Child Friendly Cities

and Communities

Barbara Lambourn

National Advocacy Manager

The UN Mandates UNICEF to advocate for children’s rights,

interests and healthy development - the UN Convention on the

Rights of the Child as platform.

NZ signed UNCROC in 1993

Govt. reports every 5 years

• Nov 2008 - Last report submitted

• Feb 2011 - Govt. examination

• Feb 2011 - Recommendations

received from UN Committee for

Children

Child Friendly Cities

Our Mission:

That every city and community

in New Zealand has a

Child Friendly agenda by 2020.

Child Friendly Cities

“A Child Friendly City is a local system of good

governance committed to fulfilling children's rights.

The voices, needs, priorities and rights of children

are an integral part of public policies, programmes

and decisions.

As a result, it is a city that is fit for all.”

Child Friendly Cities Director, Innocenti Centre, Florence

Why? • It is their right-all organisations concerned with children must work towards their best interests.

• Children have their own culture, world view, understandings, needs and opinions - they are not just small adults.

• Children are active and important consumers of local government services. They live in streets and houses, attend schools, use community facilities eg transport, cycle ways, walkways, parks, pools, libraries.

• Local Councils have obligations to implement children's rights

UNCROC: relevant Articles

Children have rights to:

12: say what they think when decisions affect them

and have their opinions taken into account

13: get and share information

24: good quality health care, clean water, nutritious

food, and a clean environment

27: a standard of living good enough to meet their

physical and mental needs

31: relax, play and join a wide range of activities

You are only a child once

How we treat the child the child will treat the world.

Teacher’s story

We were doing maths and a five year-old girl called out “Look, an elephant.”

I knew she was imaginative so I said: “Hey, pay attention. What is three plus two?”

She said: “No look! An elephant.”

I was not going to fall for that old trick and turn around.

“Come on”. I said: “Let’s concentrate on our sums”.

She ran to the window behind me. I turned and there was a real, large, elephant walking past the classroom. A circus was setting up on the grounds next to the school.

Lesson learned: We spend a lot of time ignoring the elephant walking past. We need to listen more and take seriously what children observe and tell us.

Child Friendly Cities

Where did we start in NZ??? 2006... Awareness raising:

- Forums/seminars to Mayors, councillors, child advocates and communities

- Visit by CFC International Director Christoph Baker

- Network of academics, activists, advocates and interest groups - building and sharing Information Bank

- Child Impact Assessment trials

- Submissions to Council long term plans

- UNCROC and Local Authority research and publication position paper

Child Friendly Cities

UNCROC and Local Government

- No explicit legislation requires NZ Councils to recognise UNCROC in governance, planning or to report on compliance

- UNICEF NZ argues that Councils are “agents of the State” – derive powers from central government therefore bound by UNCROC

- Supported by UN CRC in Concluding Observations to NZ Government (Feb 2011) after submission of NZ 5 - yearly periodic report

LGA 2002: S.14

Local Government in NZ is obliged to:

• Make itself aware of, and have regard to, the

views of all its communities

• Take account of future and current communities

when making decisions

• Take account of the reasonably foreseeable

needs of future generations when taking a

sustainable development approach

Child Friendly Cities

What underpins a CFC agenda?

- Child Rights

- Sustainability

- Cultural diversity and biodiversity

- Think globally, act locally

- Good governance

- Citizenship

- Participation

Childrens Rights in the context of

• Climate change

• Increasing urbanisation

• Industrial expansion

• Economic recession

Child-Friendly Cities: 9 Building blocks

1. Childrens Participation: promoting active involvement of children in

issues affecting them, listening, taking their views into account in decision making

2. A Child Friendly Legal Framework: ensuring legislation,

regulatory frameworks and procedures which consistently promote and protect the

rights of all children

3. A City-wide Children’s Rights Strategy: developing a

detailed, comprehensive strategy or agenda for building a Child Friendly City, based

on the UNCROC

4. A Children’s Rights/Issues Unit or Coordinating

Mechanism: developing permanent structures in local government to ensure

consideration of children’s perspective

5. Child Impact Assessment and Evaluation: ensuring a

systematic process is in place to assess the impact of law, policy and practice on

children - in advance, during and after implementation

Child-Friendly Cities

6. A Children’s Budget: ensuring adequate resource commitment and budget

analysis for children

7. A Regular State of the City’s Children Report: ensuring

sufficient monitoring and data collection on the state of children and their rights

8. Making Children’s Rights Known: ensuring awareness of children’s

rights among adults and children

9. Independent Advocacy for Children: supporting

nongovernmental organisations and independent human rights institutions - children’s

ombudspeople or commissioners for children – to promote children’s rights

The nine building blocks(contd.)

