GFTU BGCM 2019 Minutes

as the future economic driver of this country. It is on the basis that young

people were very much before unions exploited and, by the way, young people

have always been exploited in this country. They have never been liked. They

have never been valued. I do not know how we survived, but we got there.

We have heard about what the Youth Service and cuts have done. When you

have poverty you get crime, you get gangs. It is there for us to want to look at

social history. It is a fact. If you go into the traditional areas of deprivation and

disadvantage it is there. Nothing changes. It just becomes a reflection of the

time. That is what can happen when we do not have the right

prevention/interventions, diversionary activity, youth services, because at the

end of the day lives get lost and I believe every life is priceless. If every life is

priceless, how are we then trying to put a per head per cost on provision?

That is your Choose Youth campaign. I looked it up. Everything is there,

everything that we should be doing, but I am the most impatiently patient

person you have ever met and I want to know why this is not happening at a

quicker pace to match what continues to be an unacceptable pace, that young

people’s lives disaffected, disadvantaged and disillusioned sees lives lost or go

to the university of crime. By the way, that is the criminal justice system and

every single one of us pays for that and you can get three nights in the

Dorchester cheaper than you can at Her Majesty’s pleasure. I always say to

those who did make it when we go to Buckingham Palace, “Isn’t it good here?”

and they never put anything in their pocket. We are all terribly well behaved.

You did not get that one!

That is me, the most formidable individual you will ever meet on the

competition square, everything honed and harnessed and channelled, as I

shared with you, all that causal effect and impact, world beating and reflective.

It is worth noting that Great Britain per head per population was the most

powerfully successful combat sport nation in the world. 95% of us came from

socially economically deprived backgrounds, 99% of us could have been at Her

Majesty’s pleasure rather than her leisure. Work that one out. I just came from

the World taekwondo championships in Manchester last night. Britain got three

gold medals. Of the 900 competitors from 150 countries, they all came from

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