Young People

Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone Excerpts

Thursday 13th December 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone (Con)]

My Lords, I warmly congratulate the noble Baroness on introducing this debate. She has created an appalling dilemma for us all, because there are so many points to which each of us wants to respond—particularly as I find myself in agreement with a huge number of her points. It is a paradox that, at a time of greater prosperity, physical health and opportunity, we have young people who are anxious and uncertain. Maybe that is partly because we live in a time of such change.

Before moving on to more substantive matters, I want to comment on the wretched fetish of social media, to which so many young people are addicted. It feeds them false facts and a false reality, but they are obsessed with Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat or Facebook—I cannot remember them all. It portrays all their friends as having a deliriously happy time while they are the only ones feeling lonely and isolated. It encourages them to compare themselves with their peers and causes problems around body image. The situation is extraordinarily serious: it causes bullying and much else besides. It is enormously important for us to do all that we can to create shared opportunities and purposeful activities in settings where young people feel part of a larger whole. Dangerous material can also come through on social media, and the NSPCC’s Wild West Web campaign tackles the sexually inappropriate and violent material that young people see.

The noble Baroness mentioned Dame Martina Milburn of the Prince’s Trust, who has now gone on to chair the Social Mobility Foundation. Dame Martina said:

“The single most important thing we can do to empower these young people is to help them into a job, an education course or on to a training programme”.


On all these counts, the Government deserve credit. Despite all the problems, it is the case that youth unemployment in the UK is at 11.5%. In France it is almost double that, at 20%; in Italy it is 30%; in Greece it is 43%; and the EU average is 15.1%. Whatever one thinks about the types of jobs or zero-hours contracts, they are an opportunity for meaningful activity, and the Government deserve credit.

It was Disraeli who wisely commented:

“Upon the education of the people of this country the fate of this country depends”.


The House will know that the Government have been relentless in their attack on inadequate schools. I know only too well, from my work in Camberwell, Brixton and Peckham, long ago in the 1970s and 1980s, about the inadequate education and the lack of expectations and rigour. Through UTCs, free schools and academies, the Government have been determined to raise standards. The Minister himself is a wonderful exemplar, as chairman of the Inspiration Trust, which has 14 academy schools in East Anglia. Will he tell me how many children previously in a failing local authority school are now in academies rated good or outstanding?

Only last week, at Battersea power station, the Secretary of State talked about the key need for skills. Further education and technical paths must be of equal esteem and effectiveness to revered universities. The CBI estimates that the greatest growth in jobs will be in management, professional and technical roles, all of which will require specialist skills that higher technical training courses could provide. This is an issue that unites the House, but we have to make real progress.

I move now to young people’s mental health, which the noble Baroness also mentioned. The increase in the figures is, I am sure, in part because people feel alienated and confused. We live in a diverse society, but in some ways that creates greater anxiety. David Goodhart’s book is about “anywhere” and “somewhere”, and the “somewhere” model gives more people a sense of space and belonging.

It has become more acceptable to talk about mental health problems, and I pay tribute to celebrities such as Jo Brand and Stephen Fry who have made mental illness an acceptable form of distress that can be discussed. I pay special tribute to the Charlie Waller Memorial Trust. Charlie Waller took his own life in 1997. His parents, Mark and Rachel Waller, set up a pioneering charity which has been an exemplar for best practice by equipping young people to look after their mental well-being, helping people recognise the signs of depression and ensuring that expert and evidence-based help is available.

My particular preoccupation when Secretary of State all those years ago was to achieve proper recognition and understanding of mental health and in particular to insist that it was part of the health of the nation strategy. I welcome the transforming programme being set out to assist young people with mental health problems, with a partnership between the NSPCC and schools. The Prime Minister said that every school should have someone who knows about mental health. Nelson Mandela said:

“There can be no keener revelation of society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children”.


I agree, and we have more to do.