Tag Archives: dads and doughnuts

Free to be Young

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At the Liberal Democrat conference last weekend, I moved the motion on our new youth policy paper, Free to be Young. Here’s my speech:

When Nick Clegg gave me the Youth portfolio – we agreed that Liberal Democrats would be relentlessly pro-youth – not anti-youth!

Young people often get a raw deal. When they work hard and pass their exams – all they hear is that they only did well because tests are getting easier these days.

And although young people are more likely to be a victim of crime than any other group in society – politicians – Labour and Tory obviously – and the media often treat them as though they are all criminals.

And when there is nothing to do after school, because youth services have been decimated over the last two decades – then they are blamed for hanging around the streets.

The pressure comes at young people from so many angles:

  • from the medial who are happy to report on the kids who do cause trouble but never seem to give those same column inches to all the volunteering and good things that young people do; and
  • from the fashion, beauty and diet industry – who bombard young people with fake images and we know that  issues of low self esteem, anxiety and eating disorders are on the rise – directly correlated to this unremitting diet of over-perfected stereo types.

There are huge challenges ahead, particularly as we climb out of a recession that threatens young hopes and aspirations. If we don’t want a lost generation – then we have to make sure that we deliver a worthwhile future for our young people.

We Liberal Democrats are committed to creating a country where our young people can be free to be themselves, enabling them to be the very best they can be – and enjoy equal life chances with everyone else.

We want our policies to be effective – not vindictive.

That is why our youth policy paper, Free to be Young,  sets out what Liberal Democrats would do differently to provide a fresh start for young people in the UK today.

Families and relationships are so important – but we know that sometimes things don’t work out – and children see little of their fathers.

It’s not a tax break for married couples that are needed – it is about engaging both parents with their children regardless of who the child lives with.

We propose a program called Dads and Doughnuts.

And if both parents are not involved – we have to make an effort to facitlitate that involvement. We know that if fathers read with their sons at an early age – that child does much better. Dads and Doughnuts is about encouraging schools to involve both parents in their children’s lives – separately if necessary.

In employment – what message does it send to young people when they do the same job, the same hours – but receive a lower minimum wage?

That isn’t about fairness – that’s about doing it on the cheap.

And young people can get married and have children at sixteen, serve in the armed forces – pay tax. What was that about no taxation without representation? So we believe that young people should be able to vote at 16.

And as I said – the recession focuses our proposals on ensuring that we don’t have a lost generation.

We need to ensure that every young person has a pathway – whether that is work experience, training or education.

We will fund 15,000 more college based foundation degree places in the first year.

Introducing a new ‘paid internship scheme for the first year after the election paying a training allowance of £55 (£5 more than jobseekers) per week.

Because how do you persuade an employer that you can do the job if you have no work experience in that field – and how do you get that experience if you cannot get a job.

And freedom – what freedom is there on being on the DNA database when you are innocent?

I remember a young black mother coming to my surgery almost hysterical with worry because her young son, 11, had been playing hide and seek in the grounds of a local hospital.

A policeman stopped him and asked what he was doing (his mates ran off) and from that his DNA was taken and despite the fact he did nothing really wrong – he was just playing – that DNA record was held.

His mother was hysterical because she knows that one day an employer may ask if he is on the DNA database – and that record albeit for nothing – may add to the already difficult challenge in getting a job. Moreover – it is just wrong to hold records on innocent children.

We would remove them from the DNA database unless there is a conviction for violent or sexual offence.

Homophobic bullying is rife in our schools – we know that 6 out of 10 children are homophobically bullied.

Nick Clegg has spoken out about the need for teachers to talk about being gay – so that young people understand that it is just another way of being – another normal way of being. We will ensure better training and guidance for teachers and youth workers.

Lastly – because I believe there may be a call for a separate vote on the statutory duty – I urge you to support the motion as is. Liberal Democrats are not natural allies of statutory duties –– so whilst we might very well want to remove a whole raft of statutory duties if we could – but we are where we are – and because youth services in many authorities have been decimated over the last two decades we will make Youth Services a statutory responsibility.

We desperately need an army of youth workers with the commitment, energy and experience to work with our young people – and when the media charge young people with hanging around with nothing to do – much of that is to do with their budgets being raided by a cash-strapped authority.

We have to throw a protective ring around them if we are serious about investing in young people.

So – there isn’t time to cover all that is in the motion – let alone the policy paper.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the young people who took part in the consultation stages of this paper – bright, caring, and passionate and involved – nothing like the picture the media paints.

I would also like to thank Laura Willoughby who chaired the initial stages, and the members of the policy working group who were enthusiastic and determined that this would be a paper that enabled young people to breathe again.

