'Children's Rights Ireland'

national | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis Saturday February 24, 2007 06:09 by J. P. anderson - Author. 'Lost Children in the Wilderness' greagues2 at yahoo dot co dot uk

Child/Adolescent Mental Health

The most needy, most deprived are indeed very poorly served by the political establishment in Ireland. There is overwhelming evidence to suggest that most crime is linked to poverty, social exclusion, educational disadvantage and dysfunctional parenting, often each are combined. If we really want to reduce crime, we have to invest in the education and welfare of our disadvantaged children right from birth and even before birth.
Early school-leaving has consistently identified as a major risk factor for offending, but there are no systematic supports for those at risk of dropping out of school.
http://uk.360.yahoo.com/greagues2

Lost Children in the Wilderness©
By J. P. Anderson
(International registered copyright of the author 2006)

Link to: UNICEF: > http://www.unicef

‘The true measure of a nation’s standing is - how well it attends to it’s children - their health and safety, their material security, their education and socialization, and their sense of being loved, valued and included in the families and societies into which they are born’

‘In rich countries children’s basic needs have been generally met but there is scope for further progress in child well-being’

Launch of the Report Card 7:
Child Poverty in Perspective
BERLIN/FLORENCE, 14 February 2007 – The UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre today releases the Report Card 7 which focuses on the well-being of children and young people in the world’s advanced economies and provides the first comprehensive assessment.
The six dimensions taken to measure the well- being of children – material well-being, health and safety, education, peer and family relationships, behaviours and risks, and young people’s own subjective sense of well-being – offer a picture of the lives of children, and no single dimension can stand as a reliable proxy for child well-being as a whole.
The landmark report shows that among all of the 21 OECD countries there are improvements to be made and that no single OECD country leads in all six of the areas.
“All countries have weaknesses to be addressed” says Innocenti Director Marta Santos Pais, “No single dimension of well-being stands as a reliable proxy for child well-being as a whole and several OECD countries find themselves with widely differing rankings for different dimensions of children’s lives.”
According to the Report Card small North-European countries dominate the top half of the table, with child well-being at its highest in the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Finland. There is no strong or consistent relationship between per capita GDP and child well-being. The Czech Republic, for example, achieves a higher overall rank for child well-being than several much wealthier European countries.
Also no country features in the top third of the rankings for all six dimensions of child well-being.
Pointing out that the Convention on the Rights of the Child calls on all countries to invest in its children “to the maximum extent of available resources”, Ms. Santos Pais said that international comparison was a way of testing this commitment -
“A country cannot be said to be doing the best it can for its children if other countries at a similar stage of economic development are doing much better – and that’s what the league tables are designed to show.”
First step
The Innocenti Report is intended as a first step towards regular and comprehensive monitoring of child well-being across the OECD. Its scope is limited by the availability of internationally comparable data (which means that key areas such as mental and emotional health and child neglect and abuse are omitted).

Nonetheless UNICEF hopes that the Report will help to stimulate the collection or more comprehensive and timelier data.
Child wellbeing needs to be addressed by public policies across a broad spectrum of aspects.
Given levels of child well-being are not inevitable and show what is possible to do to improve the lives of children.
“All families in OECD countries today are aware that childhood is being re-shaped by forces whose mainspring is not necessarily the best interests of the child.
At the same time, a wide public in the OECD countries is becoming ever more aware that many of the corrosive social problems affecting the quality of life have their genesis in the changing ecology of childhood.
Many therefore feel that it is time to attempt to re-gain a degree of understanding, control and direction over what is happening to our children in their most vital, vulnerable years.
That process begins with measurement and monitoring. And it is as a contribution to that process that the Innocenti Research Centre has published this initial attempt at a multi-dimensional overview of child well-being in the countries of the OECD.” (Innocenti Report Card 7, page 39)

The Report Card series present ‘league tables’ on aspects of child wellbeing in the world’s most advanced economies (countries that are members of the OECD) seeking to identify areas where societies could do better in supporting every child to be and become all that s/he can be – over and above generally universal access for every child to basic services in education, health, nutrition, shelter.

