PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
Youth Investment Fund - 15 June 2023 (Commons/Commons Chamber)
Debate Detail
Contributions from Lucy Frazer, are highlighted with a yellow border.
Simon Fell
Barrow and Furness
Lucy Frazer
The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
The youth investment fund will build or refurbish up to 300 youth facilities, supporting 45,000 additional young people each year. In March we announced the first tranche of awards, with 43 youth centres receiving over £90 million. We will be undertaking an evaluation of this fund.
Simon Fell
The Walney Community Trust is a fantastic charity operating out of my constituency. It helps people of all ages but particularly focuses on young people from deprived areas. Unfortunately, when it applied for funding through the youth investment fund, it was turned down due to the postcode of the hall it operates from. As you well know, Mr Speaker, Barrow is not a big place, and it is particularly unjust that it has not been deemed eligible because of where that centre is, rather than the people it serves. Would my right hon. and learned Friend be able to look at this?
Lucy Frazer
I know that my hon. Friend is a huge champion for his area. He will be aware that the youth investment fund is a targeted programme, and eligible areas were ranked by a combination of youth need and low provision. The methodology underpinning the selection of areas is publicly available on gov.uk. It is unfortunate that the youth club in Walney falls outside those eligible areas, and my right hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Stuart Andrew) has offered to meet my hon. Friend to discuss this particular case a bit further. I draw his attention to the national youth guarantee. Walney will be eligible for a number of different Government-funded programmes, and we would like to provide him with further details of that, as well as any other Members in the same position.
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