And lastly Linda Jack – who chaired the Policy Working Group with experience, energy and commitment and a resolute determination that this paper should be positive and encouraging – and the title ‘Free to be Young’ is a reflection of the Liberal Democrat belief that every young person should feel that there is a decent, happy and fulfilling life ahead of them.

Thank you.

The role of fathers

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That’s the topic of my latest piece for the Highgate Flier and Muswell Hill Handbook:

It’s all sorts of dads we should be thinking about – not just black ones!

I refer to both Barack Obama and David Cameron’s recently zooming in on the world of fatherless black children. Now yes – there is a disproportionately high number of black families being brought up essentially by the mother – but it’s also an issue in white communities.

I’ve been a single mother myself since my children were 7 and 12. And two things that used to annoy the whatsit out of me when they were at school were firstly that each year parents got a class list (with contact details of all the class parents) and despite informing the school many, many times that we were separated – it was always (only) my address and number on the list – the school itself was acting as if to exclude separated fathers. Secondly – the school tended to send notes home with the child about parents evenings, plays etc. And again – that means they all came to me – and more generally, as it is usually the mother that children live with, to the mothers. So again – the school was acting in a way that excluded separated fathers rather than bringing them in and encouraging their involvement

Being obviously extremely civilised – I would tell my ex the details from the notes and we would often go together to the parents evenings and so on. But if you’re not so lucky in how things work out, the school should be there encouraging the involvement of both parents.

The school should have an obligation to contact both parents about all school activities. Clearly if the situation is hostile – there may be issues – but at least both parents would be informed (so long as the parent and their whereabouts are known).

This has improved a bit in recent years – with email and some good practise where it is the norm to list and contact both parents regardless of status or hostilities – but not nearly enough.

I continue to believe that given it has been shown that a kid’s reading ability, particularly boys, improves beyond measure in correlation to how much reading they do with their dad – it’s time for pro-actively engaging fathers more.

I’m sure lots of you reading this (fathers) are engaged and equally involved with your kids – but this is about improving a situation where there is need.

In America, they have been implementing a scheme (or various schemes) called any variation on ‘Dads and Doughnuts’. Now whilst here we might prefer something other than doughnuts – the idea is a good one that can travel: the school invites Dads in to do things with their kids without the mums. Sometimes this is reading with a breakfast (great for Dads who go to work early) or evening events or parents’ nights for Dads only.

Dads have been left out in the cold for too long. We are seeing the consequences of their absence – but it’s not something we need simply complain about. We can, and should, act.

Dads and doughnuts

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It’s all sorts of dads we should be thinking about – not just black ones!

I refer to both Barack Obama and David Cameron’s recently zooming in on the world of fatherless black children. Now yes – there is a disproportionately high number of black families being brought up essentially by the mother – but it’s also an issue in white communities.

I’ve been a single mother myself since my children were 7 and 12. And two things that used to annoy the whatsit out of me when they were at school were firstly that each year parents got a class list (with contact details of all the class parents) and despite informing the school many, many times that we were separated – it was always (only) my address and number on the list – the school itself was acting as if to exclude separated fathers. Secondly – the school tended to send notes home with the child about parents evenings, plays etc. And again – that means they all came to me – and more generally, as it is usually the mother that children live with, to the mothers. So again – the school was acting in a way that excluded separated fathers rather than bringing them in and encouraging their involvement

Being obviously extremely civilised – I would tell my ex the details from the notes and we would often go together to the parents evenings and so on. But if you’re not so lucky in how things work out, the school should be there encouraging the involvement of both parents.

The school should have an obligation to contact both parents about all school activities. Clearly if the situation is hostile – there may be issues – but at least both parents would be informed (so long as the parent and their whereabouts are known).

This has improved a bit in recent years – with email and some good practise where it is the norm to list and contact both parents regardless of status or hostilities – but not nearly enough.

I continue to believe that given it has been shown that a kid’s reading ability, particularly boys, improves beyond measure in correlation to how much reading they do with their dad – it’s time for pro-actively engaging fathers more.

I’m sure lots of you reading this (fathers) are engaged and equally involved with your kids – but this is about improving a situation where there is need.

In America, they have been implementing a scheme (or various schemes) called any variation on ‘Dads and Doughnuts‘. Now whilst here we might prefer something other than doughnuts – the idea is a good one that can travel: the school invites Dads in to do things with their kids without the mums. Sometimes this is reading with a breakfast (great for Dads who go to work early) or evening events or parents’ nights for Dads only.

Dads have been left out in the cold for too long. We are seeing the consequences of their absence – but it’s not something we need simply complain about. We can, and should, act.