Internationally, measurement and comparison gives an indication of each country’s strengths and weaknesses. It shows what is achievable in practice and provides both government and civil society with the information to argue for and work towards the fulfilment of children’s rights and the improvement of their lives. Above all, such comparisons demonstrate that given levels of child well-being are not inevitable but policy-susceptible; the wide differences in child well-being seen throughout this Report Card can therefore be interpreted as a broad and realistic guide to the potential for improvement in all OECD countries. Given the potential value of this exercise, every attempt has been made to overcome data limitations. Nonetheless, it is acknowledged throughout that the available data may be less than ideal and that there are prominent gaps. Children’s exposure to violence in the home both as victims and as witnesses, 2 for example, could not be included because of problems of cross-national definition and measurement. Children’s mental health and emotional well-being may also be under-represented, though attempts have been made to reflect these difficult-to-measure dimensions (see, for example, the results of surveys into children’s own perceptions of their own lives on pages 34 and 38). Age and gender differences are also insufficiently attended to, again reflecting a lack of disaggregated data and the fact that the majority of the available statistics relate to the lives of older children. A particularly important omission is the level of participation by three and four year-olds in early childhood education (for which, again, no internationally comparable data are available).
What Action was taken, (if any) by the Gardai at Pearse Street Dublin? 2. in this matter?

On Sunday 18/02/07 at about two pm, I reported the matter of a young boy of about 11 years of age, and 'of a traveller background' in a deplorable state of filth and overall neglect, with 'dirt engrained into his hands, his other outward features and his clothing.
He wore a Green/Blue jacket and had several 'blue rosary beads around his neck, his hair and eyes are of brown colour. His frame is of a 'very thin structure' and he sat in the middle of O'Connell Bridge, BEGGING.
The Neglected and Filthy state of that child 'shocked me'.
I had spoken to the child, who told me that he was homeless ‘I had come across this child under similar conditions in Henry Street. Dublin last year and his condition have not improved, nor by the looks of it has the HSE/State sought a protection/place of safety order in order to protect this child from further abuse/neglect.
The Garda at Pearse Street told me that 'she knew the child, as had the Garda in Store Street almost one year earlier.
So where may I ask, is the 'protection of the state' in this little boy's terrible plight?

I trust that you will contact the Gardai and 'make adequate and proper provision for the care and protection of this small boy'.
Joseph Anderson.
The Irish Times. October 20th 2005: also Department of Education @
www.education.ie Drop out rate of school children. -- New figures show a continuing drop-out rate, especially in poorer areas. The report found that one-in-twelve schools have a drop-out-rate of more than 50%, it also revealed that 40% of students leave school before completing the Junior Certificate. Boys are much more likely to drop-out than are girls; 28% of males go before the Leaving Cert, compared with just over 12% of girls.
Reacting to the figures - teachers unions attributed the situation to the gross under-funding of second level education in Ireland with the TUI President cited inequality in Irish society, the union has estimated that at least 100 second-level schools serving disadvantaged communities do not have disadvantage status, while ASTI general secretary Mr John White said that “the gross under-investment in Irish second-level education places Ireland 21st out of 27 OECD countries in terms of spending per second-level student which is nowhere near other countries and steps should be taken in forthcoming budgets to redress this imbalance.
‘Civil Rights /Liberties Must Be Safeguarded By Law
As The Word ‘Soft’ Is An Inappropriate And Misleading Description For Information - Detrimental Malicious Or Otherwise In The Possession Of State Agencies’

By J. P. Anderson.

The law of the land applies to everybody - man, woman and child in the state, each with the same force of severity and to each, it affords the right to defend and have vindicated - the good name and standing of each person within his/her own family, community and wider society.
While the Government’s proposed wording for the Plebiscite would ‘improve’ the rights of children, there remains in my opinion some very serious doubts regarding the proposed ’sharing of ’soft’ information as I take the view that the word ’soft’ is an inappropriate word - possibly without a ‘defined’ meaning in law, but having a common meaning as ‘gratifying to the touch or nerves - gentle, balmy, creamy, velvety, soothing, tender, mild, silken, smooth, comforting’.
These terms could hardly properly or adequately describe information, possibly in the possession of state agencies or other agencies or individuals which asserts that a named individual is or may be a ‘child molester’ rapist’ and so on.
Now the government wants to retain, extend and foster the development of a culture of ‘conviction without trial’ on the basis of what may well be malicious or ill-held, hearsay, gossip, with the intent to damage an ‘innocent person’ and thereby remove from that person his/her right to his/her ’good name and reputation’.

