TRANSCRIPT of the panel discussion on co-production at ‘Excluded: The Event’, held at the CCA in Glasgow on 9 November 2022

Betty Mayo (Advocacy Academy)
OK, hi, everyone. I'm Betty Mayo. My pronouns are she and they. And I am here because, well, because I helped on the Excluded documentary. As soon as I met Sarah and Jack, I was completely enthralled with the work that they were doing and really, really was excited to be a part of it. I'm also a huge, huge advocate for co-production. I work at the Advocacy Academy now, which is a youth social justice movement in South London, where we train young people on social justice and campaigning, and how to really tackle the issues that impact you, and so I'm all about ‘nothing about us without us’ and making sure that the people making the change, and the decisions to make change, are the people who face the issues that they're trying to solve. Because nobody is more of an expert on these issues than the people facing them. And so, I feel like hugely passionate about this and really excited to be here.

Laura Lundy (Queen’s University Belfast)
I'm Laura Lundy. And Sarah's introduced me really. I'm an academic. I'm a professor in Belfast. And in Cork. A lot of my work is – all of it is – child rights. But a lot of it is child and youth participation. I have a model for participation that some of you know, The Lundy Model: it's very well used. I am involved in a very big project on school exclusion in the UK, that's led by Oxford, but involves Edinburgh and Cardiff and ourselves. And when I saw the Excluded film being advertised on Twitter, and watched it, I was blown away, then found out who did this, you know. And then we had a phonecall conversation. And, as I was talking to Sarah, on the phone one day, lying in my bed for some reason, but I know where I was, I was talking because we have a phone. And I thought she's just being completely rights compliant without ever really intending it. It's just like a perfect example of how you should do something like this. And then we got connected. That was me.

Olivia Brown (Scottish Youth Parliament)
I'm Olivia. I am a trustee for the Scottish Youth Parliament (SYP). And I'm here because the SYP was involved in the creation of the documentary and they interviewed two of our former trustees, who unfortunately couldn't make it, about our views on school exclusion. We take very much a rights-based approach to all of our work. Particularly, we pay attention to Article 12, which is the right to have young people having their voice heard. And so I'm very excited to be having this conversation. I watched the documentary and was also blown away by it. It was on a topic that I didn't really know too much about prior to watching the documentary, and that the Scottish Parliament hasn't done loads of work on. But co-production is a massive task – the amount of projects that we have going on right now, particularly with outside organisations, really have co-production at their heart. So, I'm really looking forward to this conversation.

Juliet Harris (Together)
I'm Juliet Harris. I'm Director of Together, the Scottish Alliance for Children's Rights. Together is a membership organisation of over 500 children's organisations, but also academics and interested professionals. And it's really our vision that all children and young people in Scotland have all of their rights respected all of the time. And I know from watching the film, and from all of my work, that we're a long way from achieving that vision at the moment. Through our membership, we work really closely with children and young people to raise awareness and understanding of some of the breaches of their rights that they experience in everyday life. And, at the moment, we're doing everything that we can to actually get these breaches recognised by the international community. So, tomorrow is an exciting day: it's the UN Universal Periodic Review, when lots of other countries review how well Scotland and the rest of the UK is actually doing in taking forward children's rights. And we are hoping for a recommendation from one of the other countries of the world around school exclusions. Because it's so important that we use that kind of power of the international community to influence what happens here in Scotland, and that we use the power of children and young people's voices here in Scotland to tell the international community what we need help with and where we need recommendations. So, like all my other panellists, I’m really impressed by the film: it's an incredible piece of work. And it’s pieces of work like this that provide us with the evidence and the power that we need to get that scrutiny of our human rights record. And to make sure that things actually do change for all children and young people here in Scotland.

Sarah Wishart
So, we’ve got a good amount of time today. It's a bit like Question Time, like I said: we're going to have the questions; the panel’s going to talk about it. What's not like Question Time is that there will be a coffee break, and there will be hopefully biscuits, and at the end of both panels, we're going to have a wine reception, like before we screen the film. So, I'm just going to do a little running around to put the first question. So, a really basic question, I guess: Why should we do co-production?

Betty Mayo
Be careful what we say here. There are young people on the board. Does anyone want to speak to this in particular?

Laura Lundy
Trying to pass it to Betty. And I don't use the term ‘co-production’ because, you know, I think, a lot of people do, and it's a really important term. But I think the way we look at it, the way I look at it, a lot of people do, is, you know, entitlement. And a right. That if you see it, that actually, young people are entitled to influence the decisions that are made about them, then it's just automatically you have to do it with them. And that's what you were saying at the start, Betty. And then the question is: how do you do that really well? And that means you do it early. And you do it all the way through, and you follow through. And that's it – you know, we do it because young people are entitled to have it.

Betty Mayo
Yeah, I agree. I also think that, that we should do co-production, because we should just believe that young people know. And I think that we should believe that there's co-production with young people, but, as I was saying, co-production with all people who are marginalised from decision making, marginalised from being at the table, having a seat at the table. And I think that it just comes from a belief that ordinary people just don't know how to solve ordinary issues. And I think it's just not true. So, we should co-produce to actually just shake the tables up a bit. Let's rethink. This system isn't working. The answers we've already got aren't working. They clearly aren't right. I don't think the answers lie in who's sitting at the table right now. So, we should co-produce to maybe get the right ones, ones from people who are in the community, facing these issues. And I think that that is the case for young people as well – that there's a lot of belief that young people don't know, and we do.

Olivia Brown
Yes, so at the SYP we kind of commonly refer to co-production as meaningful participation. And something that our chair said to me the other day, which I keep recalling – Sophie, she said that people are always going on about how young people are the future. And they kind of forget that we are right here, right now. And that it's just there's so many services right now which are failing young people. And that is because they don't have young people at the heart of them. Young people aren't designing them, they aren't brought into the process. And, like you said, co-production, when it is done well, it involves young people from the start, throughout, and then afterwards, so it closes that feedback loop. And then we can continue to improve.

Juliet Harris
Thank you. Yeah, like my other panellists, I don't tend to talk about co-production: we talk about it in terms of Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) and we see it as a right. And, importantly, it's the right of all children and young people from birth, right up to the age of 18, under the UNCRC. And so, I know from the work that we do around Article 12, that we do it because it makes children and young people's lives better. But it makes the lives of communities, families, it makes everybody's lives better. Because everybody has the right to have an equal say in the way that their communities are and the way that they experience their communities. I think a good example of this is a piece of work that the children's parliament did in East Lothian, where they spoke to children of primary school age about what they liked about their town, but also what they didn't like about the town and how it could be improved. And I think if they'd have spoken to the adults, the adults might have said, oh, we need a playground. We need some swings, perhaps: children like swings. And maybe we need some more parking spaces so that we can drive our children to school. I'm assuming that's what adults would say, and maybe being a little bit stereotypical. But instead, by speaking to children, what do you want Tranent to be like? What do you see it being like? They said, we want more green space. We want vegetable stores – there's nowhere to buy vegetables. On the internet, all the vegetables that we buy from an unnamed supermarket are all out of date and horrible. We want to see more flowers, we want to see more green space. So, don't build playgrounds on our green space. Create green space that we can play on and do what we want. We want to see more flowers. We want Tranent to be a place that we're proud of and that we're excited to walk around and that we think is pretty. We want a Rocket Train because it takes too long to get to Edinburgh. But by talking to children and young people, they drew a great big mural of what Tranent used to be like what Tranent is like now and what Tranent will look like in the future. They were able to work with these children to actually create a Tranent where these children were proud, and they did like walking around and they did like to be there to grow up. So, since doing that consultation, there are more flowers in Tranent: they've actually won an award – a Scotland in Bloom award, or something like that. So, there are more flowers in the street. They've set up a farmers’ market, so that there is a possibility of getting fresh vegetables. The children and young people have really kind of established themselves as people who've got their own opinions, their own voices, and now the local council listens to children in Tranent and listens to them about how they want the town to be. And so, this is an example of where, actually, through co-production, through really respecting the rights of children to be heard, Tranent is a nicer place for children to grow up in, but it's a nicer place for families. And there's that real value put on what children think and what children have to say. And it's a better town as a result.

Olivia Brown
Yeah, sorry, just off the back of that, it's so true that when we involve young people in the process, that gives our decisions so much more legitimacy. SYP are completely youth-led. So, sorry, I'm looking at our MSYPs in the audience. And so, you know, our decisions are made by young people for young people. And we find that people listen to us because of that. It just enhances the level of debate so much more; we hear so many more viewpoints. And so, sorry, Tranent is in my constituency. And it's so true, you can see the difference. There are so many more flowers, there's so many more people moving out there now. And that is because we involve young people.

Sarah Wishart
OK, can you recount positive experiences of engaging with large groups of especially mainstream children? And I do want to sort of say, because most of these questions came from the audience, we haven't obviously put the names of people with them, but if this is your question, and you want to jump in, because you had a particular thing that you wanted to find out or a particular angle that you want to hear the panel discuss, please do.

