Children and Social Work Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2016-11-23
Topic: Civil Rights
Joan Walmsley (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I strongly support this amendment and very much regret that the Government have failed in their promise to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, that action would be initiated across Whitehall before this Third Reading to consult on how the public duty to have regard to the UNCRC, which is what our amendment asks for, would affect the work of government and the well-being of children. We were promised that that work would start, with particular regard to the possibility of introducing either the Scottish or Welsh model of protecting children’s rights, before today. As far as we have been informed, it has not. That is why we are justified in bringing this amendment back at Third Reading. We still need clarification on whether and when the Government intend to keep that promise and how Parliament will be informed of their progress. When in doubt, I always return to the convention itself. It may be informative to remind your Lordships of what we have been bound by the convention to do for the past 25 years. Article 4, on the protection of rights, states that the Government, "shall undertake all appropriate legislative, administrative, and other measures for the implementation of the rights recognized in the present Convention. With regard to economic, social and cultural rights, States Parties shall undertake such measures to the maximum extent of their available resources" That is not unreasonable. Article 20 states: "A child temporarily or permanently deprived of his or her family environment"— the children we are talking about in the Bill— "or in whose … best interests cannot be allowed to remain in that environment, shall be entitled to special protection and assistance provided by the State" That is another very relevant article. We feel it is very important to the scope of the Bill to put a duty into primary legislation to ensure the delivery of these rights In Scotland they have a very specific procedure, which I have read, to make sure there are impact assessments at every level to ensure that these rights are delivered. We have not got that in England yet. That is why the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, in its report in June this year, in general comment number 9, recommended that we: "(a) Introduce a statutory obligation at national and devolved levels to systematically conduct a child rights impact assessment when developing laws and policies affecting children, including in international development cooperation", and, "(b) Publish the results" As to its general comment number 14 in its 2013 report on the right of the child to have his or her best interests taken as a primary consideration, the committee recommended this year that we should, first, ensure that this right is appropriately integrated and consistently interpreted and applied in all legislative, administrative and judicial proceedings and decisions as well as in all policies, programmes and projects that are relevant to and have an impact on children; and, secondly, develop procedures and criteria to provide guidance to all relevant persons, and so on The case is made by the convention under the UN committee for our amendment. We signed up to that convention 25 years ago and, although we have made some progress, there is a great deal further to go, especially in relation to children who are particularly vulnerable because they are in care or have recently left care If the Government will not accept this amendment and insist on pursuing a non-legislative approach to children’s rights, will the Minister commit to introducing a child rights framework across government and assure us that the impact of such a framework will have the same effect as the due regard duty Three hours ago I received a short statement—one paragraph—from the Minister, Edward Timpson, referring to his commitment to the convention. It says: "The possibility of extending this to legislation is still under review. No decisions have been taken about this and officials are continuing to explore the pros and cons". He went a little further in a letter to Harriet Harman—a copy of which I have received and which has been mentioned by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf—and said: "We are now planning a programme of action which will build awareness and lead to greater consistency in the way in which children’s voices and views are heard, and policy developed across Whitehall" Will the Minister set out how and, importantly, when this framework will be introduced to ensure that children’s rights are not kicked into the long grass once the opportunity presented by this Bill has passed? I hope the Minister can give this specific information about the Government’s actions and plans.