Blog by Maya Richardson, 20/11/2023  

On the 34th anniversary of the UN General Assembly’s adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), we reflect on the importance of children’s rights as a cross-cutting concern in research and policymaking. Far from confined to the realm of education or healthcare, children’s rights are impacted by developments in many of the fields covered by Miller Research’s work.  

Wales & the UNCRC 

The Welsh Government enshrined the UNCRC in domestic law in the Rights of Children and Young Persons (Wales) 2011, making it the first UK nation to do so. Since then, Wales has established a relatively strong track record of taking a child rights lens to social protections and other policymaking, with the Wellbeing of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 serving as a flagship policy for all public bodies[1] in Wales and First Minister Mark Drakeford having argued that children’s rights are one “thread” which has run through every administration in Wales since 1999[2]. Last month, Cardiff secured the title of the UK’s first UNICEF Child Friendly City[3], recognising five years of effort to ensure “all children – whether they are living in care, using a children’s centre, or simply visiting their local library – have a meaningful say in, and truly benefit from, the local decisions, services and spaces that shape their lives.”[4] Aiming to empower children and young people with the knowledge of their unique rights, the Curriculum for Wales requires schools to offer children opportunities to develop their understanding of the UNCRC, as well as the rights of themselves and their peers.[5] This is just a snapshot of some of the key policies across Wales which reflect its alignment with the UNCRC. 

Challenges to Children’s Rights  

While the UNCRC is the most widely ratified human rights treaty in history, endorsement of the rights it outlines is not necessarily a given. A main point of controversy is children’s right to be involved in making decisions about their own future, particularly in how this is perceived to conflict with the rights of parents. This is one of the reasons the United States stands almost alone in its failure to ratify the UNCRC, and even in areas where a children’s rights rhetoric is largely accepted, implementation is still incomplete.[6] 

In Wales, the Office of the Children’s Commissioner highlighted child poverty and the climate emergency as two of the key issues threatening children’s standard of living in Wales.[7] Moreover, a recent Public Health Wales webinar comprehensively outlined the harms caused by the cost-of-living crisis to many aspects of child protection and wellbeing through child poverty.[8] Children are living in poverty even in working households, and the cost-of-living crisis and concerns around fuel poverty are impacting child health and hygiene, as well as parent mental health and the wider context within which children are growing up. An updated Child Poverty Strategy is currently under development in Welsh Government, with the consultation on its key objectives having occurred earlier this year.[9]  

While the principles of children’s rights have been adopted in many parts of the Welsh policy system, these need further embedding and mainstreaming. The 2022 evaluation of The Right Way (TRW), the Children’s Commissioner’s approach to embedding children’s rights into decision making, policy, and practice concludes that practical use of TRW is inconsistent, with “motivation to use TRW…down to chance” and competing demands such as agendas of senior political officers.[10] It identified a need to link TRW with the “driving factors” that impact and direct work on a day-to-day basis, and to further promote the resource particularly in sectors whose main focus is not children’s rights.  

Miller Research & Children’s Rights 

At Miller Research, we seek to take a holistic and person-centred approach to research and evaluation, with children and young people at the heart of many projects and impacted by many others. With the importance of child rights in mind for all sectors, we try to consider how we can foreground the following principles in our work. 

• Person-centred (and where relevant, child-centred) approaches
  While public policies and services all operate within their unique sets of constraints, it is often relevant to consider the extent to which they are able to address and adapt to the unique needs and circumstances of individuals. In our work on education and early years, this often means considering any adverse or disproportionate impacts of policies on children with additional learning needs, for example.  
• Meaningful participation for those impacted by our work
  As researchers, this means offering opportunities for impacted communities to have their voice heard – for example, through interviews and focus groups. In our work with education, early years, and social justice, this often involves engagement with children and young people themselves, and we are constantly considering the best ways to do this within individual project contexts and more broadly.   
• Long-term perspectives
  While individual projects may not all include or directly impact children, much of our work seeks to promote sustainability, justice, and inclusion – an attempt to make the world friendlier and more accommodating to all children over time.  

[1] https://www.childcomwales.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/AmbitionToAction_ENG.pdf  

[2] https://childrenslegalcentre.wales/why-does-wales-have-stronger-laws-on-childrens-rights-than-england/  

[3] https://www.unicef.org.uk/press-releases/cardiff-becomes-first-city-in-the-uk-to-achieve-unicef-child-friendly-city-status/  

[4] https://www.unicef.org.uk/child-friendly-cities/about-child-friendly-cities-communities/  

[5] https://hwb.gov.wales/curriculum-for-wales/humanities/designing-your-curriculum  

[6] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1744-1617.2007.00183.x  

[7] https://www.childcomwales.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/CCFW-Annual-Report-and-Accounts-22-23.pdf  

[8] https://publichealthnetwork.cymru/event/children-and-the-cost-of-living-crisis-in-wales/#event_evaluation  

[9] https://www.gov.wales/draft-child-poverty-strategy-wales-2023#:~:text=Consultation%20description,including%20those%20with%20protected%20characteristics.  

[10] https://www.childcomwales.org.uk/resources/the-right-way-a-childrens-rights-approach/