Betty Mayo
I guess, like, this, when I see this question, obviously, I’m 23 – technically, I'm still a young person, for a bit. And so, as a young person, I can talk about what it's been like to be engaged with. And I think that my first experience of that was with the Advocacy Academy. We're based in Brixton. And they, they work with 17-to-19-year-olds who are deemed as marginalised young people, with a bit of oppression – usually poor, black or brown, queer, like, struggling in school, basically angry at the world around them, knowing that, actually, life isn't fair, and I don't think it's my fault. And I think that we were given a space where we were just told that it was OK to be angry – that your anger is, like, your power. And it's what's gonna carry you through. And I think that coming from schools and an education system that at the slightest glimpse of anger, punishes it, which is like so tied to school exclusions – I don't have an experience of school exclusions myself – but I think that's a lot to do with my whiteness, that like in school my gender is still deemed as like a nurturing and sweet gender. So, when I'm angry, I'm just sassy, and probably a bit bitchy, but not actually like a fret. Whereas my friends, like black boys, excluded from the moment they open their mouth, and those friends have been in prison since then. And I think that, actually, that's because we're not given spaces that allow us to be angry, that tell us that like, actually, yeah, the world isn't fair. And it's not right. And instead, we're punished for those emotions. And I think that being in a space that engaged us and told us that we are powerful, and that we can make change and actually went on to make change. And we did the action on education or exclusion and the school-to-prison pipeline. And we were angry, more shouting from the rooftops about this and to be given that space to just be allowed to be angry, is really, really powerful. It's a really, really powerful place to be, and, as you see, I haven't left it.

Sarah Wishart
Can you speak a little bit about how far that, you know, campaign got – where it got to? I mean, I know we do cover it in the film, but some people might not be able to stay around and watch the film.

Betty Mayo
Yeah, so, basically, we made like a tube map, like the routes on the tube. So, we made our own map that we stuck over our map on the tube in London and the Northern Line, and we made it so that the first stop was like you go to nursery, and then maybe you get told off, then you're put in isolation, then you're excluded, then your family excluded. And then you're unemployed, and then you go to prison and it's like the school-to-prison pipeline. Rather than going from Brixton to Morden, you go from school to prison. And there's a little offshoot of that map that asks what would it look like if we had compassionate education? What would it look like? If these bad kids were actually just seen as children who're probably just traumatised, properly hurt, have like some feelings and some needs that aren't being met in school. And what if those needs were met, and people were just seen as humans, and that had a nice ending, but, actually, we don't have that yet. That line was temporarily closed because that's just not the way our system is set up now. And so, we stuck this over the tube maps at 11.00pm one night, and actually that was the night before GCSE results day. And so, we said, OK, as we celebrate all these kids that have got their GCSEs, congratulations. But what we care about are the young people who, like 99% of young people that get excluded, don't get A-Stars, don't get five GCSEs that are C to A-Star. Only 1% of young people who are excluded from the age of seven are going to get five GCSEs. We care about these young people today. And we took pictures of these maps, and we sent them to all our friends on Twitter, and we said, OK, even if you didn't see it this morning, please can you just tweet so that you saw this picture? And you're so angry. And they did. And it just like it blew up on Twitter and Robert Hoffman, the Chair of the Education Select Committee, saw it on Twitter, and was, like, I want to meet these young people. So, we did get into parliament, but, it turns out, the Tories don't really give a fuck. And so, yeah, there was not much in there. But we got into parliament, right, we got into these rooms. And that is from a really creative action. And having connections on social media and, sadly, like lockdown happened. And, sadly, the Tories are in power and whatever. But yeah, like what good has come from it is that like Sarah found out about us; this amazing documentary was made by young people; it's just got youth voices in it. It's completely led by voices of young people who have been excluded and have all the answers. I really hope if you don't see it today, like see it soon. Because the young people in it absolutely have the answers. They know it's not their fault. And, yeah, so that's the campaign. Who else does talks about being involved in it?

Olivia Brown
Yeah. And so, SYP, obviously, we revolve around engaging young people. And it's at the heart of everything we do. So, if you don't know how we work, we basically have MSYPs, which kind of reflect the MSPs and the Scottish Parliament. So, we've got the same constituencies. And then we come together, and we campaign on certain issues. We have two sittings every year, where we vote on policy that MSYPs themselves put forward and then we can campaign on this. And we have had so many instances of success through engaging these young people. And we have had campaigns that have been really successful. So, we campaigned on equal marriage, way back when, we campaigned on free bus travel. We're currently campaigning on things like fast fashion, which is like my bread and butter. But there's other wee projects we run as well. There's the mental health investigation team currently ongoing, which is where our MSYPs are kind of reviewing local mental health services. We meet with the SQF once a month to tell them about our issues with the exam system. There are many. And all of these projects we run, all of these campaigns have young people at their centre, and that is why they are successful. And that is why people take them seriously, because it's so unique. There's no-one else really like us in the world who have the same structure, the same user-led structure, and who operate in the same way. And that makes us really special. And not to like big us up or anything. But yeah, and we've one of our most recent ones was we engaged with Liam McArthur MSP, who was putting forward the Assisted Dying Bill. And I won't go too much in depth into what that is about. But we made sure that in that consultation, young people were involved. And then we got to go to the bill launch. And it was really exciting. And it was just so nice to see the product of our efforts, and how young people were included from start to finish, because when young people are included from start to finish, most of the time, the project is successful, or the campaign is successful. And you can really see the impact that we have.

Juliet Harris
I completely agree with that. And I would say the Scottish Youth Parliament is incredibly special. And they've changed Scotland for the better. Here is another example, where we talked about Tranent before, which is just a town, an important town, but just the town, whereas SYP has changed all of Scotland. And I think a real example of that is around the campaign for UNCRC incorporation, because I honestly don't think we'd be in this position we are, where soon, hopefully, fingers crossed, rights will be binding – children and young people's rights will be binding in law in Scotland. And that, again, was so led by SYP. I remember a meeting: a former chair of SYP came along to seminars that we had way back in 2017, learning about the UNCRC at that time, and she met Laura, and was completely captured by the idea and the power of incorporation of making rights binding and law. And I know, I think it was that same year SYP in its manifesto, where they did a consultation with 70,000 children and young people to find out what their priorities were. And one of the top priorities was make our rights binding in law. And that kind of evidence, how can government argue with it: 70,000 children and young people say we want our rights to be made binding in law. And government can argue with it, they probably did argue with it, they drag their feet a little bit. But SYP did not give up and they carried on that campaign. They worked really strongly with us, together with the Commissioner's office, with the children's parliament. And we had an incredible march down the Royal Mile to the Scottish Parliament on Universal Children's Day. We were joined by a member of the UN committee. So, this just shows the power. If it was lots of adults marching down the Royal Mile, there's no way that somebody would have come over from the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child to march with us. It was because children and young people were leading those calls and pushing those calls to get rights made binding in law. And again, it was the nerve – and I guess the anger – of a young person standing up in the Scottish Parliament and challenging Nicola Sturgeon, because for a long time the Scottish Government had said yes, you know, we'll incorporate at some point in the future, maybe somehow some kind of model, a little bit vague. And Ryan McShane, a member of the Scottish Youth Parliament, got the opportunity to stand up in the Scottish Parliament to celebrate I think it was either Human Rights Day or Universal Children's Day. And, unscripted, he puts Nicola Sturgeon on the spot and said, I challenge you to incorporate the UNCRC into law by the end of this parliamentary term. And what can you do if you've got a young person standing in front of you in Parliament? What can you do? You have to keep that kind of promise. And so, this is why I fundamentally believe in co-production, of rights of children and young people to be heard – the power of the Scottish Youth Parliament, of children, of young people in Scotland, because it's through their work. Once the bill does go through, once we sort out the constitutional wranglings, that children's rights will be binding in law in Scotland, and this includes the right to express a view and to have those views taken seriously. So, what a legacy is that, that we actually have in law, or we will have in law, that right to be heard? And it's down to young people? So well done!

Laura Lundy
Yeah. How do you follow this? I suppose this is my day job. A lot of it is talking to lots of young people in the research that we do. But Juliet mentioned the Committee on the Rights of the Child. And I think one of the things that I think I am proud of over the past decade is I've done a lot of work with the committee itself, trying to make it better at talking to children, young people, because when I first started working with them, they weren't talking. And I was saying, well, actually, you know, you're not modelling good practice. And this brings me to the one example I want to give you, because Juliet used it yesterday. So, what's in my head is that they write this guidance for world governments every couple of years. And I was saying, like, you write this guidance, and you never consult children. You've really got to consult children before you produce what are called general comments. And then they notice, and then they came back and said, right, we're going to do it: help us. And I was like, well, what's your general comment on? And they said public budgeting. And I thought, oh, no, no: who wants to go there? And it could have been on the digital environment. It could have been on so many exciting topics, and they wanted spending budgets. And I thought, and my heart sank. And, actually, then I thought, it has to be done. And we went and did it. And we went, we worked with the international children's organisations. And we did a global consultation on how government spent money. And it was eye opening, because, of course, children and young people had tonnes to say about that, and tonnes to say about the process, and tonnes to say about, you know, efficiency, waste, involving them, how to do it, and we did a brilliant consultation with young people that informed the general comment that now informs governments. But just because you mentioned that, it brought it back in my head, things kind of go in circles. And a couple of weeks ago, I got an email from the Finnish government. And they said, way back in 2019, Finnish children filled in your survey, and we are the Ministry for Finance. And we thought it was really, really good. And we want to run your survey again. This was last year, they said that. Last week, they told us what happened. So, they ran this consultation. And then I said, well, what are you doing? And we had this call with them at [?] Connect. And they are running this every year. And they're helping, using the information to set priorities and budgeting. So, for example, we all think Finland's brilliant at education. Everyone knows that. Yeah. But Finnish children were saying things like they get complete free school meals at all levels, and all schools. But the young people were saying your food is rubbish, you know, your food's terrible. You need more money to get better foods. And so, we're now looking at the budget that's allocated to lunches. So, there was that. And Florence is here. Can we, like, bring people in? Because that was – sorry for putting you on the spot – but you're looking at these kind of fallouts. And on that particular research project, I learned a lot about how important it is to involve children and young people in spending decision making. And then we were asked by BBC Children In Need, in a particular programme, the Million In Me programme, how could they involve children more in deciding where money goes? And we did a pilot project here in Scotland. OK, Florence, to bring you in. Because this all flows from that one thing: would you like to say something about that?

