Improve Mental Health services for young people!

The Mind the Gap campaign was launched by UK Youth Parliament to advise governments on improvements to services and improve education in this area in schools. The campaign is calling for improvements to be made to mental health services, through consultations with young people.

Beth, 18, UK Youth Parliament member for Hackney says: ‘This is a vital issue for all young people, not just in London, but across the UK’

Mental Health became the UKYP’s priority campaign after securing 167 votes against Better Work Experience’s 117 during the UK Youth Parliament’s House of Commons Sitting in November 2014. A total of 285 Members of Youth Parliament aged 11-18 took part in the debates, the subjects for which were voted for by over 875,000 young people across the UK.

How you can get involved

The Make Your Mark ballot takes place between August and October – this year the UK Youth Parliament is aiming to get a million young people involved, making it the biggest youth consultation ever.

Think it doesn’t matter…?

UK Youth Parliament annual sitting has seen the issues raised by the Make Your Mark survey debated in the House of Commons. It’s a way of bringing the matters that concern you to the attention of Government Ministers. It’s just one way of making those in power sit up and take notice, but many of the UK Youth Parliament proposals have been taken on at a national level:

• Votes at 16 – One of UKYP’s 2015 priorities. 16 year olds were given the vote in the Scottish Referendum and UKYP is pushing for the policy to be adopted in the up-and-coming EU referendum. PM David Cameron has backed a vote in the Commons on votes at 16.  The Labour Party included it as a policy in their 2015 manifesto.
• A curriculum to prepare us for life. Former government Ministers and leading health professionals have demanded that PSHE is made statutory – that means schools failing to provide PSHE would be breaking the law https://pshe-association.org.uk/news_detail.aspx?ID=1430