The Politics Project

This year, we at The Politics Project have expanded our offering to our partner schools, adding a new version of our programme – Digital Dialogue: Select Committees. To deliver this, we’ll be working with the Select Committee engagement team to help school students get involved in giving evidence to Select Committees. 

Giving evidence to Select Committees can seem intimidating, and the kind of thing many schools might assume isn’t open to them. Even those that might want to take part can find the logistics of doing so to be a problem – travelling across the country to London in order to give evidence is difficult at the best of times, and will only be more difficult post-Covid. 

We are using our experience in preparing young people to have meaningful conversations with politicians to help them to engage with select committees. By using video calls, we’re helping young people talk to various Select Committees and All-Party Parliamentary Groups, opening up areas of power that often young people don’t get to explore. 

This work is an adaptation of our Digital Surgeries programme, which aims to allow every young person to have a meaningful, informed interaction with their local, regional or national representatives during their time at school. With a small group of our partner schools, we ran a new version of our Digital Dialogue programme with the Lords Committee on Digital Technology and Democracy.  

Our first session with the Lords committee saw pupils talk about their thoughts on social media, giving evidence regarding their use of it and discussing their thoughts on reform. The second session was with teachers involved in the provision of digital literacy from across the UK. Their thoughts helped to inform the committee about the situation on the ground, and are referenced in the committee report ‘Digital Technology and the Resurrection of Trust’, which you can access here. 

No matter your area of work, the chances are that there’s a Select Committee conducting an enquiry into an issue that affects your organisation or the young people you serve. Select Committees are a great way to get involved with the evidence-giving process, and choosing to give evidence can help young people to learn about the parliamentary process and help committees incorporate the lived experiences of young people into their recommendations. For many of the students we work with, the experience demonstrates that when you engage with parliament, parliament will engage back with you, helping to solidify trust in both politicians and the democratic process more broadly. 

We’re proud to be Parliament Week partners. Yes, we love the (always stylish) UKPW t-shirts, as our Twitter pictures will no doubt prove come UKPW 2020, but it’s crucial to find ways to engage beyond Parliament Week. It’s been an unusual and incredibly difficult year for everyone, but the need to engage with parliament hasn’t stopped for young people, and we think that our digital engagement strategy is a great way to make that happen. We’re already looking forward to facilitating our sessions in the new school year.