Florence Burke (BBC Children In Need)
Have to channel Paddy Sloane, who's the programme director for it (Children In Need), but I'll try and do her justice. We had the Million-in-Me-Squad. I think we called it the Million in Me Consultation Group. But the children wanted it called a squad. That was fine. And the thing that I hold from it was the papers and documents and guidance was all produced, given to the children. And the question they asked was: who speaks like that? And we have to put up their hands and say, ‘we do’. And it made no sense to anyone. So, the whole thing had to be rewritten. And we talk about it making sense to children. But it may made it make better sense to us as adults as well. It was easier to communicate, it was much clearer, there was no jargon to get us caught up. And what we've done is we've used that as part of our grant making. We've just launched a new strategy. And we're hoping to build more of that into it. But the voices of the children we were trying to capture as part of that process, and a Top 10 list that they came out with which was what they would look for, from a project, not a funding application. But what was the end point would make a difference to them. So that's what we've tried to capture. I'm sure Paddy would have an awful lot more to say than that.

Laura Lundy
Thanks. So, I just wanted to show you an example of a big consultation that affects national policy, affects funding. And Betty, do you want to talk about your funding thing? I think that's really good.

Betty Mayo
Yeah. So, I'm also a young consultant for Esmée Fairbairn, which is like a big philanthropy foundation. And they give away, like, £45 million a year to charities in the UK. And they started an involving young people collective, which I've been a part of, for three years now. And when we first started, they were like, OK, I don't know what this is or what you're going to do. But we want you to let us know what you think about who we fund and how we should fund them. And it was so open and we've all never really been part of like big, big co-production programmes like that. So, we're like, OK, actually we have no idea. We didn't even know what that funding was. And there was a little bit of training that was needed, that's really important. But from that, we were able to run whole big projects on things that we were interested in. So, we were like, we want to see the big investment. We want to see your endowment, like where does that money go? And we want to see, actually, who are you funding for the environmental sector that looks quite white? Like I would say, diversify that a bit. Have you got any money to give us support that we can run our own fund? And so, at the moment, we're building a participatory fund. I think, yeah, we're gonna have some participatory factors to it. It's quite hard to make it quite a purist pot, but it's going to be run by young people who have experience of co-production, and we're going to be giving money to organisations who want to involve young people in their governance of the organisations. And we want to make sure that we are building as many opportunities for young people to get feet in the door, get onto the table, but also just, like, bring innovation and excitement and energy into organisations that like are very traditional and keeping just doing things just because this is how we've always done it. I just don't believe in how we've always done it. So, yeah, that's really exciting. I really love co-production. Can you tell?!?

Sarah Wishart
Okay, so there's only two people really in the room with microphones. So, looks like I'm going to be talking about… maybe I should come on stage. Can anyone talk about the experience of the co-production processes on the Excluded documentary? This is where, obviously, I was creating a second PowerPoint because I left my other one at home. So, that film is obviously the last word at the end there. So, who wants to go for it?

Betty Mayo
OK, yeah, you started it.

Sarah Wishart
So, I talked a little bit about how the film was kind of like put together and about my expectations about how it was gonna go. And I mentioned the film that we made with the EHRC. I mean, remember what this is – the Equalities and Human Rights Commission commissioned me to make a little film called Fair Play, which was kind of cute. But what I did was that my background’s performance, and I've done a lot of devised performance. And this is where you get in a room and you don't have a script, and you come up with a performance. And that's how, that's what I brought a lot into, into this role. And so, when we first did that film, Fair Play, a lot of people in the background at RightsInfo, which was sort of what we were called at the time, were suggesting that we try and take the children, we were like, well, we know what we want them to say. So, let's take them on that trip. And I was like, doesn't sound like the best idea. But OK. And so, the very first day of filming, that's what we injected. And I think Mike was there as well. And it was really depressing, because it just was, you know, trying to sort of like force these things through a particular hoop. And we had like filming planned for the rest of the week, we did something in Glasgow: me and Jack did a day trip to Glasgow. It can be done. I wouldn't advocate it after a day's filming to London. But what we did instead is that we got questions. So, we had some questions all about human rights, and then we gave them to the children. And these were children between seven and ten. And so, that film had this, you know, it wasn't, you know, getting the children involved from the get-go. But it involved them, they could make choices about what they wanted to have conversations about. And they chose the questions that they were interested in. So that's already something that was in the background. And so, when we started the filming, and I met Betty, and Betty said, I want to get involved. And I was like, OK, this is really interesting. And we also worked with a filmmaker called Anna Merryfield. And Anna had been trained in doing co-production with communities. And so, she came on, and she did some filming in London. And then we decided to start workshopping. So instead of kind of like, just because we were saying things like, how do you want to be represented? And people were like, we don't know what you mean? Like, you know, we don't actually know what you mean by that? Or what do you mean by that? So, we were like, we have to kind of, like, unpack a lot of this stuff. And we need to do it in quite a process-based way. So, we had a workshop online, because that was the immediately as COVID kind of stuck. And we showed everybody that had the rushes of the filming that we'd already done in PRUs (pupil referral units). We've done some filming already. And we showed that film, and then we said, what do you think? What should we be doing next? Who should we be talking to? What would you like to see? And we just took it from there, really. And from that first conversation, people were saying, well, you know, because we filmed Betty and some of your friends in Brixton. And a lot of people were saying, actually, quite a few of this group don't actually have experience of exclusion. So, we are kind of like exclusion adjacent. But we haven't had it. So, you need more people in this room who've experienced exclusion, and we'll help you find them. We know people, we're gonna put you in touch with people that would like to be in it. And we want, we want music, and we want poetry. And we think we should have some poetry from people who you interview. So, we kind of engaged people. But we also, you know, we weren't saying to them, how would you like us to find the funding for this? You know, I mean, we tailored the engagement that we had. But at all points, people could get more involved. We probably annoyed them, to be honest, like, you know, after the film had been finished: we kept saying, what would you like us to do with this? And you could just tell people like, oh, we don't want to know any more, like, we've done it. And that was the limit of our kind of engagement. Leave us alone. You know? So there is that: there is an interest there around how much you bring people in, how long for, and, you know, how much you think about that. And I'm somebody who feels like every single project, even if it goes wrong, is a learning opportunity and that we, you know, at EachOther, afterwards, we always have a wash-up. And so, what's really interesting about this is that this project has been going for an awfully long time. And, you know, we didn't get funding – we had to do it around the back of other things. So, it would be eked out and have to stop and start again. But we're constantly still learning now. Like, this hasn't stopped, you know,

Betty Mayo
You know that is really interesting. I didn't really know what co-production was, I didn't really know that's what I was doing, by saying I wanted to work with like EachOther, that, for me, I was just being interviewed about the action that that happened. And then I was like, Oh my gosh, you’re a human rights charity! Yay, I love human rights, and it's funny, because, actually, I didn't really know what human rights were. Like, if you asked me what they were, I wouldn't be able to tell you, but I just knew that OK, this is kind of adjacent to what I care about. It's kind of sound social justice, see? And it's like, this is what I want to be working on, and you care about exclusions and that – you're so my peoples. And so, I was brought in to do some research. And I was like, yeah, I'm really working. I was in the office, I go sit on my Trello deck.

Sarah Wishart
Trello, I'm obsessed about Trello. Yeah.

Betty Mayo
And then I think that it kind of links to that other question. It's like, what does it feel like to really be in that group production? Done well. And I think, for me, it just feels like you're working, like you're doing the work? And like, yeah, there should be a focus on like fun and celebration. And there should be like, space for you to be energised and passionate, and all these things, but, actually, you should just kind of be working, you should be doing the job that is being given to you. And you should feel like it's going somewhere. And that's what it felt like for me. I was like, oh, yeah, like, I'm just, I'm just working.

Sarah Wishart
And we did, I mean, you know, so you're using the word ‘work’, right? And, I mean, when you're working in charities, an awful lot of the time, people are constantly asked you to do things for free. And it's just something that I'm so resistant about, you know? We've had moments where rather than, you know, various people in the organisation saying, What, can't you get people to do some animation for free? Or can’t you get people to do this for free? And it's like, no, we should absolutely be paying people for what they're doing. And my hesitation, when Betty was first wanting to get involved, was absolutely because of that, like, I could see that Betty was going to be amazing. That wasn't the point. The point was, I didn't want Betty to get used, being asked to do things for free. And so, the minute we got funding, we started paying people, and that is not without its own complications. You know, like, if if you pay young people like, you know, a wage, who's paying tax? How does it work? When, you know, how does it affect especially people from, you know, marginalised backgrounds? Is it affecting them, you know, on different kinds of like benefits? Like, there's lots of questions around this. And I've been involved with the Human Rights Consortium in Scotland recently talking about that. But the minute we got it, we started paying people for their time. So, they came, they did a day rate, we paid everybody London Living Wage, no matter where they were in the country. And people, even the Scottish young people that we sent audio, you know, equipment to so they could capture, we paid them for their time, they told us how many days they worked, we made sure that we paid them, if they came to a workshop, we paid them, you know, and so, absolutely, it's about feeling like you're part of the work, but then the work has to recognise that, you know, you're not getting this stuff for free – you should be ensuring that people are paid exactly like anybody else's paid.

