There is an ur­gent need to es­tab­lish a Child's Rights Com­mis­sion and, in it, set up a Chil­dren's Om­buds­man Of­fice. This is the view of for­mer Teach­ing Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (TSC) chair­man Dr Fazal Ali.

Ali was re­new­ing the call made sev­en years ago by a 2014 Task Force.

He said the move has be­come nec­es­sary giv­en the un­mask­ing of vary­ing lev­els of de­pri­va­tions and dis­ad­van­tages among stu­dents dur­ing the lock­down brought on by the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

The pan­dem­ic brought with it learn­ing loss as many chil­dren were left with­out elec­tron­ic de­vices such as com­put­ers while oth­ers were un­able to af­ford in­ter­net ser­vice or in some in­stances get a re­li­able ser­vice. Oth­ers were with­out food and oth­er ne­ces­si­ties as par­ents and care­givers lost jobs, while some faced ver­bal, emo­tion­al and sex­u­al abuse.

"Since phys­i­cal class­es came to an end in schools across the coun­try in March 2020 be­cause of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, the toll on chil­dren has been enor­mous," Ali said.

"It is in their best in­ter­est that we save our chil­dren and their fu­tures by es­tab­lish­ing such an of­fice–the om­buds­man of­fice–in­side of a new Child's Rights Com­mis­sion."

Ex­perts have not­ed the psy­cho­log­i­cal im­pact of lock­downs on chil­dren every­where as they were forced to ad­just to life away from schools, their friends and vir­tu­al class­rooms.

There are al­so con­cerns that there are not enough so­cial work­ers to deal with the dis­tress calls from chil­dren and those who have "van­ished" from the sys­tem.

The Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion (MOE) re­port­ed that over 2,000 chil­dren have dropped out of school since the pan­dem­ic. The MOE has en­list­ed the help of the min­istries of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty and So­cial De­vel­op­ment to help track these chil­dren.

Dr Ali said that it was time for some­thing to be done to save and pro­tect the na­tion's chil­dren.

"In its Con­clud­ing Ob­ser­va­tions of 2006, the Com­mit­tee on the Rights of the Child not­ed the ex­is­tence of the Of­fice of the Om­buds­man, but ex­pressed con­cern at the ab­sence of an in­de­pen­dent and ded­i­cat­ed mech­a­nism with a spe­cif­ic man­date to reg­u­lar­ly mon­i­tor and eval­u­ate the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the Con­ven­tion on the Rights of the Child," Ali said.

"The Com­mit­tee al­so ex­pressed con­cern that there were no mech­a­nisms em­pow­ered to re­ceive and ad­dress in­di­vid­ual com­plaints on be­half, or from, chil­dren."

The om­buds­man, a cit­i­zen de­fend­er

An om­budsper­son in some ju­ris­dic­tions is a per­son who can be a com­mis­sion­er, bu­reaux, me­di­a­tor, or de­fend­er. Obudsper­sons' of­fices are gen­er­al­ly re­ferred to as In­de­pen­dent Hu­man Rights In­sti­tu­tions.

Ali has de­scribed such an of­fice­hold­er as a "cit­i­zen de­fend­er," deal­ing with com­plaints from the pub­lic about in­jus­tice and mal­ad­min­is­tra­tion by gov­ern­ment agen­cies.

"Some re­ceive com­plaints from in­di­vid­u­als and might have the au­thor­i­ty to me­di­ate be­tween cit­i­zens and an Au­thor­i­ty,” Ali said, adding that "Oth­ers might have the pow­er to bring cas­es to court."

Claim­ing the first such role was es­tab­lished in 1809 in Swe­den and was called an Om­buds­man for Jus­tice, Ali said, "To­day, om­budsper­son-like in­sti­tu­tions ex­ist in coun­tries in Eu­rope, Latin Amer­i­ca, Asia and Africa. Some may fo­cus on a spe­cialised field, such as an om­budsper­son for chil­dren."

