President’s Trust launched to help 'disadvantaged youngsters'

The President's trust aims to inspire the most vulnerable members of society to begin to rebuild a new life for themselves and their families, President Marie Louise Coleiro Preca said at the official launch of the trust earlier today.

Coleiro Preca explained that her desire to seek the wellbeing of all the people of society, including those living in poverty or social exclusion had led the presidency to establish various initiatives including the trust being launched today.

The president explained that the Trust, which was linked to the Prince's Trust in the UK, had the main aim to provide disadvantaged young people with a number of programs geared at providing personal and professional development as well as specific training to help improve employability.

“The poverty rates for Malta are striking, and the number of people at risk of poverty in the country was estimated at 100,000 in 2013,” she said referring to NSO statistics. She added that poverty and social exclusion effecting people between 18 and 24 years of age, was even higher, with more than 31% of men and 32.6% of women being at risk of poverty at this age in 2013.

“The President’s Trust will be helping to break the cycle of poverty, social benefits and crime,” Coleiro Preca said.

CEO of The Prince's Trust International, Alistair de Costa explained that international aspect of the trust was a somewhat new concept, established in 2014, with the Prince of Wales as its President, based on the success of the trust in the UK.

“The trust has made significant improvements in the lives of young people threatened by unemployment in the UK. The trust has helped over 800,000 people in the UK, through its relevant training programmes, over 40 years of service,” de Costa said.

He explained that youth unemployment is a global issue affecting both poor and rich countries around the world, with an average youth unemployment rate of 20% among the rich G20 countries.

“As the youth population continues to grow, it is estimated that five million new jobs are required each month for the global economy to keep up and address the global problem.” 

Winston Zahra, CEO of the President’s Trust, explained that a memorandum of understanding had been signed in the past few days to explain the aim of the trust to push the mental and physical development for young people to improve their condition of life.

Zahra explained that the Trust would be organizing a number of training programmes, and that a pilot programme was already being planned for next October in conjunction with Ministry of Education.

He added that the trust had showed the need to narrow the gap in lifestyle for the underprivileged and that it would be identifiying projects, problem areas, raising funds, and running projects smoothly and successfully.

The presidency has run a number of initiatives in the past two years, to empower the most vulnerable groups in society including the foundation for social wellbeing, launched last year, the conversion of the Malta Community Chest Fund into a foundation, and the establishment of a National Cancer Platform to bring together all NGOs working with cancer patients.