Betty Mayo
Yeah, I agree with that. I think that like, with the work that I do now, which is partially like being a professional young person, like being in spaces, like a young consultant, but also now thinking about what would it mean to consult for other organisations wanting to do this work, and I wouldn't need to coordinate that. I would always be a proponent of, like, definitely paying young people. But also, I think that you're very transparent. Like, this is a small organisation, actually, we just don't have the funds. It's not like, I've got it here, and I'm holding it, and you're not getting it. And like, I felt very grateful that I was able to make that decision for myself and like I really wanted to. And I think that, yeah, I think that it's funny because like, as Sarah was saying, when you're involving young people, like we're not really going to want to do everything. And sometimes you're going to ask us questions like, what should we do next? Like, I don't know. But, actually, it's really great. Like just having that invitation to be a part of that conversation. I think that what it requires from organisations is just like effort, it's just like constantly having that door open and poking your head and be like, Yeah, don't do this. Don't come here. Don't do that. Don't do that. I'm like, maybe young people will come to like, 40% of that. But like, what a young person isn't going to do is like, come and look and don't click, please. Can I come here? Please? Can I do this? And I think that organisations are waiting for young people to be like, Yeah, I want to do this, and I know all Asians have said to me like, oh, yeah, if we learn that all young people do that, like, yeah, of course, we would have like, there's loads of space for that. But actually, we're not taught to advocate for ourselves. We're not taught that there are spaces available for us. We're not taught that there's money there, available for young people. And I think that, like it's that constant effort of reaching out, making sure that people are aware that there are conversations that people can be a part of. And yeah, it's like the effort of organisations. And then like the young people can decide whether they are interested or not, maybe have something bad to do, but like most of the time, no, like, young people want to be in there. Yeah.

Sarah Wishart
OK. How involved do you think you need to be before something can be thought of as co-produced: what's the minimal level of engagement?

Olivia Brown
I mean, co-production: it can be quite a vague concept. In many ways, it's, you know, there's no way of really measuring it. But, for me, if you want something to be truly co-produced, young people need to be engaged from the beginning to the end, and throughout. And they need to be involved afterwards, as well getting the feedback, whether that's feedback on the project that they've worked on, where it's going, or if it's feedback on their actual participation, or it’s feedback on the people who brought them into it. And it's so important for, you know, these decision makers who are engaging the young people not to make assumptions, like what you were saying: it shouldn't be our responsibility to engage ourselves; people need to reach out to us because that's the only way our voices can truly be heard. And, you know, you need to consider all of the barriers that could come with meaningful participation or co-production. One of the things that SYP is working on right now is some guidance for other organisations who are looking to involve young people. One of the key things we're talking about, and that is the really basic thing that people often overlook, is like, is this successful for young people? Like, is the location of the meeting good? Should it be online? And are you paying young people? It goes back to like, even, is the food like young people friendly? Because we don't want to be eating anything really fancy? But yeah, and there's so much that goes into it, you know? And it's such a wide ranging and complicated topic really.

Juliet Harris
I think it starts with what's the minimum level? Because I always think of Laura, when I get asked this question, because I remember Laura speaking at one of our conferences years and years ago, and she said, tokenism as a start. This was back in 2017. And I'm really with Laura on that. Because sometimes I think people run away from co-production, because they don't think they're going to do it properly. They think it's binary that either you do it or you don't. Whereas co-production is a journey. And adults need to learn how to approach ensuring that children's rights to be heard is respected and taken into account. And I really noticed this through our work, particularly with the Scottish Government. It's a real journey to take adults on. And children and young people take adults on this journey. And so, tokenism is definitely a starting point that shows that people are aware of the need to speak to and listen to children and young people. But tokenism isn't the end: it has to be a journey. And so, once you've started to engage with children and young people, once you've started to commit to co-production, you have to learn from each other, you have to feed back, you have to create those safe spaces. And that's where, ultimately, in the end, you will come to what you might see as kind of full and proper co-production. So, whilst I know when Laura said that back at our conference, a few people were like “Oh, really, Laura”, I absolutely back her up on that. And I think it's really important that we start somewhere, as long as we recognise the failures, as long as when there is tokenism, we say this is tokenistic. This is the beginning of the journey, and we're committed to seeing it the whole way through. As long as you make that commitment, then I think it's OK to have a minimum level at the beginning. As long as you know the goal of where you want to end up

Olivia Brown
Yeah, sorry, to just jump back in. Even if I just don't know, yeah, I'd completely agree with that tokenism. It's a big issue which we do face in these parliaments sometimes, mainly with like stuff that MSPs are doing on a grassroots level. Well, but it is really encouraging to see other organisations going to take that first step being like, OK, let's involve a young person, even if that is a bit scary, but there's so many, like, Scotland has so many charities, which are young people centric. So, it's kind of encouraging those organisations who are just beginning this journey to even reach out to them, you know, we have Young Scot, Youth Link, SYP. And as long as they keep in mind that the goal of this co-production is to have these young people's opinions influence the outcome of the project so that young people can look at the final product and see, oh, that was the bit that I worked on. This is how I've changed this project, as long as that is kept in mind, and that is the final goal, you really can't go wrong with it.

Laura Lundy
That did it for me, Olivia. That's what I was gonna say, to clarify, on tokenism [… unclear…], so thanks, Juliet. I'm not an advocate of tokenism. But what I really want to be clear about is I think sometimes we've created a chill factor, where people are afraid to do anything, because it's not perfect. And what I’d point out is participation is never perfect. Didn't you never do something? That's perfect, I would just do exactly the same way that there would always be, could always be more young people, more diverse children and young people more of the time, or whatever. So, I think I just want to encourage people to start, you know, and that was where it's from tokenism as a start, but it depends how you define it. And Olivia did it really well there, for me. A lot of people define it, as you know, it's tokenistic if it's not representative enough, or it's not long enough. And that's wrong. It's only tokenistic, to me, if you don't go in with the right intention, and Olivia defined it really well. And the intention is to do as much as you can, with the time and resource you have, learn and get better with young people. Just in case anyone gets get annoyed at me in the room. And there's a whole article about that. And it wasn't, because I was reminded to say, in my lunchtime conversation, and someone who'd read the article. I won't put them on the spot. But what I tried to say is this is a human right. And there's no other human right where you would say I can't give you a good enough education. Let's use education, because this is what we're here for today. Slicker education was not good enough. And because I can't do it really well, you're not getting it at all. And yet, when it comes to participation, adults, sometimes I feel want a badge of merit for saying I couldn't be tokenistic. And what you're basically saying is, I'm denying your human right. And you want me to congratulate you. I'm not going to do that, you know. You have to start and do your best and get better. And then young people, in proper co-production, young people help you get better. And then one, just one or two other things. I have a model of participation. And, Betty, you captured it really well. The first element is about space and what the right is, it says it's to be assured, assured – it's really strong in human rights terms – and that means that you don't just wait for young people to come and say, “Can I? Here's my view”. But that there is an absolute active obligation on adults to create the meaningful conditions to go: what was happening to you? They're coming around going, do you want this one, do you want this one, do you want this one, and then make it possible for you. And the second thing – the thing I'm most excited for in the in the article that I'm known for – is this is not the gift of adults; it's the right of the child, so it has to be voluntary. So, my answer to this really gets me back to where I planned to start – that it's not about a level; it's to do with have you created the right conditions? And it doesn't matter what the level or wherever, it's, is it voluntary, the young people want to do it. And if they don't, it doesn't matter. So, it doesn't matter if they're not involved in every bit because it might just not be interesting to them, or boring, or just they’ve other better things to do at that time. You know, but early is good. Too much. But this is my passion.

Sarah Wishart
So, what does it feel like to be part of co-production done well?

Betty Mayo
Yeah, I think the way my work with Esmee Fairbairn has been in the offing, involving a young people collective after up to a year and a half to two years of like doing that work, me and my colleagues or friends, we made the involving young people values and it's like 10 values for what it means to have best practice, involving young people in governance, like we're young consultants. And in there we have a framework of 10 things that we think are really important, and so the number one is that ‘nothing about us without us’, and I know I said this at the start: that's a term from the disability justice movement. I think to feel the feeling that you get when you're in a really good co-production space: there is nothing happening for you without you being in that room, or having the opportunity to be there? And then, second, was accessibility. Like, is that space accessible to me? Actually, if my mum couldn't pay the wifi bill next month? Could they do that for me? Could they make it possible for me to make sure that, like, I can turn up and I can show up? And for young people that may mean different things. Like, you may have caring responsibilities, difficulty with transport. Could you provide a laptop? I mean, if you are like giving £1,000, like millions of pounds to charities? Yeah, then that. Yeah, you probably could. And like, do that. Are you focused on my training and my development? Is this nourishing me as a young person, as well as you as organisation, or is this extractive? And I think that, in order for it not to be extractive, I want to feel that I'm making connections, that my development’s being nourished, that you are training me in facilitation and in skills that are transferable beyond this placement. And is it fun? Am I being celebrated? Are you actually celebrating what it means to be a young person in this space? Are there chances for socialisation? Is there a budget for socials? And I'm saying this is best practice, right? And it's OK, actually, if you don't have the budget to do all of these things now. But there's always ways to have fun, like without spending money. But I think what it feels like to work in a co-production space done well, is that you are really there in all the conversations and you can see this accountability, you can see what these conversations that we're having, the words that I'm saying, how is this being put to use. Like, there's a feedback factor that you are learning, there's a culture of learning in the organisation that it feels fun. And that's like all very wordy. But, like, I think that these are also, as well as being processes, as well as being things that can put into policy and organisations, it's also about a vibe that you create, as well. And I think that that's really important, that you just need to have people that are really on board, people that really believe in your voice. And if you have people in an organisation that really, really believe in your voice and really believe that young people need to be there, then like a lot of that will fall into place. Like a lot of that is about a feeling that it evokes.

