COMMITTEE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD REVIEWS REPORT OF THE SOLOMON ISLANDS

CRC
33rd session
26 May 2003




The Committee on the Rights of the Child today considered the initial report of the Solomon Islands on how it was implementing the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Dennie Iniakwala, Co-Chair of the National Advisory Committee on Children of the Solomon Islands and Under-Secretary for Health Improvement, Ministry of Health and Medical Services, said the socio-economic impact of the 1998-2001 ethnic conflict had been far reaching in terms of lack of funding for social services such as health care and education. Until such a time that the country could recover economically, support from international donor partners and communities would be of paramount importance to guarantee full realization of the obligations inherent to the Convention in the Solomon Islands.
Committee experts questioned the delegation, asking, among other things, what it would take to reverse the situation in the Solomon Islands; the nature, power and scope of the National Advisory Committee on Children; the difficulty of monitoring and compiling data and communication given the geographical and linguistic situation of the country; what efforts were being made to eliminate all forms of discrimination within society; issues linked to economic exploitation of children; and juvenile justice issues.
In preliminary concluding remarks, Committee Expert Ghalia Mohd Bin Hamad Al-Thani, who served as Rapporteur on the report of the Solomon Islands, said that many issues of concern had been addressed during the meeting, but it was hoped that these would be resolved in the long term. The Committee looked forward to the second report of the Solomon Islands to see what positive impact the initial document had had on its children.
The delegation of the Solomon Islands also included Anika Kingmele, Member of the National Advisory Committee on Children and Senior Crown Council, Attorney General Chamber, Ministry of Justice and Legal Affairs; and Afu Billy, Former Solomon Islands Country Programme Manager for Save the Children Australia and Member of the National Advisory Committee on Children, currently Regional Rights Resources Training Officer and representing non-governmental organizations.
The Committee will issue its final recommendations on the report of the Solomon Islands towards the end of its session, which concludes on 6 of June.
The Committee will reconvene at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, 27 May, to consider the second periodic report of the Libyan Arab Jamarhiya (CRC/C/93/Add.1).

Initial Report of the Solomon Islands
The report (CRC/C/51/Add.6) reviews general measures of implementation of the Convention, the definition of the child, general principles of the Convention, civil rights and freedoms, family environment and alternative care, basic health and welfare, education, leisure and cultural activities, and special protection measures taken in the Solomon Islands.
It says that the extended family system in the Solomon Islands is under pressure from socio-economic changes. Families are becoming more dependent on cash rather than on land with rich resources. Education is neither compulsory nor free. Educational opportunities for the girl child in a family are often subordinate to that of the boy, however this situation is beginning to change towards more equal opportunities. There are significant social problems emerging in the country, many of which affect young people, such as single teenage motherhood, sexually transmitted diseases, sexual and physical abuse, youth suicide, youth delinquency, and alcohol and drug abuse.
Rural-urban migration among the young and educated is a growing phenomenon, and those migrating from villages have to face conflicts between traditional and modern values. Frequently people are ill prepared to handle this conflict, and find they begin to indulge in unhealthy behaviour and lifestyles. Increasing divorce rates indicate a weakening of the traditional family unit upon which children depend for their security, and may be giving rise to the recent phenomenon of homeless children, and there is concern that this may grow more serious in the future. Considerable progress has, however, been made in improving the health status of children in the past decade. Mortality and morbidity from infectious diseases are decreasing, although acute respiratory infections, malaria and other infectious diseases remain important health problems for children in the Solomon Islands.

Presentation of Report

DENNIE INIAKWALA, Co-Chair of the National Advisory Committee on Children of the Solomon Islands, said the ethnic conflict of 1998-2001 had traumatized all Solomon Islanders, especially women and children, and had presented a new social, economic and political environment. The socio-economic impact of the conflict was far reaching in terms of lack of funding support for social services such as health care and education. The country was more reliant on support from donor countries and external sources, and lack of funding had led to shortages of basic medical supplies and education facilities, a situation in which implementation of the obligations of the Convention became very difficult.
Other major challenges that posed more long-term concerns for implementation of the Convention were lack of understanding of human rights among the general population; lack of disaggregated data and information specific to the Convention; lack of effective mechanisms and institutions to enforce the laws concerning children; a prevailing societal attitude towards children that adults should decide what was good for them; and a lack of Governmental tangible commitment and political will on issues such as providing financial allocations for specific child activities.
The positive efforts that had been made had collapsed, stalled or regressed due to the diversion of government priorities to the aftermath effect of the ethnic crisis. The country was now regarded by many as a nation in economic crisis. Until such a time that the country could recover economically, support from international donor partners and communities would be of paramount importance to guarantee full realization of the obligations inherent to the Convention in the Solomon Islands.

