A draft version of a comprehensive, eight-year national children’s policy was launched by the Family Minister in conjunction with the Children’s Commissioner. Its vision is for “Children [to be] respected, protected and have their rights fulfilled… for children’s voices to be heard, their opinions and ideas considered and supported so that they may grow to realise their full potential”.
The proposed policy is aimed at bolstering existing programmes and strategies and giving children more rights. The long-term goals seek to ensure that Malta has an active and healthy generation growing up to be independent and responsible adults and becoming full participants in the community.
Over the short-term, the goal is for children to live an active and healthy lifestyle, live in a safe and economically stable family environment, achieve their full potential in education and, later, employment and are respected and enabled to participate fully in society.
The key areas identified as being of the utmost importance to a child’s life in meeting these long- and short-term goals were four: health and environment; family and relationships; education and development; community and the State.
The research done identified a number of key emerging trends that now affected children as a result of lone parent families, reconstituted families following marriage breakdowns, mixed race families and same-sex parents.
The document analyses the four key areas and makes conclusions and recommendations on the way ahead.
The key area that deals with health and environment has resulted in 23 recommendations, which range from providing children with knowledge about healthy lifestyle choices to tackling social media addiction.
Another 23 policy recommendations are made with regard to family relationships. These range from addressing the reintegration of homeless families and individuals to strengthening child protection to curb all forms of abuse.
In the case of education and development - the third key area - 29 proposals were made. These cover policy recommendations for increased opportunities for job placements, providing induction courses for foreign families to enable children to integrate more easily and strengthening the provision of pre- and after-school programmes.
The final key area, dealing with community and State, comes up with 28 policy recommendations. These include seeing that children’s views presented at policy forums are taken properly into account, addressing the vexed issue of ever-increasing informal adoption and ensuring children’s safety at all times. It also deals with voting rights and proposes extending these to all 16-year-olds.
The overall aim of the national policy is for the 103 recommendations made to be implemented and effective up to the year 2024.
The policy document is clearly a most comprehensive piece of work that sets out a progressive wish list for improvement in this vital area of national life for the next eight years.
While the sentiments, objectives and the thrust of the recommendations cannot be faulted, the document appears to lack one vital ingredient for success: a comprehensive action plan.
While most of what is being proposed requires legislative action affecting other ministries, this is inevitably a slow process. The danger is that without a comprehensive action plan – and clear accountability - the national policy, while worthy, will only partially be achieved.