Juliet Harris
I can't comment on it as a young person, because I'm definitely not young. But it's making me think of some work that we did last year with a group of children and young people who named themselves Rights Right Now. And they were from across our member organisations. And they were working with us to influence and inform how the Scottish Government takes forward children's rights, to having meetings, high level governance meetings about what they're doing with their strategy, with their action plans, with their participation plans, etc. It was all on Zoom. So, it was quite difficult to build the relationships that you need to be able to build. And, after one of the meetings, one of the children and young people came into the space of the adults in the strategic implementation board and said exactly how they see implementation of children's rights in Scotland, what Scottish Government priorities should be. And they really, they challenged them on quite a few areas. And towards the end of the meeting, the children and young people asked for feedback from the adults in the room – strategic decision makers – about what they thought about their contribution. And one of the adults said, that was nice. And we thought that is not co-production. Adults who have power, who meet children and young people who are challenging them on things. It's not nice: co-production should be challenging. It should be exciting. It should be fun. It should be inspiring. It should be creative. It shouldn't be nice. So, for me, if I'm ever in an environment that's nice, I know that is not co-production done well. If I'm in an environment where I feel challenged, maybe a little bit scared, really inspired, excited, nervous, that to me is a space where I feel that co-production’s happening properly. But it's never nice.

Olivia Brown
Yeah, I completely agree with you: it's about the value. I think as a young person, you know, when the co-production is working, just as, you know, when it's not, you know, when it's tokenism, which isn't going anywhere. And one of the young people we spoke to when kind of developing these guidelines said that young people are gaining that seat at the table slowly but now we need to have our voices listened to as well, because there's so many adults who do not realise that we are experts in our own lives. And adults kind of sometimes it does feel like a checkbox activity where they're like, right, we've got the young person at the table, we know what they're gonna say. So, let's just like, leave it, it doesn't really matter. But when, I mean, we've touched on a lot of it already, you know, it's the decision makers being aware of the possible power imbalances, making sure that it's accessible, making sure that the conversations we're having are constructive and that they're being taken forward, that these young people's opinions aren't just being heard. And then they're going like, well we heard them, don't need to actually think about it. And one of the examples of this is in our SQA learner panel, where we kind of talk about various subjects all to do with exams, and the curriculum with the SQA. For all the SQA’s faults, they do come back to us and say, this is where we've sent your opinions. This is the person who we’re inviting along to kind of hear from you. And that is encouraging, although it's not the most perfect example. But it’s encouraging when you can see where these opinions are going in. That is when co-production is done well.

Laura Lundy
Yeah, so I got my researcher hat on again. And, you know, we've talked to thousands and thousands of children all over the world about what it's like, and fun is always up there, and trust and patience. I mean, these are really good qualities. But I think you've made me think, you know, why don't we get out of it. And, I think, for me, the most exciting moments for me, are just you're in a discussion, and young people see something in a way you just couldn't have seen it. And it just so makes sense. And I don't know if anybody else can share these. You've been in this and then you've just been told something. And of course, of course this how a young person would experience it, and you don't see and I'm not going to give an example of my own – I've many for my own projects. But there was one this year I've talked about a lot. Scotland's going to get a Bairns’ Hoose, which is, you know, a place for children who are victims or witnesses of crime to go and give their evidence, really incredibly important development, based on an Icelandic model. And I have done work, they wanted to use the Lundy Model to look at Bairns’ Hoose and how to involve young people. And they're brilliant at listening to individual children. But actually, the Bairns’ Hooses across Europe had not been developed with young people. Scotland's doing it differently, which is great. And I've been partly involved in that. And there was this example that was it was not one of my own, but I want to tell you it, because it blew my mind away. And it was this. The Estonian Bairns’ Hoose, they realised, Lundy Model, they had to involve young people in designing and planning the Bairns’ Hoose. And they invited a group of young people to come and co-design this house where children will come to tell their most traumatic stories, OK. Give evidence, you know, once they would get their social services support, they get their medical examination, and counselling all happens in this house that looks like a house. It should look like a house. And the day the children went to the Estonian Bairns’ Hoose, the plumbing was broken. And it was stinking, it was smelly, you know, it's not really, you know, you work it out, OK. And the children started complaining about the smell. So, these children here were co-producing the Bairns’ Hoose. And what they then said was, we’ve got to have a conversation about smell. And we all know children have an incredible sense of smell, don't they? Really fine. If you've ever been a parent when some of your children started complaining about the person sitting next to you on the bus, you know, children have a great sense of smell. And they stated scent, smell’s really important to us. And they were like, Well, how should the Bairns’ Hoose smell? And they were like, Let's not talk about the Bairns’ Hoose. How should you smell? How should you adults smell? Think about it. And they said, well, what should you smell? They said we hate the fact that so many adults wear these strong perfumes and aftershaves, and apart from the fact that that could be a trigger – and many of these children are abused – they just said it's really off-putting, and, as a result of that, staff in the Bairns’ Hoose in Estonia and I think every Bairns’ Hoose in Europe now they’ve heard the story, wear neutral body products. OK, would you think of that? No. And that's those moments, those moments where we can't know or see or feel or experience what they feel, and they tell us and then you change something: those are the bits that really do it for me. So, the other thing was, how do you think the Bairns’ Hoose – this is a quiz for everybody. How do you think the Bairns’ Hoose should smell. They then talked about the house itself. What did they not want? Just look: I wish I had prizes. What should a Bairns’ Hoose - if you were a child coming along to give evidence of a traumatic event - what should it not smell like? What are the two smells children did not want to smell like, the building, the place? Exactly: disinfectant. They didn't want to smell like a clinic, that was scary. And they didn't want to smell like a school. Because apparently that smells like bad bananas. They wanted it to smell like a home, which is exactly what, and so what does a home smell like? Cooking - toast or cookies? Yeah. So, again, could we think of that? No. Did any adults in that Bairns’ Hoose before think of that? No. And that's why we have to have co-production. Well, one reason. Anybody else got good examples like that, because I love those things. Where has a child or young person in something you were engaged in, just told you something as soon as there's somebody who passed the mic down, just told you something that you know, you couldn't have known it until they told you and of course, it makes sense. And something had to change.

Audience Member
Yeah, sure. This might actually be guessable. But it wasn't one that I guessed. It was a big consultation with children. We tried to make it big, as this Scottish Youth Parliament's was much better than ours. We were talking to them about what safety meant. And they very much concentrated on their environment, both immediate and wider. And their community. The big thing we said was streetlights. They did talk about playgrounds and what a safe playground environment was, but they were also talking about walking into school by themselves. And we thought safety would perhaps be a bit more interpersonal; they very much spoke about concrete things in an environment and a number of children's spoke about streetlights that would make them feel safer. So, it was absolutely concrete. So, your example was resonant. Thanks.

Laura Lundy
Any other examples? I love these – I collect them. But is that Bruce? The lights are a bit dazzling!

Bruce Adamson
When I became Children's Commissioner five and a half years ago, I went around the country and spoke to lots of children and young people about what they wanted from me and the office. And one of the things we talked about was communication. And we made a lot of assumptions that digital was the way forward, that we would focus on social media, that we would focus on digital and young people, particularly children, said, No, we don't want that, particularly younger children – they aren't even using social media or aren't digitally engaged anyway. It also plays into digital exclusion. They will say, no, we want you to come to our communities. And we want physical information, we want the leaflets and the posters and things we can hold in our hand. We don't want you to focus online. And then some of the older young people said, where we are engaged on social media, that's our space, and we don't want you in it. So don't come into our spaces, as we're there to do the things that we want to do. So don't be kind of trying to come into our spaces and turn them into your spaces communicate in that way. Build trusted relationships with us; communicate through those trusted relationships. But, actually, digital wasn't something they wanted us to focus on, which totally challenged all the stuff that we were thinking of. And maybe that's changed a little bit during COVID. But I was quite struck back then, because we would move a lot of our budget towards digital, but actually, particularly younger children, were saying that's not how we want to engage with you.

Sarah Wishart
I'm going to leap in and just throw a question that's popped into my head. And I'm at a tiny, tiny charity – there's five of us – a lot of us don't work directly with people, sort of like facing it. And one of the things we have to do all the time is build relationships with charities, like include those who are working directly with, you know, marginalised communities, because obviously, nobody, we can't just go in and sort of like start those things going. However, because we're small, and often those charities are small, what will tend to happen is we’ll get a champion. And in relation to Includem, we had a champion in Meg, who loved the project from the get-go. And she'd happened to pick the phone up to me that day, and I'm not entirely sure, like, I don't know if somebody else would pick the phone up because there were other charities in Scotland I spoke to who weren't interested. And I think what do you, does the panel, think about the challenge of trying to expand that champion-ness, like when one person or organisation gets it, but then they have to do all the work. But what happens when they leave? If they leave that post? Like, how do you sort of like continue that? And are there any examples that you've seen where organisations have, you know, taken that passion that one person's got and taken it on?

