Have your say the ‘Right’ way

The rights of children and young people are laid out in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). The UNCRC ensures that children and young people grow up healthy and safe and that their views are taken into considerations in decisions that affect them.

In these pages, you can find information on the UNCRC and other mechanisms that provide rights protections for children, as well as how children’s rights are being progressed in Scotland.

Programme for Government 2020-21
The Programme for Government 2020-21 focuses on COVID-19 recovery and includes a range of commitments relevant to children and young people’s human rights.

The commitments include that Scottish Government will:

Introduce the UNCRC Incorporation (Scotland) Bill: the First Minister announced that the Bill would be “shortly introduced” and will fully and directly incorporate the UNCRC, to the maximum extent of the Scottish Parliament’s powers, within the current parliamentary term. It will place a statutory duty on Scottish Ministers and public authorities not to act incompatibly with the UNCRC and give powers of redress to children, young people and their representatives.
Roll out a new Child Winter Heating Assistance programme
Keep “the Promise” with care experienced children and young people.
Establish community health and wellbeing services that will support children, young people and their families
Promote equality and tackle the attainment gap: including improving digital connectivity through the provision of 25’000 chrome books, £135million additional investment including funding to recruit 1400 additional teachers and 2000 support staff to help close the poverty related attainment gap.
Conduct a review of exams and qualifications: to learn lessons from this year’s SQA moderation and results.
The Programme also addresses previously made commitments which were delayed due to COVID-19. These include:

Scottish Child Payment: applications will open in November 2020, with payments beginning from the end of February 2021.
Early learning and childcare expansion: all three and four year olds and eligible two-year-olds will be able to access 1’140 hours of childcare by the end of 2020 (the previous target was by August 2020).

As part of Children in Scotland’s 25th Anniversary ‘25 Calls’, Together has launched a call to action along with Children’s Parliament to make Scotland “a nation of Unfearties

What is an Unfeartie?

Unfearties are people who are courageous in discussing children’s issues, make a difference in children’s lives and speak up for them so that children growing up in Scotland are healthy, happy and safe. Anyone with an interest in children’s rights is invited to become an Unfeartie adhering to six basic principles:

· Listen to children and view them as capable assets to their community

· Strive to ensure children’s voices are heard and challenge infringements of human dignity

· Help children and adults learn the values of honesty, empathy, respect and social justice

· Promote greater awareness and understanding of children’s rights

· Support children who want to become children’s human rights defenders

· Speak up about the Unfeartie role and spread the message about how to join our movement

As highlighted by Rona Blackwood and Chelsea Stinson from Children’s Parliament in the call to action, “many adults – from community workers and school bus drivers through to police officers and politicians – are Unfearties in practice and take every step they can to uphold children’s rights”. Juliet Harris, Together’s Director, reemphasised the need for full incorporation of children’s rights as outlined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child into domestic law to make children’s rights binding and not guiding.

Read the full ‘call to action’ here.
Learn more and become an Unfeartie here.

A further 24 calls are being launched during October including those from Together’s members, the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland, respect me and Starcatchers. All 25 calls to action are featured in the Children in Scotland’s October-November 2018 edition of their bi-monthly magazine. Together provided editorial support to this special anniversary edition to highlight how each call to action is underpinned by specific articles of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.