NCB has launched a five-year programme funded by The National Lottery Community Fund to support children and young people with lived experience of poverty to influence decisions that affect their lives - locally and nationally.
- https://www.tnlcommunityfund.org.uk/funding/funding-programmes/the-uk-fundLocal Voices, National Change is a five-year programme designed and delivered by the National Children’s Bureau to support children and young people with lived experience of poverty to influence decisions that affect their lives - locally and nationally.
- The programme will engage more than 1,000 children and young people from across England and Northern Ireland and create stronger connections between local communities and national policy and decision making.
- The project is funded by The UK Fund, one of The National Lottery Community Fund’s programmes set up to help children and young people thrive.
The National Children’s Bureau (NCB) is thrilled to announce that thanks to National Lottery players, it has received almost £3.5m of life-changing funding over five years from The National Lottery Community Fund.
The funding will be used to support children and young people with lived experience of poverty to influence decisions that affect their lives – locally and nationally. Working with communities across England and Northern Ireland, the project will build and expand on NCB’s work connecting children and young people directly to local and national decision makers, enabling young people to shape policy developments, change systems and challenge the stigma of poverty.
The project, Local Voices, National Change, was developed and designed by NCB, informed by the input and guidance of young people, who helped identify key priorities and refine the approach on engagement. More than 1,000 children and young people across six local authorities in England and Northern Ireland will be engaged over the course of the project, with the aim of changing national child poverty policies and strategies to ensure that fewer children from across the UK are living in poverty.
There are currently 4.5m children growing up in households that are below the poverty line and with the government’s new Child Poverty Strategy and Anti-Poverty Strategy in Northern Ireland, there is political momentum to address this urgent issue.
However, the experiences of young people in poverty are rarely considered by local services or national decision makers, and through this funding, NCB is committed to amplifying those voices and ensuring they play a key role in shaping strategies and policies to eradicate child poverty once and for all.
Children growing up in poverty rarely get to have a say and influence the decisions that affect their lives. At NCB, we’re about to change that. We will provide a voice for some of the 4.5m children in the UK today who face the obstacles and hardships of living in low-income households. The young people we will engage will tell us about their experiences from rural communities as well as urban centres in England and Northern Ireland. I am delighted that thanks to National Lottery players, we have a fantastic opportunity to build on our work amplifying lived experience and empowering children and young people to impact and influence decisions that affect their lives.
Anna Feuchtwang
Chief Executive, NCB
Local Voices, National Change aims to deliver the following outcomes:
- More children and young people are given the confidence and skills to actively participate in the decisions that affect their lives and the places they live in,
- Policies and services to reduce and eradicate child poverty are more effective and relevant because they are underpinned by children and young people’s lived experience.
- A shift toward a culture where marginalised children and young people’s voices are routinely listened to and act as partners with genuine agency.
- A replicable, high-quality model for youth voice and influencing and evaluation and learning that the wider sector can adopt.
- Stronger links between local services, councils, and national government, creating more effective systems for children and young people.
This project builds on and extends NCB’s existing expertise and experience engaging children and young people in the issues that affect their lives.
Annually, NCB engages around 1,400 children and young people, with approximately 150 involved in long -term advisory groups, reflecting a diversity of ages, ethnicities, and genders from across the UK.
This work includes national participation events and training, public campaigns on the latest issues affecting children and young people, convening government advisory boards, providing experts-by-experience support to research studies, and informing our internal strategy.
Alongside the extensive community-based engagement, Local Voices, National Change will involve two longstanding NCB groups:
- Young Research Advisors, who will work with the evaluation / learning team.
- Young NCB, members of which will sit on a dedicated advisory board for the duration of the project, meeting quarterly to provide oversight.
Participation is fundamental to who we are and what we do at NCB. This project will build on all our work to date to engage underrepresented and traditionally under engaged children and young people to shape the direction of research, practice and policies. Young people who experience poverty are rarely listened to by decision‑makers and we want to show that including and listening to lived experience leads to better systems, services and policy, and, ultimately, better childhoods and brighter futures.
Joanna Carr
Assistant Director of Participation, NCB
Over five years, Local Voices, National Change will focus on:
- Youth voice and local delivery: facilitating over 400 engagement sessions with children and young people in local and familiar venues such as youth clubs; and children and young people planning and chairing annual public meetings with local authorities.
- National policy and public affairs: children and young people contributing to parliamentary events in Westminster and Stormont; and working alongside civil servants to shape strategies and guidance and with NCB to translate lived experience into policy influence and impact.
- Evaluation, learning and sharing: Children and young people design how the impact is measured using the Outcomes-Based Accountability model and share their views and ideas through a variety of channels; and a new model of policy development through community-based participation is created for future generations.
The project will be funded by The UK Fund, one of The National Lottery Community Fund’s significant commitments as part of its 2023-2030 strategy, ‘It starts with community’, which funds projects that help children and young people thrive – one of the funder’s four key missions.
The six local authorities participating are Lambeth, Luton, Wigan and Northumberland in England, and Antrim & Newtownabbey and Fermanagh & Omagh in Northern Ireland.
Regular updates and learnings from the project will be shared over the five years in a variety of formats, from webinars and in-person events, to blogs, newsletters, toolkits, video and podcasts, before a final report is published in 2031.
Find out more about our work involving children and young people