Betty Mayo
I can just like name something that I've seen, because I've been thinking about this too, right? That, like, even as a young person in organisations you can feel when there's somebody who really, really believes in this and really believes in you and like you can see your champion, basically. And you can also see who's probably not your champion, and probably needs a little bit more convincing to be in a room with you. And I don't know if anyone's heard about the Young Trustee Movement, but the Young Trustee Movement actually does like a champion training. And so, it's like a free one-hour Zoom training, which like I recommend everyone does. I did it yesterday and it's just build that championing to give you the language to describe why it's so important, having young people in governance, and to meet other people who also want to become champions and to build like a little bit of a network there. And I think around about 2,000 people have done that champion training. And it's just like spreading that. But beyond that, I haven't actually seen much. I just thought that was kind of cool. Have you two seen anything?

Olivia Brown
I mean, for me, if you need to carry on that legacy, I mean, documentaries, like this one (Excluded) are so eye-opening that when you show that to someone, it almost kind of instantly strikes a chord within them. So, it is just a very simple way to put it. But it is, you know, the passion is conveyed through the work. And that then translates on to other people. And other people tune in with that. And they feel that. I know I've had that was so many things. Like, before I joined SYP, there were so many issues that I was ignorant to which I am now so passionate about. And that is just because of the people who have kind of handed the baton on to me, where I've seen what they've done. And I've suddenly been like, oh, wait, like, I can do that too. And it's so inspiring. So, yeah, it’s just kind of making sure that that passion is conveyed through the work. Completely.

Juliet Harris
I think we've got a few examples here in Scotland. Start with the Unfearties. So, this is something that the children's parliament has set up. I don't know how many Unfearties we've got in this room. We've got quite a few. I'm not wearing my badge, which is appalling. You should have a really cool badge if you're an Unfearties. And the idea of being an Unfearties is that we understand that it's quite hard to be a children's rights, human rights defender, it's quite hard to be the champion, to be the one who's always speaking out. So, you need that community around you. And it's not specific to your role in your organisation. It's intrinsic to who you are. If you're somebody who understands and is passionate about children, young people's rights, this is not a job. It's you, isn't it? And so, the children's Parliament's set up the Unfearties network, so that we can all keep in touch. And so that we've all got, that we know who the Unfearties are. We’re meant to be wearing badges. We've got a Facebook page; we've got an e-newsletter. And it's just to provide that support. And what we're looking at, as well as actually having Unfearties networks. So, for example, the other day, when I was giving a presentation to elected members, who are all going to have responsibility, obviously, for taking forward children's rights under incorporation. And a few of the elected members were just, like, oh, it's quite nerve racking always being the one who speaks out and, in it, how do we make sure that we've all got support. So, we're setting up a special network for an Unfearties network for elected members. And I think that's absolutely key, just making sure that where there are people who are passionate about children and young people's rights, passionate about co-production, we know each other, and we keep in touch, and we try and spread the word. I think another good example is actually Together, the organisation that I work for, because we are a network of organisations, individuals, academics, who are all absolutely committed to embedding children's rights into everything that we do. And so, I think being a member of Together again, means you've got that peer support, we have training events. And it's also a chance if you've got colleagues who aren't quite as passionate about children's rights as you are, then you point them in the direction of some of our events. And we'll try and capture their imagination. And, I think, the final example. So, just one more, and this is actually specifically about children and young people, rather than kind of these adults that work. We have now set up our human rights detectives, and our human rights detectives are aged from 10. But one of them just had a birthday – 11 to 17 – children and young people from across our memberships, they've got trusting relationships with their member organisations, and they come together with us to do missions. And these missions are talking to other children and young people about their experiences of their rights about what's important to them about what issues they think we should be raising, whether it's with Scottish Government, with the United Nations or just more publicly with our members. So, we've got six detectives, and they choose how they want to carry out these missions. So, some of them have done missions in their school; others have talked to their friends and their neighbours and their families. Others have set up, have got an event coming up in Aberdeen, no sorry Inverness, with a group of children that one of our detectives have brought together. And that, again, is a great way of finding more children and young people who want to be involved in co-production, who want to be involved in pieces of work like that. So, again, it’s about spreading the word, spreading the networks. And I think that a number of the children who've been involved in these missions will go on to be detectives in the future and take on their own missions themselves.

Laura Lundy
This one short sentence was given to me by a young person and, and I think it's a really sensible way of capturing it. You know, obviously, it's really important to have passionate pioneers who demonstrate good practice and convince other people, or not even just convince them, guilting them into trying something is also quite effective at times. But a young person described it to me and said what you're saying, Laura, is it's everybody's business, isn't it? That we have to get it across. It's everybody's business, you know? That entitlement thing is everybody's business, everyone should be doing it, you know?

Sarah Wishart
OK, so this is our last formal question. After that, if anyone in the audience has a burning question, I'm giving you some time to put it together. But what's the most important element to create meaningful co-production?

Laura Lundy
So, I've got the mic, and I start, and, of course, some of you know my work and some of you don't, but what I'm known for is a model of participation. And there's no one bit, but what I would say is, I've spent my last 15 years saying it's space, voice, audience and influence. And it's not just one: you can't just take them to space, or voice or audience or influence. And those are my four elements. And together, that's my take on what makes meaningful participation.

Sarah Wishart
This is Betty's question. And she said Laura is going to totally nail this one. She's right, it did get totally nailed.

Olivia Brown
No, I mean, for me to put into one sentence, meaningful co-production is engaging young people from start to finish, and then their voices being taken into account with the outcome of the project, or whatever it is they're working on. And it's just making sure that young people are comfortable in that space. And they're comfortable sharing their views and it’s successful, that is literally the bottom line. And I think it can, like you were saying, it comes across as quite a scary concept for an organisation or a project, take that first step and involve a young person. But all they need is that safe space. And that's what you build off of.

Juliet Harris
Completely agree again, as always., I'd say, obviously, the Lundy Model of participation captures everything. And I think combine that with trusting relationships, and you've absolutely got it. And those trusting relationships have to be between children and young people, between children and adults, and between the adults themselves. And yeah, take the Lundy Model, combine that with really strong relationships. And that's it, you can have really strong co-production.

Laura Lundy
Say one tiny thing, quickly. I'm so used to doing that Lundy Model. And one of the things I learned in the Bairns' Hoose project, and it was from working with colleagues here in Scotland, particularly Mary Mitchell in the University of Edinburgh. And she added that into the model, you know, I defined a safe space, as you know, safe spaces being one where children are not afraid of rebuke or reprisal. And it being an inclusive space of, you know, the model. You know, that's what I emphasise, but working with Mary on the Bairns' Hoose project we've redefined space in that we added a relationally safe space as well, because relationships are everything. And when we define relationships, that the type of relationship that defines meaningful participation, for me is one of trust.

Betty Mayo
I think, just to add, that none of this is meaningful if I can't see where where my voice is actually being used. And I’d add it's not necessarily a belief of mind is all about outcomes. But I think, like, with this, it’s kind of yeah, you can have a great journey. But if I can't see that actually what my space for my voice and all this stuff, like if I can't see that all of this is actually amounting to something, then I don't want to be a part of it. And I think that's what tokenism is like. It’s just like, yeah, you've heard me, but like, are you actually deeply listening? Are you actually willing to put what I say into fruition? Even if it may challenge the structures a little bit, even if it may mean that, actually, this may take a little bit longer because we have to then question these things too. Like, I want to see that that question is happening. Otherwise, I just don't want to do it. Like, I don't want to be there just for people to hear some really cool opinions.

Sarah Wishart
I think that really speaks as well to any kind of engagement. When I remember, I can't, even if I could, it probably wouldn't be very good of me to say who it was. But there was a very big organisation who used to do huge amounts of staff surveys. And they, they didn't understand why there was dropping percentages every single time they did a staff survey. And finally, kind of like somebody who thought to ask why percentages were dropping every year. And they said, well, look, you know, you asked us like three years ago, you know, we had 75%, like response rates, you did nothing that we suggested, and therefore there's no point in us doing them. There's literally no point in kind of like getting involved, because you're not going to do anything. So, I completely echo Betty's point about the journey. Yeah, great. But like you have to see some sort of accountability, you have to see some sort of result. Even if it isn't actually, you know, the result you think is gonna happen, you still have to show it, you still have to kind of like travel to that space.

Laura Lundy
Just want to say to Betty – and I agree on a lot of things we found out today – but Betty, I got to that journey later, after I wrote the Lundy Model, I emphasised influence about feedback and finding out what happened. And about ten years later, I got really uncomfortable. I've just been involved in so many researchers talking to children where they say they just never find out what happened. And they didn't know and, and that became increasingly frustrating to me, hearing their frustration about this. And I started to think a lot in that space. And then I created this other little model. It's now used by the Irish Government. And it's a feedback model. It's called The Four F's, and it's exactly that. But my take, like many in the room, I mean, I look at everything through the lens of human rights. And human rights are ultimately about accountability, which is the word you just used Sarah. And I think the feedback is this critical juncture in accountability, because it's the point where the decision maker, the adults, you know, often the conversation would be like that. But in some instances, when a decision maker is saying, you told me, and this is what I did or didn't do. And children and young people are often getting just really bland responses or no responses at all. So, what I've really done is said feedback should be really fast, you know, quick, it should be full, which I'll come back to, and it should be obviously child friendly language and followed up. And in full, I've created a set of questions that if you work with young people, and they give you their time, I'm not saying we don't commit to work with anybody unless they promise to respond in detail to say, you know, what surprised me? What did you do? What are you not doing? Why? What are you doing? When are you doing it? When are you going to do it? And there's a whole set of questions that we asked them to commit to. And that is signs, like just it's another tick box, but it's not: it's ultimately about accountability. And that is crucial from a human rights perspective.