Ali stressed, "In­equal­i­ty, mul­ti­ple de­pri­va­tions, un­free­doms, and be­ing an un­ac­com­pa­nied mi­grant child in a UNICEF Child-Friend­ly Space rather than at a school, and the root caus­es and abus­es that cat­a­pult many chil­dren in­to con­flict with the law are not is­sues or­di­nar­i­ly ad­dressed by the Teach­ing Ser­vice Com­mis­sion, the Chil­dren’s Au­thor­i­ty, the Fam­i­ly Court, the Chil­dren Court, or any di­vi­sion of the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion.”

The pack­age of ex­ist­ing leg­is­la­tions

Ali point­ed out that none of the bits of leg­is­la­tion as­so­ci­at­ed with the in­sti­tu­tions men­tioned, "deal with root caus­es but seek to pro­vide reme­dies post fac­to."

He be­lieves that on­ly a func­tion­ing in­de­pen­dent Child Rights Com­mis­sion can ad­dress root caus­es "that will help us to nav­i­gate the lives of our chil­dren away from harm long be­fore they come in­to con­flict with the law."

Ali not­ed that by le­gal no­tices pub­lished on May 15, 2015, the Chil­dren's Au­thor­i­ty Act Chap­ter 46:10; the Chil­dren's Com­mu­ni­ty Res­i­dences, Fos­ter Care and Nurs­eries Act No 65 of 2000 as amend­ed; the Adop­tion of Chil­dren Act No 67 of 2000 as amend­ed; and the Chil­dren Act No 12 of 2012 were all pro­claimed. How­ev­er, The Chil­dren's Au­thor­i­ty Act and the Chil­dren's Com­mu­ni­ty Res­i­dences, Fos­ter Homes and Nurs­eries Act are the two pri­ma­ry pieces of leg­is­la­tion that es­tab­lish a New Civ­il Child Pro­tec­tion Sys­tem.

"There is an ur­gent need to es­tab­lish a Child Rights Com­mis­sion to help to co­or­di­nate, iden­ti­fy, pri­ori­tise, sen­si­tise, ex­pe­dite, mon­i­tor, rec­om­mend and im­ple­ment those mea­sures and as­pects of the Con­ven­tion on the Rights of the Child that are not cur­rent­ly be­ing ad­dressed."

He ex­plained how it could work.

"The Chil­dren’s Om­buds­man Of­fice shall be deal­ing with in­di­vid­ual com­plaints, in­ter­ven­ing with oth­er pub­lic au­thor­i­ties, con­duct­ing re­search, and where their man­date per­mits them to en­gage in ad­vo­ca­cy…gen­er­al­ly pro­mot­ing chil­dren's rights in pub­lic pol­i­cy, law and prac­tice."

The for­mer TSC head ad­vised, "This Com­mis­sion must be a crea­ture of the Con­sti­tu­tion that re­ports to the Unit­ed Na­tions, and must be in keep­ing with T&T’s oblig­a­tions un­der the Con­ven­tion on the Rights of the Child and to make rec­om­men­da­tions for ac­tion via a par­lia­men­tary re­port."

* In 2000, a pack­age of Chil­dren Leg­is­la­tion was en­act­ed.

This was fol­lowed by a Fam­i­ly Court Com­mit­tee which was es­tab­lished in ear­ly 2002, com­pris­ing crit­i­cal stake­hold­ers from the Ju­di­cia­ry, Ex­ec­u­tive and the Non-Gov­ern­men­tal Com­mu­ni­ty.

This Com­mit­tee rec­om­mend­ed in­ter alia, the es­tab­lish­ment of a well-re­sourced pi­lot Fam­i­ly Court Project in Port-of-Spain, in a sep­a­rate build­ing with ad­e­quate staff and ac­cess to var­i­ous so­cial ser­vices such as me­di­a­tors, pro­ba­tion of­fi­cers, so­cial work­ers, in­take of­fi­cers, and oth­ers.