Questions on General Measures of Implementation; Definition of the Child
Committee Expert GHALIA MOHD BIN HAMAD AL-THANI, who acted as Rapporteur on the report of the Solomon Islands, said the report highlighted all the difficulties and concerns regarding the children of the Solomon Islands. The civil conflict had been taken into consideration, as had the financial situation and the geographical situation, all of which made it difficult to implement the Convention. Many questions would be asked with regard to progress in major areas, she said. It was notable that the Solomon Islands had not signed or ratified any of the other international instruments related to children, nor had it signed the two optional protocols of the Convention. Was there any political will towards signing these instruments, and were there any dissemination efforts with regard to the Convention, notably with regard to the 87 different languages spoken in the Solomon Islands.
Other Committee experts asked questions on such topics as the rule of law and constitutional reform in the Solomon Islands in the context of the conflict; capacity-building in the field of human rights; the introduction of necessary new laws in the context of juvenile justice; law enforcement activities in the context of the Convention; the extent of the power of the National Advisory Committee on Children and how it monitored children; what was being done to defend the children of the Solomon Islands; how the National Advisory Committee on Children was funded and who it reported to; why the Ministry for Children was abolished; whether it might be possible to reverse the current downward heading trends with regard to children and the tendency to disregard the Convention; the importance of English in far-flung islands and communication between the islands; and what would it take to reverse the situation to be more in favour of children and their plight in the context of the apparent lack of political will.

Response to Questions on General Measures of Implementation; Definition of the Child
Responding to the questions, the delegation of the Solomon Islands said the report tried to state real issues and the real situation, and this was why it was quite critical of the Government itself. The Ministry responsible for children’s issues had endorsed the report.
In terms of transmitting the information contained in the Convention to the general public, there was no intent of translating it into all the languages and dialects of the country, but it would be made available in two languages. Given the low incidence of literacy, the strategy was more one of role-playing and example in the community.
As for data, work was being done by the Data Office to centralize information, and this would be done with regard for children, with data collated from all available sources. This would improve implementation of the Convention.
The National Advisory Committee on Children mainly advised the Government on what was required and needed. Its establishment had been approved by the Cabinet in 1995, and it had no legal power to enforce certain things, and this had been noted as lacking during the process of reviewing how to strengthen the Committee and give it wider-reaching powers.
With regard to political will, the report was quite critical in a sense that there were issues that were important and this had been communicated by the National Advisory Committee on Children to the Government, but it had not been taken seriously. The Government needed to reform the system. A reorganization of the ministries had been carried out to make the country more economically viable, and despite representations, the Ministry for Children had been abolished. This was temporary, but the Ministry would not be re-established in the near future until the Government had the resources to do so.
It was correct that there was no specific funding for children’s programmes, but there was something in the current budget, an allocation for children and young people’s grants. However, this was very small. The budgets of certain ministries did provide for children, but disaggregating this information was very difficult. The very limited funding available for providing services to children was a matter for grave concern. There were Government or donor-funding partners who provided resources, but this was not necessarily focused on children. Many services were now externally funded, due to the lack of revenue from those sectors that provided income for the Government.
Legally, the delegation said, the country needed a review of current legislation. The Government had drafted a Child’s Rights Bill, in order to remedy the discrepancies between the various legislation. This incorporated the provisions of the Convention, and should ensure that children were further protected. If there were inconsistencies, the Convention would then prevail. The Bill was drafted so that the best interests of the child were paramount, and this concept had been taken on board by the courts in their judgments relating to children. As to the definition of the child, the object of the Bill was to implement the Convention, and what was in the Convention would become the law of the Solomon Islands. Currently, the Bill had not yet been adopted by Parliament, but had been circulated for comments. Hopefully, it would be tabled by Parliament in November 2003.
In response to further questions with regards to the current definition of the child and the various legal ages of responsibility, majority, and marriage, the delegation explained that in addition to the provisions of the law, there was also a Child Protection Bill that dealt with the inconsistencies of current legislation. This Bill was to address specifically what was not dealt with in the Child’s Rights Bill. But in general, where there were inconsistencies, the courts dealt with the matter until such time when it had been remedied by legislative forms.
The status of the child in the society of the Solomon Islands was that children were not important, and adults should make decisions for them. This was a primary cause for the difficulty in sensitizing society to the Convention. However in terms of access to basic services such as health, these were provided free at the point of delivery, to all including children. The Government was attempting to educate decision-makers such as traditional chiefs as to the rights of the child and that they should listen to the views of the young.
Getting wider society to understand the concept of human rights was a major challenge for the Government, and without this knowledge, it was difficult to develop the concept of children’s rights, and this was the case even within the Government itself and those working for it.

