Today, at Lord’s Cricket Ground, Middlesex Cricket will host its inaugural Young Persons Safeguarding in Cricket Conference, which will be attended by the Government’s Children's Commissioner, Dame Rachel De Souza.
Earlier this year, Middlesex Cricket announced that it had created the English domestic games’ first ever Young Persons’ Advisory Panel; a group of young people involved in cricket across the county who had a strong desire to make a positive impact on safeguarding issues that affect young people in the game, with their findings and recommendations reported to the Middlesex Cricket Board of Directors to be discussed and implemented.
Since the formation of that Panel, the group of young people have subsequently met to determine the issues they wish to address and seek to make change in, and the purpose of today’s Young Persons’ Safeguarding in Cricket Conference is to discuss in an open forum how to best achieve those ambitions.
Classmates of members of the Young Persons’ Advisory Panel have been invited to attend the Conference, as have pupils from a local school in Tottenham, with all conference attendees playing a part in discussing the issues highlighted by the panel, as well as discussing a series of posters created by members of the Panel to help promote a safer environment for young people to enjoy the game.
Middlesex Cricket’s Safeguarding lead on the Middlesex Board, Marilyn Toft, will open the conference, before the Young Persons’ Advisory Panel will open up discussions focussing on the seven key themes identified by the Panel, as follows, which will be considered and discussed in workshops and breakout groups:
Children’s Commissioner, Dame Rachel De Souza will deliver a speech to the conference on the importance of the young persons’ voice in safeguarding, before the conference will be brought to a close by Middlesex’s Chief Executive, Andrew Cornish.
Middlesex Cricket would like to thank MCC for hosting the conference, the members of the Young Persons’ Advisory Group for their commitment to this project to date, all other conference delegates, and Dame Rachel De Souza for giving her time and expertise to the conference.
