10.8 Current debates and reforms
On this page
The Common Political Declaration 2019-2024 highlights, in the frame of youth policies, the importance to build bridges between the various policy fields affecting young people. There is a will to create an “interministerial and intergovernemental conference” dedicated to youth in order to work on a cross-sectorial outlook of youth between the federal and regional authorities.
The Declaration also points out the importance to create synergies between services within the French-speaking Community of Belgium in order to foster partnerships projects.
The Youth Council becomes the Youth Forum. A new decree has been adopted the 2nd May 2019 and will be implemented by the 1st January 2020. The aim is to simplify the decree to allow more flexibility and to strengthen the participative nature of the structure.
The main concern is to reinforce the youth participation. To answer this question, a meeting gathering around 40 youth workers took place in September. Some elements of discussion were raised: the financial means allocated to the youth forum, the age of the public, the will to pay particular attention to young people with fewer opportunities.
At the moment, the main parliamentary debates affect the two reforms currently going in the French-speaking Community of Belgium in the field of youth policies:
- The reform of the decree related to the youth council which will be implemented by the 1st January 2020 with the establishment of the Youth Forum ;
- The political will to create an “interministerial and intergovernemental conference” dedicated to youth in order to work on a cross-sectorial outlook of youth between the federal and regional authorities. At the moment, no concrete information has been released regarding this objective.