Bucks Youth Summit 2025 –
The Police Space
About The Police Space 2025
In The Police Space, information and myth-busting accompanied an open and honest conversation around how the police can best engage with young people.
This conversation space was hosted by Thames Valley Police (TVP), in partnership with the Buckinghamshire Youth Justice and Support Team, artist Elly Bazigos, Tom from the Young Futures Fund, and Youth Voice Executive Committee young facilitator Radha.
TVP Chief Superintendent Emma Burroughs and Buckinghamshire Council Director of Children’s Services John Macilwraith took part in the conversations, as representatives of the Buckinghamshire Safeguarding Children’s Partnership (BSCP). The BSCP is a meeting of the most senior decision-makers from the Council, Police, health, and other agencies.
Read more about The Bucks Youth Summit 2025
What did young people say in The Police Space?
- We feel the best way for the police to foster positive relationships with young people is by being approachable, respectful, and non-judgmental.
- Some of us don’t really like the police and usually avoid them.
- Some of us want to be heard by the police, we want to say hi but don’t know how.
- Some of us would like to see police presence in school to help build positive relationships.
- We think it would help to show police and people. One example is that we find non-uniformed officers more approachable.
- We recommend police officers are calm, use soft tones and a mindful of mental health when engaging with young people.
- We would like to see neurodiversity representation within the police workforce.
- We feel there is a lack of accessible information around the police – for example around the different roles like PCSOs and what police life is like.
- We fed back on posters and marketing materials. We like bold colours and concise text. QR codes are great, but we can’t use our phones in school so sometimes they are not accessible. There is also a risk that they can be tampered with / pasted over.
- We suggest putting knife amnesty boxes on google maps!
So What?
- The discussion outputs and insights from this space will be used in Thames Valley Police (TVP)’s Race Action Plan work.
- An action already in the plan is to identify and improve engagement opportunities between young people and the Police – the experiences and ideas shared by young people in The Police Space will help with that.
- The key messages that young people shared at the Summit will be presented at a Race Action Plan group meeting.
- The key messages were shared at a Buckinghamshire Safeguarding Children’s Partnership* meeting on 17/06/2025. This is a meeting of the most senior decision-makers from the Council, Police, health, and other agencies.
* The Buckinghamshire Safeguarding Children’s Partnership is a group of leaders from the Council, health organisations, CAMHS, the Police and more.
The government has made a guide for children and young people that helps to explain how professionals work together to help keep children and young people safe. You can view this by clicking the button below.
- The art board created by artist Elly is being used as an engagement tool by school Police officers.
