Boys and Fatherhood

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 6:26 pm on 24 January 2001.

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Photo of The Earl of Listowel The Earl of Listowel Crossbench 6:26, 24 January 2001

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Northbourne for providing us with this opportunity. I should like to take advantage of it and pay tribute to his consistent and determined efforts on behalf of disadvantaged young men over many years.

Some weeks ago, I observed a scene of young men likely to have been without the care of a father. A 17 year-old was telling a group of other young men and two young women of his recent mugging. The narrator was bare-chested and only around 5 feet 5 inches, but of a very athletic build. His mobile phone had been stolen by a gang and he felt lucky to have escaped so lightly. His audience was enthralled by his account. Afterwards, the young people spoke of the "bloods" in London. A "blood" was originally a term used to describe a youth gang in Los Angeles. Playing loudly in the background was music which featured the strong language which the boy had used, including references to women as "prostitutes" as well as other pejorative terms.

Young men who lack a good, consistent male role model may confuse masculinity with brutishness. This is why mentoring is so important. The most vivid example of mentoring for boys I have seen was featured several years ago in a broadcast of the BBC "Panorama" programme. An Afro-Caribbean professional male was shown helping an Afro-Caribbean boy with his reading and writing at school. We were told that the man would regularly help the young boy in this way. The climax to the mentoring scheme was a visit made by the boy to the man's place of work. The Afro-Caribbean New Yorker, who was the originator of this work, came to London. The response here was mixed. An obstacle came in the shape of the leader of a London authority who could not understand why the mentor had to be a man rather than a woman. Several years on, mentoring is now the bread and butter of well-recognised groups such as the Divert Trust, the Prince's Trust, the Depaul Trust and RPS Rainer, which was mentioned by my noble friend Lord Weatherill.

Last week I visited the Westminster Youth Offending Team. It was with great pleasure that I listened to their way of working with young people, often boys with absent or uninvolved fathers. They used mentoring together with restorative justice and close partnerships with others from different disciplines to try to crack the nut of offending behaviour. I admired the experienced staff and their dedication to their work. It seemed to me that their approach, based on good principles, deserves to meet with success.

Perhaps I should sound an optimistic note in response to the noble Lord, Lord Phillips of Sudbury, who made some realistic but rather sad observations on the current penal system for young people. Some good work is being undertaken out there. The staff in the team are grateful for the resources generously made available for their work by the Government. However, my main concern remains that too much will be expected of them; namely, that public frustration at growing youth crime will put an end to this model, which promises good results with many young people. One has constantly to emphasise the great challenge these teams face.

The youth offending team ran an anger management group for young offenders, led by a female probation officer and a male police officer. Youth organisations will often try to pair up men and women as group leaders. This allows young people--our boys, for instance, or young men without the care of a father--to experience an example of a man and woman working closely, co-operatively and constructively together. It is a widely-held concern among psychologists that young men who see parental couples only arguing--if a couple they see at all--will not know how to sustain a relationship with a woman. My noble friend Lord Northbourne alluded to this when he described the "golden chain", his example of couples working together for their own good and the good of their family.

I suggest that this area of good practice needs to be given special priority. It is vital that boys can engage with a good adult of their gender, ethnicity and social background; it is equally vital that boys can engage with a mixed gender couple of their own ethnicity and background--such as the house master and his wife that my father had affection for when he was at public school.

To conclude, over the past 20 years the British family has been undermined on many fronts, as we have heard, one of the most important being the lack of investment in housing, health and education. Investment then may have helped families to deal with the other great social changes they have experienced. We now need to resource measures such as mentoring, which can mitigate the dread effects of this decline. We need to invest in and repair our faltering public services to prevent further deterioration. That the Government are beginning to address these two closely associated issues is most welcome.