Children’s rights should be defined, in language they can understand
It will do little to prevent the abuse of children.
The Independent Guide refers to the “natural and imprescriptible rights of the child”, and defines “imprescriptible” as meaning “cannot be lost by the passage of time, or abandoned by non-exercise, or lost or forfeited through the wrongful act of a third party”.
The guide says that the courts have identified certain children’s rights, but it doesn’t name these rights.
“Imprescriptible rights” were also mentioned in the Constitution. Abuse shows that unless there is a definition of “imprescriptible” and in language a child can understand, those rights might just as well not exist.
So long as the only way of determining a child’s rights is to take a case to court, which no child and few adults can afford to do, then, for all practical purposes, children won’t have any rights, imprescriptible or otherwise.
Both wordings assert that government is “the guardian of the common good”, although generations of politicians, with their addiction to ‘stroke politics’, have demonstrated, quite clearly, that the only good they can be relied upon to guard is their own.
The most serious abuse of children, in times gone by, took place outside the home, often in organisations either run by, or paid by, the State.
These abuses are not even referenced, much less addressed.
Any organisation that takes a child ” into care” is effectively adopting it, and has the same duty of care towards that child, and should be judged by the same standards, as the State itself uses to judge parents.
That duty of care should not be considered at an end when the child becomes an adult. For example, if third-level education is appropriate it should be paid for by the State.
Each child ‘in care’ should be assigned a named, adult guardian whose duty is to ensure that its rights are not infringed.
Allen Crosbie
Merville
Cobh
Co Cork
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