(c) Lynne Featherstone, 2008

Dads and Doughnuts

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They’re Photo of father and childthe subject of my latest column:

In the end if our children run riot or fail to flourish then that is our own responsibility first and foremost. Yes – the government and various authorities have an important role to play to – and they may fail our children in terms of their schooling or us in some or many ways – but in the end we are the parents.

The recent UNICEF report on children’s well-being doesn’t paint a pretty picture of how we are doing – placing British children at the bottom of the heap in the twenty-one rich countries that they looked at.

You can read me thoughts on the solutions to these problems in the full article.

Dads and doughnuts

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What are we going to do about our own behaviour? Because in the end if our children run riot or fail to flourish then that is our own responsibility first and foremost. Yes – the government and various authorities have an important role to play to – and they may fail our children in terms of their schooling or us in some or many ways – but in the end we are the parents.

The recent UNICEF report on children’s well-being doesn’t paint a pretty picture of how we are doing – placing British children at the bottom of the heap in the twenty-one rich countries that they looked at. Our children are more bullied, more unhappy and poorer. We have the second highest rate of family breakdown.

To me, a key issue is recognising that families do break down, and doing more to ensure the best for children in such circumstances. This includes have more and better male role models as well as more support for mothers. This is where the effort should go, and it isn’t about headline seeking legislation.

You can’t legislate to make two parents carry on liking each other or wanting to live together. (Though if you could make people fall in love by statute, it would make the debates in Parliament more interesting!) Neither can you bribe people to stay together through tax breaks for families. That is hardly the best of glues to cement a relationship. This goes much deeper and (allowing for the fact that there are same sex couple who do a wonderful job bringing up children) it means getting a better balance between engagement with mothers and fathers.

So many of our institutions, including many schools, really only engage with a mother and rely on her to communicate in turn with the father. The result? If the mother and father don’t get on, it means it is so easy for fathers to drift away through different mixes of volition, apathy and circumstances from proper involvement in the bringing up of their children.

Someone recently told me about ‘Dads and Doughnuts’- a USA initiative to get Dads fathers involved with their children and their schools. Interpreted in different ways in different schools, the schools invite the Dads with their kids for socials, breakfasts, reading sessions – whatever – without the Mums. Crucially, it means that whether Dad and Mum don’t get on – the Dad still gets involved.

Since I have been expounding ‘Dads and Doughnuts’ in the media for the last week or so (Alan Johnson and the Prime Minister are now following in my wake!) it has clearly resonated. Talking to people it is quite clear that even where schools have a policy on paper of contacting both parents it isn’t always happening in reality. One single father journalist rang me to say his experience, despite giving his details to the school, was that they never contacted him – contact was always through the mother. However, one of my colleagues, Paul Holmes (MP for Chesterfield) says that it is policy in his area to automatically contact both parents. So – there is some good practice in place which we can work to expand.

My next step is to contact the local head teachers to get their advice and find out what they do in terms of contact and how it works out and whether they think such a scheme might be a start. And if you’ve got feedback from your own school – do let me know too.

(c) Lynne Featherstone, 2007

Involving fathers more

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Interviewed by the TES (Times Educational Supplement) about Dads and Doughnuts. I told them about some of the schemes in America, with each school adapting the basic idea (getting fathers directly involved with their children rather than just working through mothers) to its needs – from breakfast clubs for dads and their kids through to getting fathers to read stories to their offspring.

Talking to people this week, it is quite clear that even where schools have a policy on paper of contacting both parents it isn’t always happening in reality. A journalist rang me this morning to say his experience, despite giving his details to the school, was that they never contacted him – contact was always through the mother. However, one of my colleagues, Paul Holmes (MP for Chesterfield) says that it is policy in his area to automatically contact both parents. So – there is some good practice in place which we can work to expand.

My next step is to contact the local head teachers in my constituency to see what they do in terms of contact and how it works out. And if you’ve got feedback from your own school – do let me know too.

We’ll see where we can push with this one – as it clearly is resonating to a great degree. Now we need some facts, some debate and a way forward.

(For the background to the whole issue, read my speech from last week).

Doughnuts are getting popular

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It is growing like topsy – this Dads and Doughnuts (although the Americans spell it donuts) idea. Yesterday Alan Johnson followed my lead, and today the Prime Minister is following my tack! Just glad I put it out there live on the Politics Show last Saturday week and at the Lib Dem conference last Thursday.

And the point of it all is that, in contrast to Cameron’s populist but puerile attempt to glue people together with tax breaks, we need to be getting real support to single and separated parents. Helping mothers and engaging fathers is really vital. You can’t do it through legislation, but how schools involve both parents is a very interesting line to go down – and I am going down it.

