What will the Freedom Bill do for children?

PRESS RELEASE
 
8 July 2010
 
What will the Freedom Bill do for children?

Today, the Children’s Rights Alliance for England (CRAE) launches a consultation with its members – including children – to find out which laws they can’t wait to remove to benefit children and young people, and which laws they’d like to see put in place to reinstate lost rights.
 
Sam Dimmock, Head of Policy and Public Affairs, said of the consultation: ‘Children have been among the biggest losers in the erosion of civil liberties over recent years, and very little action has been taken to halt this. It is crucial that children’s rights advocates – including children themselves – come together to ensure the Freedom Bill strengthens the rights of children in UK law and protects the civil liberties of the most vulnerable in our society. Giving our members the opportunity to tell us what laws they want to bin to protect children’s rights will help us ensure that the Freedom Bill benefits people of all ages’.
 
As well as covering key concerns such as the retention of children’s data on the National DNA database and the proliferation of low-level offences, CRAE’s survey considers other provisions that have negatively affected children’s civil liberties, including the disproportionate use of anti-social behaviour measures against children, fines for parents of under-10s, the use of custody for breaching an ASBO, the retention of the parental right to hit children, laws allowing schools to search children without consent, house arrest for excluded school students, different minimum wage levels based on age, and legislation that allows disabled children to be kept out of mainstream education to protect the “efficient education” of others.
 
A call will also go out to CRAE’s young activists to take up the Deputy Prime Minister’s challenge to have their say and be insistent about their rights by providing evidence about where they feel their civil liberties are endangered or where their rights are being violated. Children’s evidence, along with suggestions from CRAE members, will drive our work on the Freedom Bill in the autumn.
 
CRAE’s consultation will run until 8 August 2010.

More details

Contact Sam Dimmock on 020 7278 8222 extension 23 or at sdimmock@crae.org.uk

Editors’ notes
1. The Children’s Rights Alliance for England (CRAE) seeks the full implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which was ratified by the UK with cross-party support in December 1991. We are one of the largest children’s rights coalitions in the world and our membership includes all the main children’s charities in England.

2. CRAE’s consultation on the Freedom Bill – What would you bin or save for children’s rights? ­– can be accessed at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/SF9DYJC.

3. In commenting on the coalition Government’s call to the public on the Freedom Bill, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said: ‘What I find especially exciting about this project is that the debate is totally out of Government’s control. Real democracy is unspun. So be demanding about your liberty, be insistent about your rights. This is about your freedom and this is your chance to have your say’.

4. CRAE’s 2010 children’s rights conference will focus on protecting and promoting children’s civil liberties. It takes place on Friday 19 November at the Oval Conference Centre in London.

5. Following the recent decision by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe to recommend prohibition of electronic devices which emit a high-pitched noise to deter under-25s from using public spaces and facilities, CRAE wrote to the Deputy Prime Minister urging him to announce a ban would be included in the Freedom Bill.

 

PRESS RELEASE
 
8 July 2010
 
What will the Freedom Bill do for children?

 

Today, the Children’s Rights Alliance for England (CRAE) launches a consultation with its members – including children – to find out which laws they can’t wait to remove to benefit children and young people, and which laws they’d like to see put in place to reinstate lost rights.
 
Sam Dimmock, Head of Policy and Public Affairs, said of the consultation: ‘Children have been among the biggest losers in the erosion of civil liberties over recent years, and very little action has been taken to halt this. It is crucial that children’s rights advocates – including children themselves – come together to ensure the Freedom Bill strengthens the rights of children in UK law and protects the civil liberties of the most vulnerable in our society. Giving our members the opportunity to tell us what laws they want to bin to protect children’s rights will help us ensure that the Freedom Bill benefits people of all ages’.
 
As well as covering key concerns such as the retention of children’s data on the National DNA database and the proliferation of low-level offences, CRAE’s survey considers other provisions that have negatively affected children’s civil liberties, including the disproportionate use of anti-social behaviour measures against children, fines for parents of under-10s, the use of custody for breaching an ASBO, the retention of the parental right to hit children, laws allowing schools to search children without consent, house arrest for excluded school students, different minimum wage levels based on age, and legislation that allows disabled children to be kept out of mainstream education to protect the “efficient education” of others.
 
A call will also go out to CRAE’s young activists to take up the Deputy Prime Minister’s challenge to have their say and be insistent about their rights by providing evidence about where they feel their civil liberties are endangered or where their rights are being violated. Children’s evidence, along with suggestions from CRAE members, will drive our work on the Freedom Bill in the autumn.
 
CRAE’s consultation will run until 8 August 2010.

 

More details
020 7278 8222
07949 434 787

Editors’ notes
1. The Children’s Rights Alliance for England (CRAE) seeks the full implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which was ratified by the UK with cross-party support in December 1991. We are one of the largest children’s rights coalitions in the world and our membership includes all the main children’s charities in England.
 
2. CRAE’s consultation on the Freedom Bill – What would you bin or save for children’s rights? ­– can be accessed at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/SF9DYJC.

 
3. In commenting on the coalition Government’s call to the public on the Freedom Bill, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said: ‘What I find especially exciting about this project is that the debate is totally out of Government’s control. Real democracy is unspun. So be demanding about your liberty, be insistent about your rights. This is about your freedom and this is your chance to have your say’.

4. CRAE’s 2010 children’s rights conference will focus on protecting and promoting children’s civil liberties. It takes place on Friday 19 November at the Oval Conference Centre in London.

                                                                                                                                                                                          

5. Following the recent decision by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe to recommend prohibition of electronic devices which emit a high-pitched noise to deter under-25s from using public spaces and facilities, CRAE wrote to the Deputy Prime Minister urging him to announce a ban would be included in the Freedom Bill.