The UK Government signed up to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) in 1991 and has to report at regular intervals to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child about how the Convention is being implemented in the UK.

As part of the alternative reporting process to the Monitoring Committee Stop, Look, Listen: the road to realising children’s rights in Wales was published in November 2007 by the UNCRC Monitoring Group, which works together to ensure the effective co-ordination of the monitoring of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child in Wales. Children in Wales is an active member of this group.

The report revealed that Wales has progressed significantly on children’s rights but that more needs to be done. (In March 2009, the Welsh Assembly Government published Taking the Right Road, as a response to the report.)

Stop, Look, Listen was submitted in 2008 to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child for their periodic examination of the UK State party, along with the following reports:

• Rights in Action (2007) - This is the Welsh Assembly Government’s progress report on implementing the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The report focuses on progress made since the UN last considered the UK’s progress on implementing the Convention in 2002.
• Why do Ages Go Up and Not Down (ages 7-10) and Our Rights Our Story (ages 11-18) (2007) – These reports are the result of research by Funky Dragon which looked at the views of young people across Wales to see whether they felt they were receiving the rights laid out in the UNCRC and produced these reports.
• UK Children’s Commissioners Report to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (2008) – This report, drawn up by the four UK children’s commissioners, scrutinises the UK and devolved governments’ performance on children’s rights.
• UK Government the Consolidated 3rd and 4th Periodic Report to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (2007) - This report set out how the UK Government is fulfilling its obligations under the convention. The Department for Children, Schools and Families coordinated the writing of the report.

Following consideration of the evidence submitted, and an Oral Hearing at the UN in Geneva, the concluding observations of the Committee were published in October 2008. The Welsh Assembly Government worked with NGOs, children and young people and other partners to develop a joint action plan based on these concluding observations, Getting it right: a 5-year plan, which was published in November 2009.

Visit www.uncrcletsgetitright.co.uk for more information.

The UK must submit its fifth periodic report by 14 January 2014.

Resources

• 'Righting the Wrongs: the reality of children's rights in Wales'
• UNCRC Reporting in Wales Update July 2006
• UNCRC Monitoring Group Scoping Exercise