Child Friendly Cities

UNICEF NZ’s Role:

- Provide leadership, information, incentive, access to expertise

- Mobilise and inform champions in government and non-government agencies, academia, education and business sectors, institutions and communities to take up CFC agenda

- Promote benefits of CFC to decision makers and champions

Child Friendly Cities

Auckland • NZ’s largest, most multi-

cultural, economically advantaged city

• 5 cities became 1 “Super-City” in 2010

• Planning now for 2040 vision “world’s most liveable city”

• Children and young people as Strategic Priority Number 1 in the Discussion Document

HOORAY!!!

Child Friendly Cities Recognition of Disparities Like any large city, inequalities between

children of rich and children of poor suburbs

UNICEF NZ promotes the CFC agenda to address disparities and

unleash the potential for every child to be a

contributing, productive citizen

A child-friendly city and community has: • Child friendly schools

• Baby and child friendly hospitals and health care

• Child friendly sports and leisure facilities and child friendly public spaces

• Child friendly mobility arrangements

• A sustainable environment

• Inter-generational and multi-cultural relationships

• Means and tools to implement child rights

• Warning systems on violence, exploitation,marginalization

• Policies against discrimination and exclusion

• Good monitoring tools on the condition of childhood and adolescence (State of City’s Children Report)

Child-Friendly Cities

A CFC agenda includes:

• Housing: children’s living and playing spaces - development, building, standards, safety

• Transport: children moving around the city - public and private transport, walking, cycling, skating...bus and train shelters/terminals, airports

• Events: children participating in city-sponsored festivals, concerts, special events, media programmes...

• Facilities: natural and built features: trees, rivers, walkways, bridges, fountains, pools, parks, public halls and community centres, toilets...places for kids to congregate

• Business and retail: Child Friendly supermarkets, shops, outdoor markets, car yards, construction sites,

• Commercial premises: Child Friendly spaces in banks, offices, government departments...

• People: drivers, pedestrians, park staff, traffic wardens, police, city officials, librarians, restaurant, cafe and shop staff

• Back-room services: rubbish disposal, sewage ponds,

waste-water treatment, waste management, cleaning routines, animal control...

What’s it like to be a child here?

Child Friendly Cities

A CFC agenda benefits the whole population: • Informed participants - democracy, citizenship, city planning and

development

• Rights appreciation - all sectors. Caring for the common good.

• Better multi-generational, multi-cultural and cross-sectoral relationships

• Tourist, retail sectors can capitalise on the ideas

• Discovering and learning - about their city: geography, settlement, environment, facilities, history and future

• Environmental responsibility - eg less vandalism

• Cost savings - better decision making

• Children grow being valued, respected and important in the scheme of their city

Pride in their city – spin-offs for all sectors

Examples • London, Auvergne

– free buses

• Italy – planning laboratories in

schools, mapping neighbourhoods, adopt a monument

• Europe – Mayors as champions

for children

• What do you see?

“Parks and play areas should not be physically separated from other public spaces, but rather incorporated into the fabric of the city (climbable art, outdoor seating that doubles as a climbing frame, public amenities like libraries, law courts, hospitals etc. all providing safe but enticing play spaces).”

Claire Freeman

Child Friendly Cities NZ

• An application for engagement with the UNICEF CFCI, and a statement of intent

• Development and submission of a portfolio of local level data (self assessment of CF status)

• A plan of action and budget, based on the data, carried out and monitored

A journey not a destination

• Building a child friendly city is an on-going, evolving process. Needs and ideas change over time.

• Children are the most precious, vital components of a thriving, vibrant, forward looking and sustainable city.

Child Friendly Cities

around the world

Italy, Spain, France, Brazil, South Africa, Slovenia,

Switzerland, Palestine, Ukraine, the Philippines, UK,

Japan, Australia and …

New Zealand?!

Can we do it? Whangarei leads the way!

Wise words

“Human skills, knowledge, creativity and time, along with

wisdom to use resources in the community effectively

and appropriately are basic to a successful child friendly

approach.” Dennis McKinlay, Executive Director, UNICEF NZ

Child-Friendly Cities

www.childfriendlycities.org

www.unicef.org

www.unicef.org.nz

barbara@unicef.org.nz