Black belt tackles blackspots.

`If anyone is serious about making a difference to society, youth has to be the focus for what is done,' says five times World Karate Champion Geoff Thompson. And the way to reach the youth, he has no doubt, is through sport.

Over the last six years his vehicle for making these convictions a reality has been the Manchester-based Youth Charter for Sport (YCS) which he founded. Its motto is `providing young people with the opportunity through sport to develop in life'.

Thompson (now 41) can highlight three major turning points in his life to date. The first happened when he was seven and his father died. From the relatively sheltered life in Wolverhampton, England, where his Barbadan father had been a popular community worker, he moved to East London. His mother, a stern disciplinarian with a strong Christian faith, struggled to support the family.

`At the age of seven I grew up,' he says. `I was the man of the house and had to play my part in earning the family income.' He sold meat patties at school which his mother made at night. He cleaned taxis. `If you want to know about rejection, try selling eggs from door to door each day,' he says with feeling.

In his final year at school he was taken to visit the Sobell Sports Centre in Islington and saw a karate demonstration. He immediately knew he had found his sport. `I had a violent temper at school and this redirected my aggression.' He bought an outfit, found a Japanese coach and, over the next eight years, made his way to the top of the sport in Britain.

The second turning point came on the night after he had won the World Heavyweight Karate Championship in Taiwan in 1982. `I had what I can only describe as a religious experience,' he says. `I had a compelling feeling that God was speaking to me. He was asking, "Now what are you going to do?" and part of me was answering, "Win more medals." But there was a deeper conviction saying, "You know you have got to do something with this--something for the youth."'

The third turning point came early in 1993, just after he had married Janice (also a former World Karate Champion) and moved to Manchester in order to study at Salford University. All was not well on the streets of Manchester. That January a 14-year-old boy was shot dead as he waited at a take-away in the Moss Side district. `It was just one shooting too many,' Thompson says. `I had seen violence on the streets of Los Angeles, now it was coming to Manchester.' He felt that this was the moment for which he had been prepared.

Within months he launched Youth Charter for Sport in Wembley Stadium, London, with a host of sporting celebrities and 100 inner-city youth from Moss Side and London. The Duke of Westminster became President and soccer hero Sir Bobby Charlton Vice-President.

YCS raises money for sports facilities for young people and for job creation schemes. Sporting stars are enlisted as role models. The concept has spread beyond Manchester to other countries, including South Africa. Recently YCS opened a Youth Community and Training Centre in Toxteth, Liverpool, to complement the newly built sports arena.

`Forming YCS has been the most spiritually edifying and rewarding experience of my life,' says Thompson.