Youth council hosts speed meeting with councillors
Epping Forest youth councillors held a speed meeting with their adult counterparts to inform them about the range of issues affecting young people across our district.
The main issues that concerned the youth councillors were:
- Underage vaping – the latest youth council project is to raise awareness of the dangers of underage vaping
- The negative portrayal of young people
- Impact of mental health issues on young people
- Loughton Library and its after-school access
The speed meeting was held at the end of November as part of UK Parliament Week 2024. It was a fun and light-hearted event for both sets of councillors to meet and discuss their concerns. Participants had 5 minutes to interact with each other before moving on to meet a different councillor, similar to a conventional speed dating meeting.
All councillors were scored on their listening skills, approachability and knowledge of youth and community issues.
We learnt so much
Councillor Kaz Rizvi, responsible for Community Health & Wellbeing at Epping Forest District Council said:
We all learnt so much this evening and I was delighted to meet with and hear from our inspirational youth councillors. We were all thoroughly impressed with their levels of enthusiasm and commitment.
We talked about vaping and its impact on young people. We also learnt about some of the habits involved including children as young as 8 looking for and using vapes that have been discarded on the street, so it’s clearly a major issue. It was great to hear about the work the youth council are already doing on tackling underage vaping.
I will look at how Epping Forest District Council can support the youth council with this, and any other issues they see affecting the lives of young people across our district.
The challenges young people face
Youth councillor Eylul Ugur said:
The evening gave us a great opportunity to find out what the adult councillors do and tell them what challenges young people face today. There’s no better way of doing this than one to one with the councillors.
I was amazed to find out that 3 of the councillors were previously members of Epping Forest Youth Council.
We all agreed it was a great success and something we’d like to do again!
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