“International Expert Consultation on Prevention of and Response to Violence against Young Children”

Last week, 67 experts from 20 countries met in Lima, Peru, to discuss how to accelerate progress against violence in the earliest years of a child’s life.

The meeting was convened by the UN Secretary General’s Special Representative for Violence Against Children, Marta Santos Pais, and hosted by the Peruvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.  7200 people from more than 15 countries watched the proceedings as they unfolded on the internet.  Among them, a parent looking for advice, a doctor looking for ideas, staff from NGOs and international organizations, and my mother.

The Brighter Futures Programme in Birmingham – An inspiring initiative with good results and failures.…

In 2006 a National legislation came into force emphasising that Every child matters and better outcomes for children. This encompassed a restructuring of the system merging the education and social work departments into the National Children’s centres.

Birmingham counts over a million people and is challenged by a high unemployment rate (30%), 30% lone parents, 23% of the population below 16 years old, 30% of the people from minority ethnic communities and 1900 children in care.

In line with the changes in national legislation, senior managers of all Birmingham’s children’s services agencies were brought together in a cross agency Children and Young People’s Board. This collaboration has led towards the Brighter Futures Programme which is a long term strategy for improving children’s outcomes.

The  Brighter Futures Programme was designed to measurably improve the physical health behaviour, emotional health, literacy and numeracy, and social literacy of Birmingham’s children over a five year period starting in 2008.

Tanzanian Diary – Violence Against Children

Violence Against Children

All Hands on Deck! This was the cry from the government ministries working together to reduce violence in children’s lives. And for good reason. Tanzania is one of only two countries ever to study violence in children’s lives and the results of the research are not pretty. The prevalence of violence is shockingly high. 75% of children report experiencing physical violence.One in three girls and one in seven boys reported experiencing sexual violence and emotional violence is prevalent amongst 25 to 30% of children.

In Tanzania violence is perpetrated by teachers, close relatives and many adults who have authority over children.Violence begets violence. The impacts of violence against children are lifelong.The single greatest predictor of a violent adult is a child witnessing violence against his or her mother. Violence in childhood often results in early heart disease, difficulties living within the parameters of law, a perpetual cycle of violence transmitted from generation to generation within the household, and physical and emotional impairment.