthenshire Youth Council have given to my work and the Children’s Rights Agenda both locally and nationally. I’d like to add that their volunteering is appreciated, valued and cherished”

NEW 500 HOURS VOLUNTEERING ACHIEVEMENT

Brittany Alsop-Bingham said “I feel very honoured to be awarded with Carmarthenshire’s 500 hours Certificate. I feel I have gained a number of skills volunteering with Carmarthenshire Youth Council and my role as chair has increased my confidence with Public Speaking and bettered my communication skills. I would encourage everyone to volunteer”

WE MATTER. WE MAKE A DIFFERENCE
Millennium Volunteers is a way of recognising what we have done and shows our commitment to making sure children and young people have a voice in Carmarthenshire. There are so many reasons to volunteer… so here are just a few:

• Volunteering is a fantastic way to support a cause that you care about and learn new things along the way.
  
• Build your experience and skills while growing your confidence
• Make a difference to others
• Meet people, have fun and be part of your community
• Feel valued and make a difference.

There really is a volunteering opportunity for everyone and if you are 11 to 25 years old and interested in volunteering or you are already Volunteering in Carmarthenshire and want to know more about the Millennium Volunteers Scheme then please contact Carmarthenshire Association of Voluntary Services by visiting the CAVS Website, Phoning 01267 245555 or Emailing admin@cavs.org.uk

CHILDREN’S RIGHTS COMMUNITY AMBASSADOR SCHEME 
We are now involved in the Children’s Rights Community Ambassador Scheme and we are so excited to have to opportunity to get involved and spread the word about Children’s Rights! It’s the first time for us to have Ambassadors. 

This scheme is run by the Children’s Commissioner for Wales, who is Sally Holland. Sally’s job is to tell people why Children’s Rights are so important, and to look at how the decisions made by public bodies in Wales, including Welsh Government, affect Children’s Rights.

When it was announced in our monthly meeting that there would be the opportunity for some members to become Community Children’s Rights Ambassadors I knew it was something I wanted to get involved with. I feel that Children’s Rights is such an important topic so it’s great that Sally Holland has started this Ambassador Scheme. By becoming an ambassador I hope to raise awareness of children’s rights to children and young people across Carmarthenshire. Furthermore, I hope to gain more knowledge on Children’s Rights myself as I would love to broaden my understanding. I am now one of Carmarthenshire’s First Children’s Rights Ambassadors which is such an amazing opportunity and also a great privilege. I cannot wait to see what this scheme holds for not only myself but Carmarthenshire.

SO SOME OF YOU MAY BE WONDERING WHAT ARE CHILDREN’S RIGHTS?

Hopefully throughout the scheme, with support from Carmarthenshire Participation and Childrens Rights Team our Community Ambassadors will be doing work around raising awareness of Children’s Rights so more children and young people are informed and have a greater understanding, but until then here is a brief description of children’s rights. 

Children need special rights because they need extra protection that adults don’t, that is why the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) was made. The UNCRC has a list of 52 articles in total and 42 of these are rights for children. The other 10 are articles on how adults and governments should work together in order to ensure children can access their rights.

OUR ROLE AS AMBASSADORS
As community ambassadors we will have three main jobs and these are:
• Tell others about Children’s Rights
• Tell others about Sally and the Children’s Commissioner’s Team
• Be a voice for the Children’s Commissioner on the ground and to feed in to her work by completing missions (each term) where we will be speaking to other children and young people to gather their views on a wide range of issues important to them 

DO YOU WANT TO BE AN AMBASSADOR FOR CARMARTHENSHIRE?
We are all looking forward to starting our work as ambassadors as raising awareness about children’s rights is something that as a Youth Council we feel passionate about! If you are 11 – 24 years old we have opportunities for you to be involved as Childrens Rights Ambassadors so if this is something you would like to do then please get in touch or be sure to follow us on our social media so you can keep up to date with all our work we will be doing!

Also for more information on the Children’s Commissioner for Wales you can visit the website: www.childcomwales.org.uk 

In June 2017 we took part in a consultation event run by the National Assembly for Wales on the exciting first of its kind, new Youth Parliament for Wales.

Continue reading “Youth Parliament for Wales” →

Earlier this year, seventeen year old Gwen from Pembrey, member of Carmarthenshire Youth Council (CYC), joined almost 300 elected members of the UK Youth Parliament (UKYP) in launching a year-long campaign to widen  conversation and gather views and opinions about votes@16; the UKYP’s priority issue for the year. The campaign followed a National debate on votes@16 that Gwen attended in the House of Commons in November 2016.

National Day of Action
The National Day of Action in January 2017 saw members of the Youth Parliament across the UK meet with politicians who were invited to join the campaign in support of lowering the voting age to 16.  Gwen, leading a group of Carmarthenshire Youth Council members arranged to meet with local Members of Parliament; Nia Griffiths MP (Llanelli), Simon Hart MP (Carmarthen West & South Pembrokeshire) and Jonathan Edwards MP (Carmarthen East and Dinefwr) to discuss the Voting@16 campaign and discover their level of support and views on including 16 and 17 year old’s in having a right to vote in all local and public elections.

School Council Debates
Gwen has been busy gathering the views and opinions of young people on the campaign and over the next few weeks, will be liaising closely with newly elected secondary school reps who she has asked to organize debates on votes@16 within their school by the end of October.  Gwen is encouraging every young person in Carmarthenshire to get involved; to determine if they support the campaign.

Carmarthenshire County Council Councillors, the Interim Director of Education and Children, Heads of Service, senior managers and members of council staff have already pledged their support and had photos taken by Gwen; these include Cllr. Glynog Davies, Gareth Morgans, Stefan Smith, Aeron Rees, Andi Morgan and David Astins.  Gwen said “It is great meeting with local decision makers and seeing how much support the campaign is gaining.”

Gwen is also intending to extend the social media presence further by going into the town centre of Carmarthen and surrounding areas with the photo frame to give members of the public an opportunity to get involved and pledge their support for Votes@16.

Putting a motion to Council
Gwen recently met with Carmarthenshire County Council Executive Board member for Education and Children, Cllr. Glynog Davies, to work with him to create a motion which Cllr Davies has agreed to put before Full Council on 18th October 2017, to debate and vote on whether they support 16 and 17 year olds being given the right to vote in local and national public elections.  It is a fantastic achievement for Gwen, as she is the first young person to put a motion to Full Council.

Social Media Campaign
In response to the positive feedback received from MP’s and establishing a clearer picture of the level of support the UKYP team took the decision to extend the campaign by promoting votes@16 to a wider audience and arranged to meet with local celebrities to ask them for their views; these included Gwen meeting up with members of the Scarletts rugby team. Gwen and the UKYP team have also been busy promoting votes@16 on Social Media using #votes@16 with photographs of people who have declared their support holding a bespoke photo frame, developed specifically to promote the campaign.

GET INVOLVED!!
You can join in and back the campaign by sharing your views online #Votes@16

On WEDNESDAY 18TH NOVEMBER 2015 we held our Annual Youth Conference. To celebrate Anti-bullying Week 2015, our conference theme tackled BULLYING and was called “Stand Up To Bullying!”

Continue reading “Stand Up To Bullying” →