Blog Series: The #UNCRCScotland Act in Practice

Together (Scottish Alliance for Children’s Rights) is publishing a blog series throughout August and September to mark one year since the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Incorporation) (Scotland) Act 2024 came into force on 16 July 2024. This is a moment to celebrate and reflect on all the children, young people, members, professionals and adults who continue to dedicate their time to help make children’s human rights a reality. The commencement of the Act was a historic milestone, but there is still some way to go until all babies, children and young people’s human rights are fully respected, protected, and fulfilled. Together is committed to providing organisations with practical guidance on how to protect children’s rights through their work and sharing evidence of the Act in practice, so we can continually learn and improve implementation.

One way of thinking about this is by through a Children’s Human Rights Approach. A Children’s Human Rights Approach is simple tool about how to put children’s human rights into practice. Together often hears from members and others that while they understand children’s rights, sometimes they can feel a bit intangible in terms of what this looks and feels like in practice. A Children’s Human Rights Approach offers a practical way to implement children’s human rights in your work.

Developed by the Welsh Observatory for the Human Rights of Children, a Children’s Human Rights Approach is a set of five principles to help consider how your work can support children’s rights. You can read more about its design here.

Embedding – Putting children’s rights at the core of decision making, working practice, planning, reporting, and the delivery of services that affect children and young people.

Equality and non-discrimination – Ensuring that every child and young person has what they need so that they have equal opportunity to fulfil their potential.

Empowerment – Building the agency and capacity of children and young people as rights-holders to claim their rights.

Participation – Listening to children and young people and taking their views seriously, as covered by article 12 of the UNCRC.

Accountability – Delivering a proactive culture of everyday responsibility for children’s rights across services, including in decision making. Taking steps to monitor children’s rights standards and provide remedies where there is failure to meet these standards.

Together asked five organisations to provide an overview of their Children’s Human Rights Approach in Practice.

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