Sarah Wishart
If you care about a thing, you should measure it.

Laura Lundy
Yeah. Just tell them. I think its transparency as well. And what we've done, I mean, Leicester City Council in the UK has adopted the model, and they've done incredible work. And I've worked with young people there. And this amazing young woman has defined that and, you know, she's talked about that element of being, it doesn't matter if you, you're not always going to get what you want, you know, but it's really, really important to know why. If you can't have what you want, it's really important, especially important to know why when you're not getting what you've asked for, as well as when you are – when you're not getting quite there.

Betty Mayo
Just very quickly. And I think that like what makes me like excited about this is that actually, it doesn't matter the journey necessarily that you go on to get to this actually, I really deeply care about youth participation. But like, actually, maybe the way that the organisation is set up right now, maybe we just need to start with a survey that you send out to young people and, like, that isn't necessarily having a youth board or a youth trustee, but I don't think we should be putting in young people into places where organisations aren't ready for that, to be honest. And so maybe it's just about having a survey and if, from that survey, you get really great feedback and you act on it, like that is literally doing the work like it's about taking these outcomes from the voices of young people and people who are affected by different issues. And using that and then like, yeah, that's a springboard to actually now you've shown that your organisation actually probably is ready for a little bit of shake-up, you are creating more of a culture of learning and a culture of being open to change and a culture of being open to different perspectives and voices. And then maybe, like springboards, maybe we meet some like consultations, maybe we have like a Youth Advisory Board, but I don't think that there is necessarily like a dream journey or a dreamlike structure of how that happens. I think it's just about like, actually, getting voices and getting the outcomes from it in a way that suits an organisation.

Sarah Wishart
OK, we've got about 10 to 15 minutes before we are hopefully getting some coffee, tea and biscuits. Has anyone got any questions or comments or examples or anything?

Gary Cushway (Team Manager, Includem)
Sorry, I'm really rubbish. Sitting quietly, I wanted to jump in all the way through there. I feel like I should have talked to you more before. So, I went with including one of the voices you hear on there is a boy I worked with for a couple of years before. He was at a point, a point where he could articulate himself that well. And I think that creating space element is also a big lot of time in there, because you can't build a relationship straight away. I had to knock on that boy's door every day for more than a year, I think. Then, eventually, the door opened a little bit, you know, I got things thrown at me, all that kind of stuff, until I got to the point where I got him to say, well, why, issues where he wasn't going to school, because when he went to school, he was being excluded, because he couldn't cope. And I got him to articulate a bit, I went to the school, I come back, you know, and what he articulated in those two sentences in this film was all of that stuff. In any case, I was so happy, like teary-eyed hearing that voice saying that after all that time. And I think organisations and adults need to acknowledge, it takes a lot of time to build that sort of trust. And a lot of times we don't, we go to young people to ask their views. But we should be listening to their views and acting on them when they bring them up – it should be directed the other way around. That's my part of what I wanted to feed back.

Betty Mayo
Yeah, I love that. And I think just to say as well that like, it's so true that if you're an organisation, like an adult wanting to work with young people, particularly with lived experience of oppression, that if you're working with young excluded people, these are people who are at the butt of oppression, and also not given the space to like explain what that means. And like, behind that, there are going to be youth workers who are facing like shut doors for ages in order to do that. And I think that it’s an accessibility piece that actually also are these young people, is there also space for them to be, like, safeguarded and cared for in this process? If you want people to give opinions on their lived experience of oppression? Well, there probably should be like therapy after that. And there should be like provisions after that. That means that these people aren't just extracted of their oppression, and like nothing following after that. And I think that it's never going to be perfect, but I think that it's just like these real cases, there are youth workers behind the scenes that have access to these relationships. So, thank you so much for bringing that in.

Sarah Wishart
And time is such a big deal to me. And like, it's so invisible, like this project, the film, you know, it took time to film. And part of the reason it took time to film was because of COVID. But it took time to film because I had to find people. And that meant I had to build relationships. So, you know, you had to build a relationship with a young person, I had to build a relationship with different charities or different organisations, often who are really small, often who have no time to do this kind of thing, and cannot see the point of it, like, OK, well, this might be a film, what, in three years’ time? Well, you know, how is that actually going to speak? You know, to me, and you have to try? And so, I mean, you know, sometimes we get amazing champions, but sometimes it's about trying to work out, OK, what, you know, we could maybe do a film about your organisation – you try and find the exchange points to sort of like, you know, labour it up. But explaining how long these relationships take to, you know, create is a huge, I think invisible aspect. Anybody else got one?

Mollie McGoran (Chair, SYP)
I don't know. Oh, here we go. Yes, I'm Chair of the Scottish Youth Parliament. And I thought the point that you raise Betty about young people in governance positions is a really interesting one. I think I've sat on so many groups that are not made for young people and are not accessible to people outside of the sort of government's sphere. And, yeah, I think it's a really interesting point about when are organisations or groups ready for young people to be in that space. I've been thinking a lot about young people and ward positions recently. And I had a conversation with an MSP the other day, talking about an education board that had been set up and the advisory group for that. I was talking about the fact we have all this time to plan, so why not plan now about how do we make that space accessible from the start, rather than put young people in and see what happens? But I think I could talk all day about being a young person on a board, but it was whether any of the panellists have any thoughts about what makes a board space accessible to young people

Betty Mayo
It's kind of not my expertise because I'm not a trustee but, yeah, I advise, and I have sat on boards before and like they're just so random, they just say such random things and I kind of sit there, my face like this a lot of the time, and I don't really want to contribute because, like, it kind of feels like we're a little bit lightyears away from how we think about issues. And that's OK, like that's actually fine. But also, if you’re one or two people who have a perspective like you in a group full of twenty, then of course you don't want to share, and I think that with boards there's just a lot of questions that I think should be asked to boards before young people are just, like, plunked in those spaces. Like, are you willing to not use jargon? Are you willing to listen? Are you willing to actually maybe think about the structure of how this board is going to work? Are you willing to learn what a pronoun is so that, like, gender queer people can join this space? Are we willing to actually learn what the issues are that young people are facing? So that there's, like, some point of connection in that room? Because I think that young people have to do a lot of learning in order to access boards. And I don't know if the trustees do that much learning to have young people on the boards, so I suppose it a little bit unfair.

Olivia Brown
Um, yeah, so this kind of is my expertise. But I, I knew that was gonna happen at some point. But, yeah, I do come from a very privileged position, though, because the Scottish Youth Parliament’s board is designed for young people, we only allow young people on the board. And so, for that reason, I haven't really experienced a board where the young person is kind of the young person, you know, we are just, it's almost like a group of best friends run a charity in some aspects. But we are put through quite vigorous training, the communication is so clear. I know a lot of other boards, you kind of get sent the papers and you turn up and that's it. Sometimes it's less of a meeting and more of a presentation, you just hear how the charity's doing and there's not much else doing. But for us, you know, we do so much outside of the just the board meetings, we do stuff like this. We're trying to educate people about how having a young person involved can be so effective. I don't know, Ellie, you're on the Young – sorry babes, I'm putting you on the spot. And you're on the Young Scot board, aren't you? What was that like for you? Because I know that is quite a different board and its structure. What was it like for you kind of settling into that as a young person?

Ellie Craig (Vice Chair, SYP)
Yeah, I think it's really interesting to see how different charities are set up. It was quite eye-opening, actually, to go from our board where it's all young people, and to that space, that there are definitely more adults. And there are young people. I think Young Scot, though, are great at making things accessible and, like, hadn't been with me to see what they could do to support me in that role. And I think it's about, again, having those adults already had those spaces who are advocating for it to be accessible for young people and giving young people the tools to be involved. But I do think that, you know, we shouldn't be inviting young people into a space that isn't accessible. And we should be able to call out when it's not accessible for young people.

Olivia Brown
Yeah, definitely. And especially a board setting. And it can be really stressful and to throw a young person into that without the adequate support in place can be really damaging. We're quite lucky. And at SYP, where we have like these regular check-ins where the staff members who are absolutely lovely are always like, Harry, did you want to chat? Is there anything you want to go through? So, while all the decisions are coming from us, the staff are still there to support us and make sure it is as accessible as possible for us as young people.

Juliet Harris
This is a really difficult question for us to answer. So, we don't have a young person on Together as a Board of Trustees voted in by our members. We have had chairs of SYP on our board before, but we don't currently have a young person. We did do a piece of work last year with Rights Right Now and now with the Human Rights Detectives, to talk to children and young people about how they want to be involved in our strategic plan and taking forward the direction of the charity. And they said that they weren't really interested in joining the board. They wanted to get involved in our policy, influencing work, work with reporting to the UN, work with government. And so, we put together a funding application for this piece of work about how we involve children and young people in delivering our strategic plan and informing how we deliver our strategic plan. And it was turned down because we don't have a young person on our board. We're going around in circles on this. And it's a constant issue. And so, I think if children and young people want to join our board, we would have to make a big change in how our board’s run. It's definitely, I don't think it's even adult friendly! And the number of papers that go out, I think it would actually probably improve the way that we run our board. And it would mean that other board members who at the moment perhaps don't want to speak out about too many papers, too much inaccessible information, it would actually make it better for the adults involved as well. But like kind of you've both said at the moment, I don't think it is that space where children and young people would feel able to contribute, want to contribute, be interested in contributing. But I think it is something that we'll continue to look at. And we need to, first of all, get this group together to involve children and young people more in our strategic plan, and then take the steps towards how we include children, young people in the board meeting. And it's definitely not a case of kind of allocating one place and going here, while young person sits on our board. It wouldn't work. We've got a lot that we need to do. And a lot of work that we need to do with children and young people to make sure that when we do get children, young people on our board, it actually works for everybody.

