The British Youth Council condemns the racism and hate crimes against immigrants that have surfaced in recent days following the UK’s decision to leave the European Union. The British Youth Council has a history of campaigning to challenge racism and promote inclusion, diversity and equality and we calls on the media, stakeholders and decision-makers to report and support our current activities – the Youth Parliament ‘Don’t Hate, Educate!’ campaign and the British Youth Council Youth Select Committee inquiry into “racism and religious discrimination”.
The UK Youth Parliament launched their year-long campaign ‘Don’t Hate, Educate!’ to tackle racism and religious discrimination, particularly against people who are Muslim and Jewish in January 2016 and have been delighted with the widespread support of the campaign ever since.
The campaign started following the Make Your Mark ballot which took place in the autumn of 2015 seeing the issue become one of the top five with 95,000 young people nominating it as their most important issue and then the subsequent vote by Members of Youth Parliament in House of Commons to make this their national campaign in November 2015.
Ife Grillo, Vice Chair, British Youth Council said: “It’s important we work together to challenge the nasty fallout from the Brexit result. Young people were already coming together to challenge hate crime, and race and religious discrimination, and now it’s even more important everyone else gets behind them.
“We encourage supporters of all ages to back the UK Youth Parliament ‘Don’t Hate, Educate!’ campaign, and support the work of the British Youth Councils Youth Select Committee inquiry into Race and Religious Discrimination. We are playing our part and we call on the media to report these great youth-led campaigns, on politicians to listen to us, and for supporters to help us by tweeting support, or getting involved in the campaign. Young people are the future, but some have already started work to shape the present”
