World Children's Day: respecting, protecting and fulfilling children's rights

To mark World Children’s Day 2022 Bryan Evans, Assistant Director and Chair of Children 1st’s Children’s Human Rights Group reflects on how Children 1st realises children’s human rights every day of the year.

“The child, for the full and harmonious development of his or her personality, should grow up in a family environment, in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding,”

Preamble to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child

Adopted by the UN General Assembly on this day in 1989, the UNCRC sets out 54 articles which together form the most complete statement of children’s human rights ever produced. Listening to children, young people and their family’s experiences (UNCRC Article 12) plays a crucial role in fulfilling their other rights. So, reflecting on the theme of this year’s World Children’s Day, ‘inclusion, for every child,’ we wanted to share some stories from areas of our work that highlight the importance of listening and inclusion. 

Every day we see in our work how trauma, poverty, violence and abuse can profoundly impact the lives of children and young people across the country. Every day we also see how working in a rights-based way can secure a more hopeful, brighter future for children and their families. 

Children 1st Parentline is there for families when they need it most. Offering space to listen and connecting families to practical help (through, for example, our money advice teams and our local family wellbeing teams) Children 1st Parentline develop a relationship with families and are able to build parents’ and carers’ confidence, improve their mental health, help them communicate more effectively and build stronger relationships with their children.

" Children 1st Parentline has been a lifeline over the past few weeks, I had no idea such support could be available and am extremely grateful."

Parent

Sometimes a family's circumstance requires more intensive support to help children, young people and families make sense of their experiences, to improve their emotional wellbeing, and help them to recover from trauma and abuse (UNCRC Article 39).

“I began to trust Lynsey from Children 1st more and more.  I felt like all my information was being kept safe, I wasn’t getting judged. Everything I said was treated like it was important. I remember Lynsey really listening about the traumatic things that happened in my life, it made me feel real, visible to someone, like my experience mattered. At school we learn about rights, with a shrug of the shoulder, in our GIRFEC class. We are told about them, but here [at Children 1st] your rights are through the interactions, you feel it.

“You can tell someone their rights but if you respect it and show it, it matters more. I think a lot of children and young people don’t know what being respected or heard is, but I hope they get the chance to the way I have.  Now I feel and have learned that I am someone who deserves good things in my life the same as every person should experience.”

Young Person

Children 1st aim to help families stay together (UNCRC Article 9) wherever that is safe for their children. Children 1st Family Group Decision Making services put a child’s voice at the heart of any life-changing decision that is being made about them (UNCRC Article 12) and brings together their wider family network to keep them safe.

“I felt more equal as we were telling them what the plan was going to be”.

Family Member

If children and young people can’t stay with their families, their best interests must be considered when making any decisions about their lives (UNCRC Article 3). At Children 1st we recruit, train and manage the performance of Safeguarders on behalf of the Scottish Government. Safeguarders hold an incredible responsibility – safeguarding a child’s interests when a hearing or court has to make a decision that will have a significant impact on their life. So, we want to ensure that children and young people are included in the decision about who should become a Safeguarder. During our last two recruitment drives children and young people shared with us the values, knowledge and skills that they thought were important for all Safeguarders to have, including truly understanding children’s human rights and what this means for children in their day to day lives. Children and young people were involved in shortlisting and interviews.

“We had time to discuss their applications and then we interviewed them. What I found worked really well was the fact that we discussed the applicants as a team, and we all made a cohesive decision on who we really thought would be really strong.” Young Person

The children and young people involved told us that they felt proud that they had had a say in the recruitment of the new Safeguarders, and that this meant that the new Safeguarders would respect and protect the rights of the children and young people they were matched with.

Every child should grow up in an atmosphere of happiness, understanding and love, and as these brief examples of inclusion show, it is through respecting, protecting, and fulfilling children’s human rights that governments, organisations, communities and individuals will achieve this ambition.

Can you help Children 1st celebrate and raise awareness of children’s human rights?

We’re asking children and young people across Scotland to join our Design a Bunting Challenge to show what Children’s Human Rights mean to you.