Laura Lundy
Betty, there's a new initiative. I mean, I'm not recommending it, as I don't know enough about it yet. But they’ve set themselves up, they call themselves the child friendly governance project. It's an international initiative. And I'm really curious. There are people here who are really concerned about this, worldwide, and they're trying to bring in and develop best practice. And they're setting up a board. And they're putting young people on it. And my question to them was this: it's not the board; it's not the trustees; it's not. It's the decisions. You know, it's the decisions, you know, it's where the decisions are made, and which decisions young people want to be involved in, or sit through, or, you know, and I think if you think of it like that, rather than there has to be some a child or young person on the board. It's like, what were the major decisions made? And which ones do young people want to be involved in? And then how do we change the way in which young people are informed about those and involved in those? And that's what meaningful participation is to me, isn't it? It's not having a youth trustee? Yeah. Sorry. What's your reaction?

Euan Platt (GMAC Films)
Hi there. Even when we're working with a kid from marginalised groups, how do we ensure that it's not only the most confident and outspoken that steer the co-production process?

Juliet Harris
I think that's a constant challenge. And it's something that I think, looking at the Lundy Model, is about space. And it's recognising that the space that you create for children and young people to give their views and express their views have been taken into account. It varies completely depending on the child or young person. And it's something that we've really tried to take into account with our detectives project. We're working with children, young people from all sorts of backgrounds, young carers, young boy with learning disabilities. And the space in which they want to participate is very different to each other. And the space in which they want to go out and do their missions, and their detective work is very different to each other. And so, I think, insofar as resources allow, that's the important thing is talk to children and young people about their space and create a space that's safe for them safe for their circumstances. And don't think that one size fits all. Even in a small group, it doesn't. Every child, every young person is different. And every child and young person needs to tell you what that space looks like for them for them to get involved.

Olivia Brown
Yeah, I would 100% agree with that. And I think the decision maker who's facilitating the space needs to be so aware of the power imbalances, because even the most comfortable and outspoken young people can still feel intimidated when they're invited into a space and asked to be an expert in something. And so, I would 100% agree, it's about making sure that that space is safe. And they're aware that they're not going to be judged. It's just about sharing views, because so often adults assume that young people all share the same experience or share the same opinions when, in reality, we are just as diverse in our opinions as adults are. So yeah, it's about making sure that we have ground rules in those spaces almost, you know, in a very practical sense. The projects I work on in my constituency, often it is bringing together a really random group of young people from lots of different schools. And every session we start off with, you know, what are our expectations? What do we want from each other? How do we want to communicate what are we comfortable with? What are we uncomfortable with and it's going back to those really basic things that kind of you do it like circle time in primary school, just to make sure that the communication is kind of top-notch and the decision the people facilitate in the space and understand what could be barriers for these young people.

Betty Mayo
Yeah, I think that, like, there's a couple of things. I think that when I think about accessibility, speaking to a room of people is like, not accessible for a lot of people, right. Especially when there's a power dynamic, so that you are here as a young person talking to adults. That's like, that can be really, really hard. And I found that really hard when I started and like, so that's thinking about different ways that like young people can fit in, is there like, actually a way that we can ask a question, go into a breakout room of young people, maybe write something? Can I write a song about it? If that's actually how I like to communicate? Instead, can I actually draw you a picture of like, what my feelings are. So, there's different, I guess, ways of like feeding into a conversation. But I think that also, it's taken me a long time to realise like, like, the boundaries of what it means to be a young person in adult spaces. And I see this quite a lot that I feel a little bit like a professional young person, that I've kind of like, I get it now. Like, you kind of want somebody who's a little bit rough around the edges, who isn't gonna say like, what you want them to say, like, it's not gonna come out in a polished way. And I might not have like a solution. But like, here's the problem. And like, Yeah, I do have it. And like, I think that I, it took me quite a long time to realise that and, sadly, I'm now phasing out of being a young person, just when I think I've actually knocked that down. But like, it has made me think, actually, what would it have meant, like, if I could kind of see what challenge look like modelled for me as a young person that like, a lot of organisations want young people to come in with these really, really radical views and to be the innovators and like, we're the ones who, like, think outside the box and out the system. And actually, like when you've been schooled in the education system, we have, like, you're probably not that radical of a thinker, like you're not encouraged to be, especially when you're in rooms with organisations, with people who look like your teachers, or look like your family, like you, these aren't the spaces where you're going to get really, really creative and radical and challenging. And it takes quite a long time to build the confidence to do that. And so, what would it look like to actually see challenge modelled or to be given a couple of examples of like, just kind of how far you can go, just how you can communicate this? Do I have to put on my, like, my voice that's a bit more palatable. And all that kind of actually just come as my whole self and like, bring my experiences, and maybe not have a solution? Maybe not have all the answers, but this is my truth? Like, what are you going to? Do you have that? And I think that like, yeah, it's taken me a long time to kind of, of being in these spaces, like, quite frequently to realise actually, just like, just how I can show up. And so, I think that like even though it sounds counterintuitive, but like training young people, maybe get young people in who, who have this experience of this to like, kind of train young people just to like, what does it mean to like, show up as yourself? Like, what does it mean to show up in a group of, like, in a group of adults and not feel like you have to perform, because I think that I actually don't know, any young person doesn't feel that they have to perform around adults. And it takes quite a long time to take that, like, performance off and just show up. Especially if your mind marginalised, especially if you've been told that because of, like, your blackness, your working classness, your gender, your sexuality, what you say just doesn't matter. And so, yeah, modelling challenge, and allowing people to just take off their mask and just come as their full self.

Laura Lundy
How do you follow that? I want to give you a really practical example, because I think you've touched on like a dilemma for many, many people: how do we get out to those children who don't normally get involved in the processes? I wouldn't, I couldn't, I couldn't have been these people. I just the culture and community I came from, I would have been sick to stand on a stage like this as a young person, I just wouldn't have had it in me. And we need to get to those young people too, not instead of, too: we need we need all sorts of young people. And I want to give you a really practical example that came from one of my doctoral students, but not when she was a doctoral student, when she was a teacher, because I'm really, we're here to talk about children who are excluded from school. And she became a principal of a school in Northern Ireland that would have a really high level of exclusion and social disadvantage. And she came from a grammar school, you know, quite a posh kind of school. She'd come into the school and she knew it wasn't working. OK. And she wasn't thinking children's rights. But what she said I needed to know, and I didn't need to know from this just the school council, you know, because the school counsellor role functioned pretty well. And she did this thing and I just love it. I often give it as an example, so apologies if you've heard it. She went into the assembly hall in this school in the middle of rural Northern Ireland, and she gave out two sets of post-its. And she said to the children, young people, students write down one thing you like about the school on one post-it, put it on that wall; write down one thing you really don't like about the school, and you want to change, put it on that wall. OK? Cheap, efficient, effective, put everybody out, teachers, teachers not liking it, became really complicated. People might know what I'm talking about. And then she read, she just sat and read, she read what they liked, and she read what they didn't. And one of the things that it does relate to this, that she read, one of the things that was coming off the wall, is the children and young people did not like was setting, you know, setting, what you call it in Scotland when children are put in ability groupings, they're taken away from their friends who were thrown into the bottom set, and that she read how much this was hated, and the school thrived on setting, the teachers loved setting. And she just saw this had to change. It was you know, ruining friendships, it was getting people bullied, it was destroying self-esteem. And so that was her thing then, she went into stop, and that’s what her PhD was about. So, two sets of posts. Every young person at school got a chance. And someone who of course, like Drew, like read pictures and stuff, you know, that's OK, too, because that's an act. And then I don't know, she's gonna I'm gonna embarrass her. But the other thing is, she knows I'm going to do it. My Amazing Amy is at the back. And all of her work is on silence and voice. And actually, high silence can be one of the most profound expressions. I don't know if you want to say anything, Amy. She doesn't, but anyway, you don't have to.

Sarah Wishart
And then we're gonna have some coffee and tea.

Dr Amy Hanna (Strathclyde University)
OK then, I'll talk. And yeah, so I think it's really interesting to listen to how do we reach young people who don't, who aren't the articulate students who always seem to have their say, and as they should? But how do we reach the students who might not be quite as articulate? And sometimes I think, well, maybe we should think about it the other way around. And what I looked at in my study, supervised by Laura was, what do young people not say? And how can that tell us about their experiences, and how they feel in a school space. It's just where I did my study. And it was profound what they said they used silence as a means of resistance, which is an expression. And they use it as a way of negotiating situations where they felt really uncomfortable. And teachers also used silence as a way of negotiating very particular situations which often came down to authority. And young people often would use silence in terms of, I'm not really sure what that adult’s agenda is, so, I'm just going to keep quiet until I've sussed them out. And they are very, very good at establishing what adults want to hear. And they're really good at knowing when someone is coming to ask them for their views. And they don't feel like they're going to have any influence. And so, looking at silence, looking at the young people who maybe don't articulate their views in the ways, in spoken means. Maybe it's a good idea to look at how they might actually be articulating and expressing their views in alternative means, and silence is one of those ways.