Citizens Advice co-ordinates Round Table Event at Stormont

A round table event was held at the Long Gallery, on Wednesday 19th May 2010. This event, which was organised and co-ordinated by Citizens Advice Northern Ireland, was aimed at allowing the Consumer Financial Education Body (CFEB) to learn from the experiences and views of organisations operating within Northern Ireland and who work with young people outside of formal education.

CFEB hoped to gain such insights as would allow them to develop an action plan to inform policy-makers and embed practice within statutory, charitable and voluntary organisations across the UK.

Contributors to the round table discussion included representatives from CFEB, The Office of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister, The Department for Employment and Learning, The Northern Ireland Commissioner for Children and Young People (NICCY), The Youth Council, Youth Net, The Simon Community, The Prince's Trust, Barnardos, Save the Children and the Community Foundation for Northern Ireland among others.

The event, which was chaired by Gerry Campbell (NICCY), kicked off with some opening comments from Janine Maher, Financial Capability Manager for Northern Ireland, Consumer Financial Education Body, CFEB. The group then heard from June Ingram, the Director of Strategy, European and Employment Relations Division at the Department for Employment and Learning.

Declan Morris and Davy Faulkner, both of the Belfast Foyer, then showed a DVD of some of the young people they work with expressing their views about money and their experiences of managing their own finances.

Linda Jack, Youth Policy Adviser at CFEB then gave the day's main talk before the round table discussion began.

Citizens Advice currently delivers the Young People and Money training programme in Northern Ireland on behalf of the FSA. This programme has delivered free money management training to over 1,000 youth practitioners across Northern Ireland to enable them to support the young people they work with to become more financially capable.

CAB would like to thank all those who attended the event and looks forward to continuing to work with CFEB in the future.