National Citizen Service
"National Citizen Service (NCS) supports the Government’s vision for building a Big Society. It will act as a gateway to the Big Society for many young people by supporting them to develop the skills and attitudes they need to become more engaged with their communities and become active and responsible citizens." [1]
Launched in 2012, David Cameron "said it was "a kind of non-military national service – a two-month programme for sixteen year-olds to come together in common purpose"." [1]
"The government has dedicated £13m to the citizenship scheme in 2011, and £37m in 2012. It is aiming for 10,000 participants this summer and 30,000 next year. But the education select committee has estimated that offering it to all young people would cost more than the £350m spent in total on youth services in 2009-10. It also questioned whether the government was getting value for money - pointing out that the cost to the taxpayer for each six week-placement was £1,182 per young person - whereas Germany provided an entire year's volunteering for just £1,228 per participant." [2]
Important critical report from the Educational Select Committee’s review of youth services is now available for download.
Partners are: Big Change, EY Foundation, GoThinkBig, Sky Skills Academy, Apprenticeships, Traineeships, National Careers Service [2]
Contents
Board
Accessed February 2015: [3]
- Stephen Greene - Chair
Executive directors
Non-executive directors
- Julia Cleverdon
- Martina Milburn
- David Blunkett
- Nick Farnhill
- Shaun Whatling
- Alan Hirzel
- John Harley
- Bill Crothers
Contact
Web: http://nationalcitizenservice.direct.gov.uk/
Articles
- Vibeka Mair, "Serco wins big in National Citizen Service contracts 4 Governance", 13 Sep 2012. (Serco dropped out in 2014) "Overall, eight organisations have won contracts to run the government’s National Citizen Service until 2014. The eight winning bidders will share a contract pot worth £200m and operate in 19 regions across the UK.
Serco will run the National Citizen Service in the most regions - 6 across the UK - with its NCS Network, which includes four charities: Vinspired, NYA, UK Youth and Catch 22."
Criticism
- NCIA, "Big market: how localism and the ‘big society’ damage independent voluntary action", May 2011.
Resources and articles
Related Sourcewatch
- International Citizen Service
- Leicestershire Education Business Company
- Tim Loughton [3]
- Jennie Butterworth
- Changemakers UK
- Andy Cope
- John Hart
- Rachael Clarke
References
- ↑ Gov National Citizen Service, organizational web page, accessed October 9, 2012.
- ↑ Cameron's citizen service - is it working?, BBC, accessed February 23, 2015.
- ↑ People, National Citizen Service, accessed February 23, 2015.