Flattered by Labour

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I see from the papers that Alan Johnson (Labour Secretary of State for Education) is now talking too about the need to involve fathers more in their children’s welfare with ideas such as “dads and doughnuts” … all of which rather echoes my speech last Thursday which I talked about precisely this good idea from the US. Flattery, imitation etc. applies I think!

London Region Conference speech

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Ten years ago, I was in the run up to my first general election as a candidate (seems like only yesterday!) – and looking round the room now, it is great to see how much progress we as a party have made in London.

It’s not just that I’m up here speaking to you (though the bit of near-miraculous progress that saw me get elected to Parliament is one pretty dear to my heart!) – but back before the 1997 general election there was only one Liberal Democrat MP in London – and it felt like it had been that way for ever.

And as for the idea back then that here in Camden we might actually be running the council, or that we might have real chances of electing a Liberal Democrat MP in Lewisham or that the Labour-Tory battleground of Brent might have a Lib Dem council and a Lib Dem MP … or indeed just over the road in Haringey that we might even have a solitary councillor let alone an MP! Well now we have 27 councillors and I am the MP!

We have all together come a long, long way. Whether it is due to your hard work delivering leaflets, talking on the doorsteps, improving councils, working with the media or – my own speciality – nagging until we get things done – the results are here for us all to see.

Not just in election results but in the way we’ve been changing the way we are governed. We have set the agenda on so very many things.

Door-to-door recycling used to the preserve of Liberal Democrat campaigns – now Labour and the Tories have embraced it too. Success!

Devolving power down to areas and neighbourhoods used to be opposed by Labour and Tories – now they too talk about decentralising – though their words come more easily than their deeds.

And we still lead the way – as with Richmond’s innovations in relating residents’ parking charges to the pollution impact of the cars.

All these achievements have been won thanks to the hard work and steely motivation of you all in this room – and many others not here with us.

The way so many of you keep going year after year trying to make your part of the world just that little bit better reminds me rather of a quote from Horace Mann about how we should “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity”.

And the tragic news of the latest round of gun crimes in London reminds us all how much we need more victories for humanity.

The problems gun crime and gang culture raise are not amenable to overnight solutions or sudden initiatives – the usual Labour response to so many issues.

Though – to be fair – I think Blair’s recent response has got this more right than Cameron.

We do need to address the issues of young people carrying guns, and that may include revising some of the sentencing rules. But longer sentences (if you are caught) (and if you are convicted) are only a small part of any solution.

Not only are most people who commit crimes not caught, but given the state of our prisons – and the shockingly high re-offending rates – for those who are caught, far too often prison is but a pause between crimes. A welcome pause, but only a pause.

It’s a matter of in the door, welcome to the university of crime, out the door, welcome to another crime.

And yes, even our call for more police on the street is not the whole answer either.

Where Blair was right was in his call for a better witness protection scheme. In order to convict you need witnesses to come forward.

But the gang members won’t dis another gang member. And the witnesses won’t risk speaking out. So the guilty gang members escape.

I well remember how, during the 2005 election, a woman rang me in despair because both her son and her grandson were up for murder. And she said they had a loving home – but their aspiration was to be a criminal – to be somebody and to be in a gang.

So it won’t be easy and it won’t be quick; it may be hard, it may be challenging; but it is a must – changing this cancerous culture of guns and gangs.

It is not a culture that has a grip across the whole nation or in all communities. There are other issues for the crisis in youth behaviour – and the recent UNICEF report raises a whole host of other problems – but that is not the essence of this gun culture problem – which has been around for years but which is in the spotlight right now.

Where David Cameron got it wrong was in thinking that the answer is to just dish out blame, back to basics style.

His comments were an offence to all the single parents who bring their children up in loving, decent homes.

Now yes – of course – role models are vital. And good male role models are vital.

But you can’t force people to stay together – even with tax breaks. (And frankly, what sort of home would it be where the parents only stick together to get a better tax code?)

That isn’t the answer. The answer lies in getting fathers involved and the mothers supported.

Rather than trying to force couples together, we can look at the way schools often in their actions end up making it easy for fathers to drop away – and even push them away.

For schools so often work through the female, maternal network. It can – for example – be difficult for separated couples to go together to parents’ evenings. So often only one of the separated parents attends – normally the mother – and neither the school nor the father makes an effort to get in touch with the other. And so the men drop away.

In America they have something called Dads and Doughnuts. Whatever. It’s a night when father’s come to school without the mums but with the children. It gives fathers an easy route to be good fathers and engage in the school life of their offspring – separately from the mothers.

