Government urged to meet obligations on children`s human rights

The Children’s Rights Alliance for England has urged the
government to take immediate steps to meet its human rights
obligations for children.

The campaigning body says the government has failed to implement
the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which the
government ratified in December 1991.

A CRAE report to the working group of the committee on the
rights of the child, which is an international body monitoring
implementation of the convention, says: “It is plain that the
government has so far failed to get to grips with its human rights
obligations to children.” The last time the committee on the rights
of the child examined the government’s performance was in February
1995.

It adds that the government has refused to establish an
independent human rights body for children in England, and the UK
has the second worst record in Europe for imprisoning children.

Veronica Plowden, CRAE joint national co-ordinator, said: “What
is ultimately needed is huge political will, and a commitment to
children that we’ve never seen before in this country.”

The government will be formally examined by the committee in
September.

Meanwhile, six young people aged between 10 and 16-years-old
called for a children’s rights commissioner for England when
they met MPs earlier this week.

The young people, from the Office of Children’s Rights
Commissioner for London and the Children’s Rights Alliance
for England, gave evidence to the parliamentary joint committee on
human rights.