These Laws, if enacted, would need ‘solid safeguards’ enshrined into the law to protect the citizen’s rights and civil liberties. These ‘legislative safeguards’ will need to be developed to ensure that an individual is notified of the existence and possible exchange of such information and is also afforded adequate opportunity to ‘legally challenge this information’ and the ’penalty’ of meeting the costs of such a ’challenge’ should rest with the agency in the possession of the alleged detrimental information.

The ‘current wording’ of Article 42 of the Irish Constitution.
5. In exceptional cases, where the parents for physical or moral reasons fail in their duty towards their children, the State as guardian of the common good, by appropriate means shall endeavour to supply the place of the parents, but always with due regard for the natural and imprescriptible rights of the child.

Proposed wording for amendment to the Constitution*
Article 42 (A)
1. The State acknowledges and affirms the natural and imprescriptible rights of all children.
2.1o In exceptional cases, where the parents of any child for physical or moral reasons fail in their duty towards such child, the State as guardian of the common good, by appropriate means shall endeavour to supply the place of the parents but with due regard with due regard for the natural and imprescriptible rights of the child.
2.1o Provision may be made by law for the adoption of a child where the parents have failed for such a period of time as may be prescribed by law in their duty towards the child, and where the best interest of the child so require.
3. Provision may be made by law for the voluntary placement for adoption and the adoption of any child.
4. Provision may be made by law that in proceedings before any court concerning the adoption, guardianship or custody of, or access to, any child, the court shall endeavour to secure the best interests of the child.
5.1o Provision may be made by law for the collection and exchange of information relating to the endangerment, sexual exploitation or sexual abuse, or risk thereof, of children, or other persons of such a class or classes as may be prescribed by law.
2o No provision in this Constitution invalidates any law providing for offences of absolute or strict liability committed against or in connection with a child under 18 years of age.
3o The provisions of this section of this Article do not, in any way, limit the powers of the Oireachtas to provide by law for other offences of absolute or strict liability.
* Article 42.5 will be repealed and replaced with the text above.

Lost Children in the Wilderness©
By J. P. Anderson
(International registered copyright of the author 2006)

‘We Are - Our Brothers Keeper’
The Final Chapter

The most needy, most deprived are indeed very poorly served by the political establishment in Ireland. There is overwhelming evidence to suggest that most crime is linked to poverty, social exclusion, educational disadvantage and dysfunctional parenting, often each are combined. If we really want to reduce crime, we have to invest in the education and welfare of our disadvantaged children right from birth and even before birth.

Early school-leaving has consistently identified as a major risk factor for offending, but there are no systematic supports for those at risk of dropping out of school.
In Dublin, the North-side Partnership has done valuable work in arranging supports to help disadvantaged children to stay on in school. Most of these children are the first in their families to receive a second level education and qualifications, but this is only one initiative in a sea of need.
Various early intervention schemes have been launched, but they are invariably of a ‘pilot’ nature and have made no serious inroads into patterns of deprivation.

There is the long-running saga about the lack of places in secure units for children who have already fallen into anti-social behaviour, and urgently need help to get them out of it.

while most of this has little to do with the Criminal Justice System or the Department of Justice. Other Government Departments, like the Environment, Social welfare, Education and Health have responsibility for neighbour-hoods and families. But they see no relationship between their areas of responsibility and crime.
There is little evidence that the political will is there, to change the much outdated and decayed structures and policies, the tried, and failed past policies of the Irish political establishment within the crumbling present structures re-wrapped and presented to the people as what is now proposed as the tried and failed crumbling structures of the future.
No major political party is committed to the sort of redistributive policies, that would have a real impact on our marginalised communities - instead they all focus on the end result - the criminal behaviour of elements in these communities and how to contain it.

The research for ‘Lost Children in the Wilderness’ was begun in June of 2001. Those who contributed most to the project were also those who suffered the most because of the inadequate and failed systems which brought them into their terrible plight. Then there were the many who by their under resourced but gallant efforts tried their very best to service the needs of the ‘most needy’ and now in February of 2007 This is the final chapter. For today and everyday ‘we are our brothers keeper’.
To the many, especially to those friends and loved ones lost, who with great dedication and trust and much hope, have looked towards ‘A Brand New Tomorrow’. J.P. Anderson. author © 2007.
The End: