Time for a change!

Some things never change. There are lots of people out there that make sure of it!

I see this week that Ozzy Osborne, not the cool alcoholic one, but the cruel sober one, has been up to his old tricks. This week he announced that he is selling off the Royal Bank of Scotland, a bank that is owned by us, the tax payers. He is selling it off at a loss. He will make the money up somewhere else (unspecified) is what he claims. Has he had the advice he sought before, from the people who advised him to sell off the Royal Mail at a dismal price, then the shares were all bought up by the very people who advised him?

I see that there are even more programmes on TV about welfare cheats. Are the government trying to justify the measures they are about to bring in - just getting the great unwashed singing from the same hymn sheet before they release the hounds on us all?

Also there are more allegations about high ranking politicians and child abuse. This week, it's a former prime minister! If these allegations are proven, then someone must pay, as there must be people alive now that knew about this. He had around the clock police protection, so they must have known. What about the woman who had a case against her dropped because she threatened to reveal information? Of course these are just allegations for now. Has anyone heard any more about the case against Prince Andrew? Has it all been cleared up? Nothing in the news about it so far.

I have spent a great part of my working life trying to help change the lives of young people who for what ever reason find that education is not for them. I know what it's like to feel like this, as I was one of those kids that wouldn't listen, and tried my best to alienate myself from everyone. There has to be a different way to engage these young people. Kids Company tried a different way. I have to admit that this was not one of my favourite charities, and I had grave reservations about the charity for years. But I have always applauded them for trying something different. They were working with some of the most challenging young people in the country. These kids may not have had a state education but they have had very good schooling on the streets and are very clever and manipulative. So it's easy to criticise the charity for the way it worked, but it is the government's policies that created these problems. They have given up on lots of these young people, and lots of them have metal health problems - and many of them have kids of their own!

When these people have no other alternative but to go out and rob... “WHAT!” I hear you say, “NO OTHER ALTERNITAVE?” yes you heard correctly. These are young people who have a multitude of problems from drugs and drink addictions to mental health issues, they have no education and no means of finding any employment. They have been sanctioned by the social security so are receiving no benefits and have been given up on by family and friends: what do you think they will do to survive? Lots of these young people come from violent backgrounds and know nothing except day to day living - that's what they do and that's what they are good at. When they come calling to your house don't be trying to phone the police if you live in an odd number house as they wont be interested.

The police have been cut back so far that they have become a company only interested in getting fines from motorists. The young people that I have spoken about have been arrested so many times they know the game, they know what to say so they are nearly always let off. It's a vicious cycle.

So, I would like to ask the question again. What are you going to do?

We are told that we must all suffer the regime of austerity, but what about all the tax evasion by the big multinationals? Get the money they owe. Welfare fraud is a drop in the ocean compared to the big multinationals' tax evasion. But we don't see ever increasing television programs about them do we? All we see is programmes about the poorest and most vulnerable in society doing the only thing they know what to do, live day by day.

I have written many times before that I'm co-founder of an enterprise called Relight-ED we exist to try get young people to see the value of education. Like Kids Company we try lots of different ways to engage young people and like Kids Company, we don't always get it right. I have always claimed that you must start with the young people long before they end up running feral on the streets. Show them that education can be fun, break the cycle. It's not easy to do this and it is always one step forward and two steps back. We have to work with dedicated people because it is a hard slog for little reward financially.

I also heard this week about a theatre company who had been funded to work with young people discussing and making a play about fundamentalists grooming young people on the internet. They talked about being radicalised and jihad brides etc, I hope they had things about Christian right wing bigots in there too? They were making a play about this subject and had three hundred young people working on the project. To have this amount of young people wanting to take part in an art project is very impressive, trust me. Everything was going well when the plug was pulled on the project and it was cancelled, even the police were involved, why?

There have been lots of claims and counter claims. The powers that be said the play wasn't up to standard. Whose standard? If it has been written and directed and performed by the young people then it's up to their standard, and that's good enough as far as I'm concerned. Or is it the subject matter that people have a problem with? The only way you can change things is to talk about them then meet them head on and deal with them. That is what was happening here as far as I can see. We at Relight-ED have made films and productions that have been brilliant but we have also done some that shall we say were not as brilliant. It depends on who is making the film/production. We do everything not on a shoestring budget, but on a non-existent budget, in many cases.

We find it hard to get funding, we don't have the high profile or the contacts that lots of London-based enterprises have, but we do have good, hard-working and very talented individuals who are prepared to work to change the lives of others. If you're working class it seems all we are good for is being on TV showing what low life scroungers we are. When in reality, the real scroungers are the people who have the power and shift the real money around between themselves. These are the people who are creating a divide in society which is getting bigger each year. Something has to change!

Real money has to be invested back into communities. When the government say they are giving a million towards a charity it is just like you putting a pound in a box. It's a worthless gesture. We don't need charities, we need a proper government that works with the people, for the people. Enterprises such Relight-ED are not the solution to the problem, we can only work within education to help teachers. The money must be given to the schools, and not to enterprises to run the schools. We don't want or need a charitable society but a strong, government-led society, where we all have an equal chance to succeed no matter who our parents are or what they did for a living or where we were born. We want a society where people can develop and learn at their own pace so they can become a valuable member of society and give back what has been given to them. They don't need stigmatising or criminalising by the real crooks.

IT IS DEFINITELY TIME FOR A CHANGE!