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Thórhildur Líndal ENOC’S ANNUAL MEETING BRUSSELS,
2 – 4 OCTOBER 2002
The Office of the Ombudsman for Children in Iceland
As
has been the case for the past several years, the Office of the Ombudsman for
Children in Iceland is staffed by a full-time specialist and a part-time (85%)
office manager, in addition to myself, the Ombudsman for Children. Repeated
requests for increased funding to the Office have not gotten the desired result;
thus it has not been possible to hire additional employees, though the need is
acute. The number of cases handled by the Office has, on the other hand,
increased steadily and considerably, particularly in the form of written
requests for assistance that are received via e-mail. The very nature of such written requests makes them more
time-consuming to answer than are telephone requests, which generally can be
handled with verbal instruction. Children usually make contact with the Office
by e-mail. Written
requests reached a new high of 172 in the year 2001. In comparison, written
requests totalled 120 in the year 2000 and 41 in 1998. The number of requests
originating abroad doubled between 2000 and 2001. The
number of verbal/telephone requests – approximately 1000 per year – has
remained roughly constant in recent years. The most common scenario is that a
person or referring organisation will make contact with the Office in the wake
of family problems such as separation or divorce. Issues relating to school are
also numerous; i.e., regarding ostracism and/or persecution (often referred to
as bullying), special education for children with special needs, school bus
service, and in-school meals. Issues centring on the need for improvement in the
area of child protection and welfare are common as well, such as the rights of
both foster children and children dwelling in publicly subsidised treatment
homes. Matters relating to the health care system, including children’s mental
health, have also increased in number. As
has always been the case, our experience is that the requests directed to the
Office concern individual children. Though the Ombudsman for Children does not
have the authority to deal with disputes between individuals, the Office makes a
supreme effort to give advice and instruction to all those who seek it.
Moreover, many of these individual cases have a certain general applicability in
one way or another, and the fact remains that numerous issues that I have
addressed publicly were originally brought to my attention as personal matters
relating to individual children. The Office’s Chief Projects
for the Year 2002:
ü
Annual report for the year
2001 The
annual report on my work for the year 2001 has recently been issued. This report
receives wide-spread circulation and is addressed to the Prime Minister, with
whom I then meet to discuss the year’s events, the progress made, and the
things that need to be accomplished
or improved. At the outset, I decided that the annual report should be detailed
and thorough, as I believed that this would strengthen the foundations of the
Office. The annual report has always received a great deal of attention in the
press, and many of the subjects addressed therein have awakened both curiosity
and general interest in children’s issues on the part of the public. ü
Advisory
classes I have actively sought out collaboration with children in the middle
years of primary school – that is, 10-
to 12-year-olds – and have asked a group of children of this age to be my
advisors concerning various issues. This experimental project is scheduled to
begin next month and is to last through the end of the current school year. The
teachers of these so-called advisory classes will be important liaisons between
myself and the students and will, among other things, act as intermediaries by
relaying my questions to the classes. No questions will be asked about delicate
personal problems that the children might have; the emphasis will instead be on
general issues concerning their attitudes toward various aspects of their lives
and environment; for example, about school and recreational activities. This
project is one of several methods that I am using in order to promote publicly
the provisions of Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of
the Child. ü
Youth
NetParliament – the Ombudsman for Children’s 2001 youth assembly During
the 1999-2000 school year, I launched an experimental project called
NetParliament – the Ombudsman for Children’s youth assembly. As the name
implies, this Parliament takes place on the Internet, and it involves the
participation of 63 representatives (thus the number of representatives is the
same as the number of members of Althing, the Icelandic Parliament, and the
geographical distribution of representatives is the same as that in the Althing).
It was decided to hold another NetParliament in the year 2001. This was
accomplished and the Parliament structured in a similar way, except that the age
of the representatives was 16-18 (representatives at the first NetParliament
were aged 12-15). Weekly Internet meetings were held in October 2001, and the
Parliament’s work took place in five committees that were selected at the
beginning of the Assembly. Discussions took place in closed Internet chat rooms.
