National Youth Strategy – our reflections

The launch of the National Youth Strategy is something to be celebrated. Not only is it the first strategy focused on young people for twenty years, but it’s also a long-term commitment, a demonstration of working outside siloes, and of stretching into what may be possible, built with and for young people. 

Forgive me for seeing all the positives but working in an asset-based way embraces this way of thinking. Of course, a strategy with a full resource and implementation plan is stronger, but a strategy in itself is a critical starting point. And the National Youth Strategy articulates what’s important for young people in all arenas of their lives.

The strategy’s vision is simple: ​“Every young person – no matter where they’re from – should have a safe place to go, someone who cares for them and a community they feel a part of.” But the implementation is far from simple – which means it needs us all to lean in.

Like our work at Paul Hamlyn Foundation, this strategy doesn’t only articulate only what needs to be done but also covers how this work should be delivered: informed by the local context, building on local assets, working collaboratively, and empowering young people to shape the work and have a say in local and national decision making.

We welcome the focus on trusted adults and safe spaces for young people to be in community and to make friends, something Gendered Intelligence called for in a piece we shared before the strategy was developed. Like them, we’d have liked more detail on identity-specific work, including work with young trans people, young people of colour, women and girls and others, and we will continue to champion investment in this targeted work.

Through our Youth Fund, we are funding trusted adults (Football Beyond Borders, Power the Fight), focusing on strengthening the workforce (TRIUMPH), and investing in work to support connection and belonging for young people (Open Youth Infrastructure, GirlDreamer). This work demonstrates the importance of creating time and space for listening, for learning, for curiosity and for connection.

Leaning into young people’s strengths and creating opportunities for young people to lead richer lives is core to the strategy – and to the work of many organisations we fund, from arts to sports to nature (Art Against Knives, Empire Fighting Chance, Spectrum Gaming, Youngwilders) and to leading change (Coventry Youth Activists, Article 39). 

These settings create safety and belonging for young people (Contextual Safeguarding, ConnectFutures), focusing on well-being (YoungMinds, The Hummingbird Project) and ensuring they are accessible and inclusive for those young people who may be left out, ignored or impacted by injustice (Heard, Diverse Youth NI, Conscious Youth). 

Whilst many offer skills and learning opportunities and will prepare young people for education and careers, they also offer real world connections, somewhere to go, a sense of purpose, and empower young people to drive change (Youth Shedz, The Young Women’s Movement, North East Young Dads and Lads).

Reaching Higher recognise that young people are shaped not only by their choices but by the environments they navigate (schools, local communities, peer groups and online spaces). They called for the National Youth Strategy to take an integrated approach and to reflect these real-life complexities young people face. By recognising youth voice, co-creating the strategy, taking a long-term view, and focusing on local youth work delivered in partnership, the strategy has gone some way to responding to this call.

All of the work we fund centres young people’s voices, insights and power. It goes beyond young people having a say, and focuses on co-creation (Peer Power, Association for Young People’s Health), routes for young people to hold decision makers to account (Lambeth Peer Action Collective, We Belong), and roles for young people to shape their futures (My Life My Say, Youth Leads). 

Youth Access was clear on the importance of going beyond listening when we asked for their insight in May 2025 and we continue to support them to champion the importance of Youth Hubs and early support in providing fast, local help for young people that is relational, centred on their needs, and effective at stopping problems before they reach crisis point.

The National Youth Strategy highlights all of these things as critical for young people to truly thrive. We know it’ll take a joint effort, innovative practice, letting go of some things and focusing in on others, and of course there will be challenges. But for now, let’s celebrate the strategy and lean into the possibilities and opportunities it may offer to drive change with and for young people.