The Fam­i­ly Court be­came a re­al­i­ty in May 2004.

Based on the mon­i­tor­ing and eval­u­a­tion of the Fam­i­ly Court, as well as con­sul­ta­tions with var­i­ous stake­hold­ers, ex­pert ad­vice and its own de­lib­er­a­tions, the Fam­i­ly Court Com­mit­tee re­viewed the 2000 Pack­age of Chil­dren Leg­is­la­tion and for­mu­lat­ed com­ments and rec­om­men­da­tions which led to the re­draft­ing of a new Pack­age of Chil­dren Leg­is­la­tion in 2007.

*In 2008, The In­ter­na­tion­al Child Ab­duc­tion Act; The Chil­dren Au­thor­i­ty (Amend­ment) Act; and The Chil­dren's Com­mu­ni­ty Res­i­dences, Fos­ter Care and Nurs­eries (Amend­ment) Act were passed in the Par­lia­ment.

Sub­se­quent­ly, a new Chil­dren Act of 2012; a Con­sol­i­dat­ed Adop­tion Act of 2015; and the Fam­i­ly and Chil­dren Di­vi­sion Act of 2016 were al­so en­act­ed.

In 2012, as more and more se­ri­ous re­ports be­gan emerg­ing in the me­dia about the harm chil­dren con­tin­ued to ex­pe­ri­ence, this pro­pelled the au­thor­i­ties to ap­point a Child Pro­tec­tion Task Force with an ex­press man­date to op­er­a­tionalise the Chil­dren's Au­thor­i­ty (CA) as pre­scribed in the leg­is­la­tion.

*On March 26, 2014, Re­port Num­ber Two of this Task Force was sub­mit­ted by Chair­man Di­ana Ma­habir-Wy­att to the then min­is­ter of gen­der, youth and child de­vel­op­ment, Clifton De Couteau.

Page 13 of this re­port un­der the head­ing rec­om­men­da­tions, con­tained a clear rec­om­men­da­tion that "...con­sid­er­a­tion be giv­en to cre­at­ing an of­fice of Chil­dren's Om­buds­man to be es­tab­lished un­der the of­fice of the Om­buds­man or the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al, with an over­sight func­tion to en­sure the pro­vi­sions of the Con­ven­tion on the Rights of the Child are ob­served by all pub­lic and pri­vate or­gan­i­sa­tions that deal with chil­dren, to the ex­tent that such mat­ters do not al­ready fall un­der the re­mit of the Chil­dren's Au­thor­i­ty...".

The Chil­dren's Au­thor­i­ty Act

The Chil­dren's Au­thor­i­ty Act es­tab­lish­es the Chil­dren's Au­thor­i­ty (CA) as a body cor­po­rate with pow­ers and func­tions that in­clude:

§ Pro­vid­ing care, pro­tec­tion and re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion of chil­dren

§ Man­ag­ing the adop­tion of chil­dren

§ In­ves­ti­gat­ing com­plaints re­gard­ing the mis­treat­ment of chil­dren in com­mu­ni­ty res­i­dences, fos­ter homes and nurs­eries and breach­es of stan­dards pre­scribed for same

§ In­ves­ti­gat­ing com­plaints or re­ports of mis­treat­ment of chil­dren gen­er­al­ly

§ re­mov­ing a child from his or her home where the child is in im­mi­nent dan­ger

§ li­cens­ing and mon­i­tor­ing com­mu­ni­ty res­i­dences and nurs­eries and man­ag­ing the fos­ter care sys­tem es­tab­lished un­der the new leg­is­la­tion

§ is­su­ing, sus­pend­ing and re­vok­ing li­cens­es of com­mu­ni­ty res­i­dences and nurs­eries and

§ ad­vis­ing the Min­is­ter on mat­ters re­lat­ing to the op­er­a­tions of the Act, etc.

