Hawick Rugby Club hosting free workshops for young people to tackle anti-social behaviour

The workshops take part on a Wednesday evening Credit: ITV

Hawick Rugby Club has been inviting young people from the town to come down and try a range of sports on a Wednesday night.

The Community Rugby Event is for all young people aged 15-24 giving young people an opportunity to engage in physical activity, whilst socialising in a positive environment and becoming upskilled on key educational themes such as tackling anti-social behaviour within the community.

With Scottish Rugby pushing the initiative it's no wonder that rugby is one of the sports available, but it isn't the only one on offer as Graham Hogg, youth development officer says "we want kids from all areas to come down and enjoy it, we had dodgeball, boxing and then there is the learning inside too".

The scheme hopes to educate young people, allowing them to engage with local community Police officers, as well as other services and mental health experts and aims to keep young people off the streets and make them think about their actions.

Funded through the CashBack for Communities fund, a unique Scottish Government programme that takes money seized from criminals under the proceeds of crime legislation and invests them into sporting, social and cultural projects.

Since 2008, £110 million recovered under the Proceeds of Crime Act has been committed to the CashBack for Communities Programme and other community initiatives.

The programme has funded over 2.5 million activities and opportunities for young people. Scottish Rugby is just one of the partners and uses money from the fund to develop the rugby programme.

Scottish Rugby identified 17 secondary schools situated within, or taking children from, the most deprived areas of Scotland and introduced the CashBack "Schools of Rugby" programme along with a CashBack "Community Rugby program".

This aims to help young people build their confidence, develop their physical and personal skills and participate in an activity that improves their learning, employability and employment options.