First impressions of the government's Youth Matters strategy

By Hannah Charnock, Jessica Roy, Debbie Watson, Pen Williams

In December, the government launched Youth Matters, the first National Youth Strategy in fifteen years. Building on a State of the Nation report that painted a devastating picture of what it is like to grow up in the 2020s, the strategy proposes six actions that aim to “create a future where every young person, no matter their background, can truly thrive”.

Challenges for Britain’s Young People

The Strategy identifies a range of challenges facing young people in contemporary Britain. Some of these are not particularly novel or surprising, reflecting long-standing and deep-seated inequalities in British society. As the Strategy notes, young people in the twenty-first century “care deeply about the future and place a high premium on education, but too many are held back by poor housing, poverty and a crippling anxiety about the future”.

Other aspects of Youth Matters reflect the limitations of previous youth strategies. In noting that the nation has “failed to invest in places for [young people] to go and people to care for them”, the strategy sidesteps the fact that since the 1960s, numerous governments and strategies have proposed (and implemented) major investments in youth services and support for young people, only for the financial and political backing for these to dwindle over time. Between 2010 and 2023, local authority funding for youth services fell by 76% in real terms; in 2024-25 it fell by a further 10% in England. In the last 15 years, over 1000 youth centres have closed and one-in-eight local authorities reports having no youth centres in their area.

Elsewhere, there is a distinctly contemporary framing to the strategy. Central to Youth Matters is the view that “This is the most connected and isolated generation in history”. The strategy’s focus on the impact of digital technologies on childhood and youth, particularly the threat these are perceived to pose to young people’s wellbeing, is distinctive. While the digital realm is positioned as one of isolation, distance and impersonal anonymity, the strategy puts forth a vision for Britain in which all young people have people who care for them, safe spaces to spend time, and communities to which they belong. Though there may be a distinctive twenty-first century context and framings to the strategy, many of the proposed solutions mirror those of previous eras, rooted as they are in physical spaces and in-person relationships.

Trusted Adults

Action 1 of the Youth Matters strategy aims “for half a million more young people to have access to a trusted adult outside of their home” by 2035. For many young people, their ‘trusted adult’ will likely be a parent or carer. But, for some children, home might not be a place where they feel safe. This is especially true in households where there is domestic abuse or where there is parental alcohol or drug misuse, both of which can create a great deal of instability and unpredictability in the family home. In such situations, young people say that having someone to talk to - a constant and stable source of support - outside of the home can be transformative: an anchor in a storm.

However, ‘trusted adults’ cannot simply be employed or trained up. Being ‘a trusted adult’ is not a qualification or professional status. Trust– and a relationship built on trust – can only be developed over time: it is relational and personal. We build trusting relationships with people who repeatedly demonstrate they are reliable and supportive. For young people, this may be a teacher, mentor, youth worker or social worker. However, it could just as equally be a neighbour or a friend of the same age. Critically it is the relational qualities of that person that matters to a young person, not their status.

If the Youth Matters strategy is to meaningfully deliver on its promise to increase the number of young people having access to a trusted adult, then attention needs to be given to existing research with young people about what they need from the adults around them – not what adults may presume they want. What young people say they want is respect and honesty, someone they can ‘be’ safely around without – necessarily - the expectation of deep conversations, as well as someone who will act to keep them safe where needed.

Places to Go and Things to Do

Chapter 2 of Youth Matters emphasises ‘places to go and things to do’ and acknowledges the reduction in youth provision since 2010. Wanting to enrich young people’s lives inside and beyond school, it includes proposals for more than £22million for enrichment activities in up to 400 schools and £70 million to support the launch of 50 Young Futures Hubs by March 2029. The funding and initiative pledges are welcome, but there needs to be an understanding of the depth of impact the last 15 years of reduced access and provision have had on young people, particularly those living in the most underserved communities. The Sutton Trust Opportunity Index emphasises that “Opportunity is not evenly spread across Britain”. Bristol East and Bristol South, for example, are identified as two of the ten worst areas for young people’s opportunities.

Getting to places and having things to do is dependent on being able to physically travel, and there is little recognition in the Youth Matters report that lack of transport can be a major barrier to young people’s participation in cultural and social life, either through financial or infrastructure barriers.

The publication of the Opportunity Index coincided with the announcement from the West of England Combined Authority (WECA), of the Kids Go Free funding for free bus travel for under-16s in the summer holidays. This was an opportunity to understand the relevance of transport to young people’s opportunities and engagement, and research was undertaken to understand the impact of this within the two lowest opportunity areas of the city. A youth worker from the only youth centre in South Bristol described the area as “an island cut off from the city and all it has to offer” and emphasised that whilst making transport free was very welcome, years of families not being able to afford public transport had prevented children from building the skills and confidence needed for independent mobility. For the young people in her care to be able to take up this offer, she was physically taking them on buses to teach them how to buy tickets, where they should get off, and how to behave appropriately.  These are independent skills all young people need but have not equally had the opportunity to learn. Additional funding is essential for young people’s opportunities to be realised, but we also need accessible and affordable means of travel and dedicated professionals who can help young people feel confident and able to access what is on offer.

Youth Voice

The third section of the Youth Strategy, Seen and Heard, is concerned with engaging youth voice in finding solutions to social challenges. It looks to achieve this through the lowering of the voting age to 16 and prioritising civic and political education by extending the statutory status of Citizenship to primary school children. It draws specific attention to the need for the voice of youth from disadvantaged or vulnerable backgrounds. This is reflective of the fact that, historically, socio-economic inequality has determined access to Citizenship Education and the quality and frequency of young people’s opportunities for civic participation.

The Youth Strategy suggests that young people do not feel that their voices are heard; importantly many young people have not felt prepared for democratic participation and therefore have lacked the confidence to participate. Lowering the voting age would not only create new impetus for Citizenship Education but may also address some of the logistical obstacles that have limited young people’s political participation previously. Where young people currently feel unsure about the politics and practicalities of voting, young people would be able to register to vote while at secondary school and receive guidance on how and when to vote and how voting works within our political system.

The potential of lowering of the voting age has fed directly into 2025’s Curriculum and Assessment Review (CAR) for several curriculum subjects, specifically Citizenship. While the government may formally introduce topics of democracy and climate change to children in primary education; making the subject compulsory at key stage 1 and 2 will not necessarily address the challenges that face Citizenship Education delivery at key stages 4 and 5 while young people prepare for assessment, and where the curriculum is already full. Securing Citizenship Education across young people’s school journey is important, especially as the National Citizenship Education Survey found that the frequency and variety of citizenship topics encountered in the curriculum is linked to future intentions to vote.

 The Youth Matters Strategy and the state of the nation report shed light on a number of challenges facing young people today and there is enthusiasm for policy initiatives that can address these. As Centre members note, however, these problems are complex, intersecting with broader social, political and cultural contexts and will need careful unpicking and joined-up approaches to ensure that all young people benefit equally.