Three oth­er bits of leg­is­la­tion in­clude:

*THE CHIL­DREN’S COM­MU­NI­TY RES­I­DENCES, FOS­TER HOMES AND NURS­ERIES ACT:

This Act es­sen­tial­ly makes pro­vi­sions for the mon­i­tor­ing, li­cens­ing and reg­u­lat­ing of com­mu­ni­ty res­i­dences, fos­ter care and nurs­eries in T&T.

*THE CHIL­DREN ACT OF 2012:

The Chil­dren Act of 2012 mean­while, com­bines a civ­il pro­tec­tive regime for chil­dren who are vic­tims of abuse, aban­don­ment and ne­glect with a crim­i­nal regime geared pri­mar­i­ly to deal­ing with sex­u­al con­duct against chil­dren.

In ad­di­tion to the of­fences of cru­el­ty to chil­dren; aban­don­ment; beg­ging and burn­ing, this act cre­ates a range of new of­fences with stiffer and more rel­e­vant penal­ties.

It in­tro­duces the sex­u­al of­fences of sex­u­al pen­e­tra­tion of a child; sex­u­al touch­ing; sex­u­al groom­ing, child pornog­ra­phy; and pros­ti­tu­tion.

The act mod­ernises the le­gal frame­work for chil­dren in con­flict with the law, rec­og­nizes parental re­spon­si­bil­i­ties, and pro­vides for chil­dren in need of care and su­per­vi­sion.

The Chil­dren Act of 2012 al­so ad­dress­es the treat­ment of chil­dren be­fore the courts whether as vic­tims or per­pe­tra­tors and es­tab­lish­es the con­cept of a “Chil­dren’s At­tor­ney” un­der Sec­tion 88 which is to be a unit un­der the So­lic­i­tor Gen­er­al, led by the Se­nior Chil­dren’s At­tor­ney, ap­point­ed by the Ju­di­cial and Le­gal Ser­vices Com­mis­sion.

*THE FAM­I­LY AND CHIL­DREN DI­VI­SION ACT OF 2016:

Ali notes that the Fam­i­ly and Chil­dren Di­vi­sion Act of 2016 to­geth­er with the Chil­dren Act of 2012 mod­ernised the youth jus­tice sys­tem in the coun­try by en­sur­ing that chil­dren who come in­to con­flict with the law, are dealt with in a re­ha­bil­i­ta­tive man­ner and in ac­cor­dance with restora­tive jus­tice prin­ci­ples rather than the old tra­di­tion­al puni­tive sys­tem of jus­tice.

But none of these bits of leg­is­la­tion deal with de­pri­va­tion, un­free­doms, and root caus­es.

UK Mea­sures Of De­pri­va­tions

In the Unit­ed King­dom, de­pri­va­tions are mea­sured in sev­en do­mains weight­ed as in­come (22.5 per cent); em­ploy­ment (22.5 per cent); ed­u­ca­tion (13.5 per cent); health (13.5 per cent); crime (9.3 per cent); bar­ri­ers to hous­ing and ser­vices (9.3 per cent) and liv­ing en­vi­ron­ment (9.3 per cent).

These do­mains each have mul­ti­ple strands.

For ex­am­ple, the “Bar­ri­ers to Hous­ing and Ser­vices” en­folds sev­en com­po­nents in­clud­ing lev­els of house­hold over­crowd­ing, home­less­ness, hous­ing af­ford­abil­i­ty, and the dis­tance by road to four types of key ameni­ties in­clud­ing the post of­fice, pri­ma­ry school, su­per­mar­ket, and near­est health fa­cil­i­ty.

In the UK, rough­ly one in every 60 chil­dren in the most de­prived com­mu­ni­ties is in care, com­pared to one in every 660 in the least de­prived dis­tricts.

Ali said, "The learn­ing loss which chil­dren who live in sit­u­a­tions of mul­ti­ple de­pri­va­tions must ex­pe­ri­ence must be be­yond sig­nif­i­cant and the con­se­quences are yet to be cal­cu­lat­ed."