In too many places the law neglects the fact that children are full human beings with human rights. Those rights include the right to develop your own beliefs and make your own choices as you increase in maturity. It also means children deserve protection from all forms of violence and harassment. Our support for children’s rights underpins much of our policy relating to schools and pupils’ freedom of thought.
In many areas, the UK does not comply with its treaty obligations to children’s rights. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child identified children being forced to pray in schools, and the near-total segregation of children by religion in Northern Ireland as key failings.
We strongly endorse the specific wording and background principles of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). We’ve argued the treaty should be made directly enforceable in our own laws.
I think, at a child’s birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift would be curiosity.
If the child’s future is left open as much as possible for his own finished self to determine, the fortunate adult that emerges will already have achieved, without paradox, a certain amount of self-fulfilment.
