Girlguiding UK: British Overseas Territories

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd January 2024 Westminster Hall

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on a brilliant opening to the debate. I will start where he finished—with a call for a solution. I know that solutions and suggestions for solutions have come forward from various guiding organisations within the overseas territories, such as setting up separate charities to enable them to continue.

I will start with some comments from the Minister’s opposite number in the Cayman Islands. The hon. Isaac Rankine MP, the Minister for Youth, Sports and Heritage—probably broadly comparable to the Minister present—made the point that Girlguiding Cayman Islands provides structure, guidance and leadership. That is what those in girl guiding in the overseas territories want to continue: the structure, the guidance and the leadership that has come from Girlguiding in the UK. That would allow the organisational structure to be maintained with sound governance and support from the governing body of Girlguiding. That is all that they are calling for: to let that umbrella of support and structure to be maintained. They are prepared to consider new, innovative and different ways to allow that to happen.

The response from those at Girlguiding UK, however, has been frightened. That is the only word I can use: they are frightened of the risk. They talk about risk management and the challenges of different legal structures in the territories, but those legal structures have been different for generations. Those legal structures were governing the territories 100 years ago, long before email existed or people could log on to the Girlguiding intranet to get all the policies around safeguarding that they needed, for example.

Safeguarding is not a new risk, tragically. Looking after the welfare of our young people has to be paramount—of course it does—but we know that there have been those who have not safeguarded children in various organisations across the globe for centuries. We are now much more alive to the risks; we have much better policies in place to manage the risks, and we have safeguarding structures that simply did not exist 100 years ago. I would therefore argue very respectfully to Girlguiding that, although of course it is a challenge to manage structures across the globe and it is not easy in a completely different territory and time zone, we have modern forms of communication that make things a great deal easier than they have ever been.

This may seem a little off track, but I want to talk specifically about Parliament Week, because it is an opportunity for us all to visit youth organisations across our constituencies—schools, Girlguiding, the Scouts or whoever. In the past year, I have taken full advantage of that opportunity, largely because myriad invitations came in from some great organisations, including the regional Girl Guides, the brownies and a whole host of schools. I must not forget that the Scouts invited me, too.

Although the rainbows exist now, the brownies is where it all started for me. I confess that it has been 40 years since I left the brownies with an armful of badges. I was very proud of those badges, including one about the international work of the brownies. As a small child 40 years ago, I learned all about the work of British Girlguiding Overseas, and it has stuck with me to this day. The only other thing that has stuck with me is my first aid badge, which could probably do with a bit of a refresher.

I remember the importance of those badges, and I remember learning about the different brownie and guide uniforms in different territories. As a child, it was incredibly exciting to know that I had something in common with girls all around the world. At the end of Parliament Week last year, I received a whole new collection of brownie badges, of which I am inordinately proud. They were awarded to me for having taken part in Parliament Week with the Nursling and Rownhams brownies and the North Baddesley brownies. I want to highlight what those girls were learning last year, undoubtedly in common with girls around the globe.

I went to the North Baddesley brownies, where the sixes have divided into three groups. They spoke of some of the challenges that different groups are facing, and they did so in an incredibly clever way. The unicorn group spoke about the challenges of gender stereotypes in the 21st century. The mermaid group spoke about the challenges of pollution in the ocean and how that affected mermaids; the climate and pollution challenges were made relevant to the mermaid icon that they had chosen. The ogres group spoke about the challenge of appearance-based bullying. It was all incredibly cleverly done, and it gave those young girls the opportunity to research an issue, think about its impact and then stand up and make a presentation on it.

I do not know whether colleagues in this House are ever struck by this, but I am constantly struck by how scared my constituents sometimes are when they have to get to their feet and speak publicly on any issue. In those brownie groups, seven, eight and nine-year-old girls were being taught to speak with confidence on a range of issues, and to present to an audience not just of their mums, dads and girl guiding leaders, but of me, their local MP. They had the chance to make the case directly to me. That is something that happens around the globe and in our overseas territories at the moment, and we are at risk of losing it. We are at risk of losing the voices of those young girls, who are undoubtedly being given the confidence to go on to contribute in later life.

[Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)]

Does the right hon. Lady agree that we all need to do as much as we can to promote youth organisations, and particularly uniformed organisations like the Girl Guides, in overseas territories and at home? They promote discipline, respect for genders and the sort of values that are often stereotyped and not reflected on television screens, but which we need to inculcate among our younger generation.

[Caroline Nokes]

I am exceptionally grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising that point, because it brings me on to one of my other visits during Parliament Week, which was to the regional headquarters of guiding in Salisbury. Having a region that stretches from Cornwall all the way to Hampshire is an interesting challenge, but that is what girl guiding does: it has big regions that manage to communicate effectively with one another. In Salisbury they came together to speak to me, and there were rainbows, guides, brownies and rangers in attendance.