The conclusions drawn by the Parliament were delivered to the Minister of
Education, Science, and Culture at the NetParliament’s final session, which
was a public meeting open to members of the press. Since the close of the
NetParliament, the Office of the Ombudsman for Children has done extensive work
to publicise the conclusions of the Assembly. Parties whose interests include
children’s issues – i.e., representatives of Government ministries,
institutions, and non-governmental organisations – were sent letters inviting
them to meet with me and discuss children’s issues, including the problems
pointed out by the NetParliament’s representatives and the possible ways in
which to solve them. I have monitored the development of these issues closely,
as I consider it of paramount importance that children and youth rest assured
that their opinions are listened to – that their opinions matter. Various
positive trends have developed as a result of my involvement in the issues thus
brought to the surface. ü
Song
dedicated to Icelandic youth The NetParliament’s final session was also the forum for the premiere
of a new song composed by a well-known Icelandic musician who wrote the song at
my request and dedicated it to Icelandic youth. A compact disc containing this
song has been distributed to all of the NetParliament representatives, among
other recipients. The song is performed by an 18-year-old young woman and bears
the title Pray for Peace. The text is
available in English translation. ü
SafeChat
– collaborative project During the fall of 2001, I participated in a collaborative project along
with representatives of the Reykjavík City Police, the National Commissioner of
the Icelandic Police, the Reykjavík educational authorities, and others,
concerning security in Internet chat rooms. The vastly increased use and
ownership of personal computers in Iceland has simultaneously increased
children’s access to computers and the Internet, with the inevitable result
that children are more vulnerable to exposure to Websites that are not intended
for children or are grossly inappropriate for them. As has often come to light
in the press, the danger lurks especially in Internet chat rooms. For this
reason, it was considered timely to prepare a poster and brochure that draw
public attention to the obvious dangers that can accompany the use of chat
rooms. The poster points out various things that children should always have in
mind when they use chat rooms, including the necessity to avoid giving out
personal information about themselves before an adult has determined the
identity of the other party to the conversation. The poster has been distributed
to all of the primary schools in the country, as well as to other recipients. ü
18-Year
Guarantee – collaborative project A group of individuals who work for various youth support organisations
in Iceland approached me with the desire to collaborate on the publication of an
advertisement. The objective of this advertisement was, first and foremost, to
awaken parents to the necessity to think seriously about their 18-year
responsibility toward their children. The advertisement, which appeared on the
Reykjavík city buses and elsewhere, contained the slogan 18-Year Guarantee –
Consideration, Respect, and Guidance Includedand appeared in two forms:
with a photograph of an infant and with a photograph of a 16-year-old. ü
Promotional
and educational work When I assumed the position of Iceland’s first Ombudsman for Children
in the beginning of 1995, one of my first projects was the preparation and
publication of a pair of informational pamphlets on the activities and scope of
this new office – one of the pamphlets was intended for adults, and the other
was written for my clients, Iceland’s children under the age of 18. These
brochures have been distributed annually to the various organisations and
institutions attended by children and have been systematically sent to all of
the schools in the country. In some cases, I have followed up by visiting the
schools. This past summer, I visited several pre-schools in order to familiarise
myself with the conditions of the children there and to tell the children about
the Office of the Ombudsman for Children. Thereafter, I visited several youth
recreation centres and decided, upon consideration of the pointers that the
young people gave me during those visits, to modify my methods of publicising
the Office. The result of the new publicity effort is a colourful poster that
makes reference to the role of the Ombudsman for Children. The poster shows a
flower that must be protected in order for it to grow and flourish; the sun,
which gives care in the form of light and warmth; and a rainbow, where dreams
can become a reality. The original picture was the work of a 10-year-old girl,
and the poster will be distributed at the end of this month. ü
The
right of children to the protection of privacy, cf. Article 16 of the
United Nations Convention on the Rights of Children, and the right to
confidentiality on the part of public employees Next month, I will present a public report that I have had prepared on
the above topics, as I am convinced that children’s rights to privacy and
confidentiality are not well enough protected in Icelandic legislation. ü
Comments
on the Child Protection Bill and the draft of a Bill in Respect of Children Work
on the comprehensive re-evaluation of these two important laws has been underway
in recent months. The new Child Protection Act entered into force on June 1,
2002. I submitted a detailed discussion of the Child Protection Bill in 2001
after having presented my comments during the early stages of the Bill’s
preparation. Numerous innovations that are found in the new legislation are
based, at least in part, on my comments and requests; for example, the change
that allows a child aged 15 or older to be a party to a child protection case.
The re-evaluation of the Law in Respect of Children is still in progress, and I
have submitted detailed comments on the draft of the new Bill to the legislative
committee in question. It is expected that the Bill in Respect of Children will
be presented at the Parliamentary session this fall. ü
Comments
made by the Ombudsman for Children to the United Nations Committee on the Rights
of the Child
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Last edited by Barneombudet November 12, 2002 |