And there are so many other soft measures that could and would help. That’s where we need to be working.

And education. Black boys’ education in some areas falls way behind. That’s where we need to be working too.

And with the community leaders – we need to work on the good role models – so that the aspiration is not to carry a gun and be a criminal – but to be a good member of the community, working for a decent living and raising a family.

Turning to the issue of discrimination: it doesn’t directly cause crime, and it doesn’t excuse it. But racial discrimination does exist in far too many parts of our society, and it is a contributory factor to that sense of alienation and anger which gang culture feeds on.

We should also remember that discrimination boomerangs back to affect even the majority group.

When we have problems like the disproportionate use of stop and search on black and Asian Londoners, it’s not just them who suffer – so does everyone else from the police time wasted by the fact that an innocent black man is far more likely to be stopped by the police than an innocent white man.

That disproportionality means police time is taken away from catching criminals whose next victim could be any one of us.

And finally, turning to our own party. We have to be honest and recognise that our ability to champion improvements in our community is restricted if we don’t fully reflect those communities.

Right across the breadth of the challenge facing us – we make life harder for ourselves and we make success less likely if we come over as white people lecturing others on how to behave.

And that is why being serious about changing the make-up of our Parliamentary Party at the next general election is so important – and before that – on the London Assembly.

There has been a lot of talk in the party recently about Ming’s initiative with the diversity fund. I’ll simply say this – we all need it to succeed.

But in the end it is not about listening to what others – like myself – say.

The real power to bring about change lies with you, inside your head. Do you want to just sit back and comment on the world – clapping here, tut-tutting there? Or will you roll up your sleeves and get to work in your communities? Do you want to just complain about the world – or do you also want to change it?

So why not, each of you here tonight, resolve to do the following?

Visit three ethnic minority members or local residents in your ward or area within the next four weeks. And talk to them. If they are members – ask them to think about standing for council. If they are not members, ask them to get involved.

Want a change? Then help make it happen. Because that’s the only way it is going to happen!

Which is why I’d end on another quote – this time from our former Liberal MP, Russell Johnston:

“A liberal society will be built only with the bricks of effort and the mortar of persistence. And it is to you that the challenge is made. It is upon you that responsibility rests. It is with you that hope resides.”

Gun and gang culture

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A gunDid the Politics Show on gun crime in London today. It is the big story at the moment, courtesy of a spate of killings and the shocking ages involved – but gang culture and guns have been running for years.

So – yes it’s right to look at lowering the age at which the mandatory sentence for being in possession of an illegal gun can be prosecuted from the current 21 to 17 or 18. But don’t just put them in prison – where youngsters can simply learn in crime’s best university how to be on the wrong side of everything for the rest of their lives. Use that period also to invest in trying to give them real rehabilitation and pathways to a better life.

The one bit of the proposals from Blair that I thought was spot on was the need to introduce protection for witnesses that come forward to give evidence against members of a gang. But neither legislation nor police powers will change the real malaise. These gang members need such a range of support – from somewhere to go, alternative adults to care about them if their parents or parent don’t, life chances and real commitment for long periods from others. There was a guy on the Politics Show from Boyhood to Manhood, who work in South London. We need to ensure that more of that work is going on to support and sustain the individuals and the communities. It’s no good just appointing blame. This has to be about bringing support to lone parents and creating means for fathers to be with their children even if the partnership is long gone – or indeed never was. And this gang and gun culture (and I had a bit of bother saying that on TV – it came out gung!) is specific to this particular criminal culture. It is not endemic across all communities. But we all have to help resolve and resource this long term – not just now the spotlight is on it. One idea I would like to see tried more widely here is an American one – where they started something called something like ‘dads and doughnuts’. These are evenings organised by schools to bring in fathers with their children – not the mothers. Particularly useful where the parents has split up and aren’t getting on as this way – rather than only the mother attending parents’ evenings and the like – the fathers are more involved and engaged with the school and the progress of their child there.

Combined with the UNICEF report that puts our children at the bottom of the rich nation heap – it has been an eye-opening week. We are doing badly. I don’t think you can conflate the two – the gun and drug criminal culture is way beyond the norm. However, we do have a ‘behaviour crisis’ in terms of the more general findings of the UNICEF report – and I hope it is a wake-up call.

I have some sympathy with the Government in as much as so much of the damage was done under the Tories – and the Labour Government has at least made tackling child poverty one of its priorities. The child tax credits, for example, were not a bad idea – just badly executed.

However, it is clear from the report that we, all of us adults, had better have a look at ourselves and our behaviour – because we are letting our children down.