Social Capital

Lord O'Shaughnessy Excerpts

Monday 25th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

The right reverend Prelate makes an important point. My noble friend Lord Greenhalgh has been working hard, in his role as Faith Minister, to bring faith communities together. I am happy to share an obvious example with the House, which is the role that faith groups are playing to support the vaccine rollout, and to manage misinformation and disinformation about the impact of vaccines.

[Lord O'Shaughnessy (Con) [V]]

My Lords, while young people have mainly been spared the ravages of disease during the pandemic, they have suffered the economic and social consequences of the pandemic response, which we have had to follow, probably more than anyone else. Does my noble friend agree that we need to rebuild social capital and offer this group hope? Will she endorse the proposal of a funded year to serve, which was offered and suggested by the Repairing our Social Fabric programme at Onward? I declare my interest as the chair of that programme.

[Baroness Barran (Con)]

I absolutely agree with my noble friend about the impact the pandemic has had on young people. That is one of the reasons that the Chancellor announced a review of youth provision outside schools, which will be reporting in May this year. I thank my noble friend and his colleagues at Onward for providing excellent analysis and research on the year to serve, and I am happy to continue a further conversation with him about that proposal.