Youth workers to strike in protest at cuts in Cameron's constituency

Finance | Tania Mason | 8 Sep 2011

Youth workers in David Cameron’s Witney constituency are planning to strike tomorrow in protest at the closure of all five of the youth centres run by the Tory-controlled Oxfordshire County Council.

The youth workers, who are members of Unite, will protest from noon tomorrow in the heart of the Prime Minister’s constituency at what they claim is his “hypocritical” stance on the fate of Britain’s young people.

Unite will highlight the link between Cameron’s rhetoric about ‘broken Britain’ and the fact that, since 1 September, all five of the county council’s youth centres in his constituency have closed. Only the church-run Base 33 remains.

The union is challenging the Prime Minister to a public debate with his constituents about the scale of the cuts to youth services.

Unite said that the jobs of 80 professional youth workers, who care for hundreds of vulnerable young people across Oxfordshire are at risk, as the Conservative-led council plans to offload the running of its 26 youth clubs and two detached youth work teams.

Doug Nicholls, Unite national officer (pictured), said: “It is hypocritical for David Cameron to keep having a go at young people and painting an image of ‘broken Britain’, yet at the same time, the very centres which are meant to help young people are being axed indiscriminately, even in his own backyard. He can’t have it both ways.”

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