I want to focus on one former Girl Guide who became a Salisbury city councillor: Eleanor Wills, who is now an ambassador and champion for guiding regionally. Eleanor has set up her own badge focusing on community and on giving young women the opportunity to contribute to their community and become community champions. Eleanor did that herself: she went on to become a local councillor and has been a real advocate and champion for young women. That is what guiding does, and I say respectfully that it is what we are lacking on a national and international stage. In democracies, parliaments and assemblies around the globe, we still have far too few women speaking up. Girl guiding has a role to play in making sure that we give girls their voice and encourage them to go forward with it.

Girl guiding sometimes leads to women ending up in this place, but those opportunities are at risk for British girls in our overseas territories. They could potentially be taken away from girls like Chelsea Been, the Turks and Caicos Member of the Youth Parliament. That young lady spoke so eloquently in the Youth Parliament debate on 17 November that she made a significant impact on Mr Speaker in this place: he often talks about her contribution, and how it is only right and fair that girls like Chelsea be allowed and empowered to continue finding their voices and using them. Her contribution in that debate in November was focused exclusively on what girl guiding had done for her in Turks and Caicos, on the involvement of both her grandmother and her aunt, who was a commissioner there, and on how guiding had given so many girls their voice.

I do not need to highlight this to the Minister, but I will anyway. The joint declaration of Governments of the United Kingdom and British overseas territories was published exactly a month ago today. One month on, we can reflect on that document, which rightly speaks to a modern partnership for a stronger British family. However, it manages to talk about family without using the word “woman” once, and we do make up 50% of that British family. We cannot have the strong, safe and prosperous societies that that document aspires to without everyone being able to

“play a full and active part in society.”

I am quoting very deliberately from the text.

I want to emphasise how Chelsea and generations of young women living in the overseas territories have cultivated their roles under the auspices of Girlguiding. To lose that without a fight would be abdicating our responsibility to girls like Chelsea who are yet to come.

[Alexander Stafford]

My right hon. Friend is making an incredibly powerful argument. She paints a rosy picture of what girl guiding was and how it treated her, which is very good; I completely agree with her. However, as I am sure she knows, last year Girlguiding UK went through the biggest rebranding exercise in 113 years. It has changed lots of things, including the uniforms and the logo, to create a new identity to

“address outdated perceptions holding us back”,

according to its press release. Does my right hon. Friend share my concerns that Girlguiding UK sees the overseas territories as outdated and is therefore trying to refresh the brand by throwing off parts of the British territories? Is she concerned that it is not doing what it should be doing and looking after our British girls?

[Caroline Nokes]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point. Every youth organisation has to refresh; it has to move forward and be relevant to the 21st century. In so doing, however, it must not cast the baby out with the bathwater. I am not sure that Girlguiding UK is taking the decision that the overseas territories are old-fashioned; it would be incredibly regrettable were it to do so. I think Girlguiding is taking the view that this is all just a bit too difficult and risky, so it is not going to do it any more. That is wrong. We do not want to encourage a generation of snowflakes. We want young girls to learn about how to manage risk, which can be an opportunity as well as a threat. We have to learn about risk. We cannot wrap ourselves in cotton wool. We have to recognise that it is through challenging ourselves and doing the difficult stuff that we actually get better.

We must not abdicate our responsibility to girls like Chelsea or to young women like Eleanor Wills in Salisbury. We want to make sure that British girls overseas are given the same opportunities. Of course, it is not just Turks and Caicos; the hon. Member for Strangford spoke about the important role that girl guiding has played in Gibraltar. I was struck by the briefing, which described how girl guiding had continued even through the war, when they were all evacuated and became refugees all around the globe.

I failed to declare an interest at the start of my speech: I chair the all-party parliamentary group for Cyprus. I benefited from a fabulous visit to Cyprus a couple of years ago, and there is another coming up—that is not an advert to colleagues! Girl guiding is a way for girls who get posted overseas with their serving forces family members to have some continuity and thrive with the same social engagement and structure—we are back to structure—with which they are familiar. When we go to a new country, it is sometimes difficult to blend in, assimilate and make that adjustment, but girl guiding can provide a route for girls to do so.

My hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Alexander Stafford) made a point about the Falkland Islands. I have never been to the Falkland Islands, but I know that teenagers from the Falkland Islands end up in Winchester, adjacent to my constituency: Peter Symonds College is the catchment area college for the Falkland Islands, believe it or not. We want to ensure that girls can come from the Falkland Islands—a tiny community that is very remote from the rest of the United Kingdom—to this country and instantly assimilate, with a structure, a familiarity and a routine that they are used to.

I conclude with the point that I have made throughout: this is about giving girls their voice, giving them opportunities and ensuring that they can thrive and become independent young women in an increasingly difficult and challenging society, wherever they are in the globe. This is about managing risk and accepting that risk can sometimes be a challenge. My plea to Girlguiding UK is to stop being so risk-averse; to accept that comms around the globe are a lot easier in the 21st century than they have ever been; and to regard that as an opportunity, not as a chance to shy away from a long-standing tradition that is absolutely cherished by the girls I have spoken to.