Subjects: Launch of Empowerment program; Youth Off The Streets.
JUDY BARRACLOUGH: Good afternoon. I'm Judy Barraclough, CEO of Youth Off The Streets, and I'm very pleased to welcome the Federal Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus and the Federal Minister for Education, Jason Clare. We're delighted to welcome them as they announce the Youth Empowerment program.
Youth Off The Streets is proud to be participating in the Youth Empowerment program, which will be a vital support to at risk youth across Australia. Youth Off The Streets will be providing alternative pathways for at risk young people. There's a common misconception that these children and young people are bad. At Youth Off The Streets our experience has been anything but that. We have never seen that. These are children and young people who have enormous strength and resilience, but have faced a myriad of challenges from domestic violence, homelessness, poverty and disconnection. We want to help these children and young people avoid falling into crisis and give them the opportunity to build a stronger and fulfilling life.
ATTORNEY-GENERAL MARK DREYFUS: Thank you very much, Judy. And could I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land we're meeting on, the Gadigal people, and pay my respects to their elders past and present, and I extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who are here today.
Thank you very much, Judy, who is the Chief Executive Officer of Youth Off The Streets, which all of you absolutely know. And thank you to all of the team for welcoming me and Jason here today. Jason has told me so much about your amazing dedication to young people and on that theme, I cannot think of a better place to launch the Government's Youth Empowerment program.
It's a program that's going to provide $28.3 million to 35 community organisations nationally for programs targeted at young people aged between 10 and 17 who are engaged in, or at risk of becoming engaged in, criminal or anti-social behaviour. Each one of the 35 organisations that have been successful in getting this funding have been chosen on merit because they've demonstrated the capacity to be able to work with their local communities to put in place programs that will help vulnerable young people stay in school, reconnect with family and community and determine their own futures.
Every one of the 35 organisations that is going to receive funding under the Youth Empowerment program has a strong and established presence in their local community and a demonstrated ability to deliver effective and innovative youth engagement activities. The successful projects will provide locally based support for young people across Australia, including in remote and regional areas.
This is new funding. It's in addition to the Government's U25-GO grants program, which provided $13.5 million through 2024 to State and Territory Police Citizens Youth clubs, Blue Light organisations and other eligible organisations. And just like the U25-GO grants the Youth Empowerment program will, we are certain, have significant positive impacts for participants and for the wider community. Improving educational outcomes, developing better interpersonal skills, equipping young people with more skills, resources and opportunities will prevent potential problems like substance abuse, school refusal and involvement in anti-social behaviour. It's funding that reflects the Australian Government's commitment to tackling youth crime and increasing community safety by delivering significant investment in programs that are shown to strengthen community safety and improve access to justice for all Australians.
I am delighted to announce that one of the 35 organisations that's been chosen to receive funding under the Youth Empowerment program is Youth Off The Streets, which will be provided with $991,138. It's a very precise amount of money for its Empowering Youth For Positive Change project. The project will support up to 1740 at risk children and young people in Blacktown and the Hunter Valley in New South Wales and Logan in Queensland. It's funding that will enable Youth Off The Streets to provide crucial support at each of the key youth justice intervention points, including outreach and drop in programs in school, life skills programs, individualised support and case management and youth court and detention support to reduce contact with the justice system.
Can I congratulate Youth Off The Streets, which, as I say, Jason has told me a lot about, and all of the other organisations that have been now successfully funded under the Youth Empowerment program. I want to thank all of you here and at a distance, I want to thank all of the other organisations that have received funding for your continued commitment to the provision of programs that help children and young people reach their full potentials. And because I know this is dear to Jason's heart, I'm going to throw to Jason to say a little bit about Youth Off The Streets. Thank you.
EDUCATION MINISTER JASON CLARE: Well first, thank you, mate. This money is not going to just change lives, it'll save young people's lives. And I thank you, Judy, and can I thank the whole Youth Off The Streets team for everything that you do. You know what you do, but we've got a camera here, and just in case the world is listening, let me tell the world a little bit of what you do.
I thought I'd just mention two stories today. I remember being on the street with the Youth Off The Streets team a couple of years ago on the streets of Sydney, and they told me a story about a 12 year old girl that they met sleeping rough in Sydney, and she was injected with heroin for the first time when she was 12 years old by her mum. And that girl's not dead today, because she was found by you, and she was given a place to sleep, and she was given a place at school, at your school, and she finished school, and now she's a school teacher, saving lives and changing lives. That's what you do.
And just one more story, I was at one of my local shops on the weekend, handing out for the election that will come sometime soon, we don't know when. I was just about to leave and one of the ladies who worked at the IGA where I was standing up the front said "can you talk to my son?" And I picked up the phone, and he told me the story about how he was bullied at school and how he thought about taking his own life. And he said, "I left my local high school and I went to Youth Off The Streets at Merrylands", and because of that, he finished school, and now he's at TAFE. And the voice I heard on the phone was a voice of optimism, of hope, and of confidence. That's you. That's the work that you do. It makes the world of difference each and every day, all of those individual stories and this money matters because it makes all of that possible.
So, I just wanted to say thank you for what you do. Thank you for making this possible. Thank you to my old mate, Tony Stewart, who's been here, I don't know, 20 years now, 22 years? I got to catch up with Karen a minute ago. Karen and I grew up together as little kids, well, 50 years ago in the streets of Western Sydney. We were lucky. You know, we were lucky when you think about the children and the young people that Youth Off The Streets help, and this is providing more children with a bit of the luck we had when we were kids, right, changing lives, saving lives. So, thank you. Thank you so much.