Questions on General Principles; Civil Rights and Freedoms; Family Environment and Alternative Care
The Rapporteur, Ms. Al-Thani asked for more details on, for example, how the Convention was coordinated and implemented in all the islands? Did the Government have good information on the geographical distribution of children, she asked, since this would ensure better coverage of their needs and rights. With regard to discrimination, there was concern for the girl child and her rights, and for disabled children; were these children marginalized? Further questions were asked on the practice of corporal punishment and what its legal status was, both in school and in the home, in a context of strong cultural violence, and how this could be changed. She also expressed concern for the strain that extended families were being put under, and for the potential disappearance of this form of family as prognosticated by the Government, asking what was being done to remedy this situation.
The Committee Experts also asked questions on such topics as civil rights and liberties notably in the context of registration and apparent problems of cooperation and even coordination; why there had been no decentralization of services such as health authorities; children’s participation in decision-making; the possibility of external monitoring; police violence against children and whether training was being done to combat this; rehabilitation of child criminals; gender discrimination with regard to custody of children; options for improving the level of attention paid to children’s opinions; discrimination between ethnic groups and against children born out of wedlock; which local authority had influence to protect children when the family could not do so; and which social services existed to support families.

Response to Questions on General Principles; Civil Rights and Freedoms; Family Environment and Alternative Care
Responding to the raised questions, the delegation said that with regard to the dissemination of information, given the geographical nature of the country, this was difficult. The idea now was to move towards decentralization as the Government was looking at giving provinces more power to manage their own affairs. Programmes and initiatives with regard to children would also be decentralized, and offices working with children would be moved closer to the communities to facilitate interaction. This was stipulated in the National Policy and Plan of Action. The majority of children were in the provinces, and were difficult to reach. Radio was used as an effective form of communication, and was being used to disseminate information.
Work was being done to improve birth and death registration at all levels, the delegation said.
With regard to child participation in the family or in the school there was still a large gap in which children’s views fell. However, some improvement was seen, and decisions within the family, especially within the working family, now seemed to be changing slightly. Family structure took an extended form in the Solomon Islands, and responsibility for the children lay on all adult members, however loosely related.
The National Children’s Policy had been updated recently. This Policy examined the plight of children in danger, made provisions for them, and set strategies for children as a whole. This was not a stand-alone Policy, but had cross-sectoral input, which ensured a wider dissemination of the plan of action contained within it. During consultations for its creation, children had been implicated in the drafting and their views had been brought into the consultation process. It also contained provisions for abused children.
With regard to corporal punishment, it had been banned since 1999, but implementation of the ban was patchy, and there was no way of verifying it. Help, said the delegation, was required on this topic. As for violence within the home, the Child Protection Bill aimed to give children a safe way out, since they could be removed from their parents with just cause.
As for discrimination, stereotypical gender roles had always been perceived as normal until the women’s movement and outside influences became common, at which point some came to realize that treating women and girls differently was unacceptable. School enrolments, previously lower for girls than for boys, had shown a marked increase, with almost an equal number of enrolments for girls and boys in primary schools. For secondary schools, this was different, since there were frequently more boarding schools (necessary when a child must commute from another island) for boys than for girls, and this eliminated girls from secondary education to a wide extent.
Children with disabilities were a group within the community for whom it was difficult to formulate programmes. The Ministry of Health had a programme for these children to rehabilitate them into the community, but where these disabilities were severe, this was exceedingly problematic due to the lack of capacity. Work had been done on formulating a legislative framework that would help all sectors to address this issue. It was believed that the problem with discrimination was more related to the lack of capacity to help these children, and there was a considerable disparity between those in the community and those in medical centres with regard to the services provided to them.
As for ethnic discrimination, this was mainly related to unfair distribution of wealth, certain groups owning certain resources; hence the intention of the Government was to get more power down to the peripheral level. This had led to reviewing the national Constitution, giving people more possibilities of expressing their concerns. Children born out of wedlock suffered no discrimination within the family, but they did suffer some legal discrimination, but during the current Constitutional review this issue had been raised, and it should be remedied until Solomon Islands law was in line with the Convention.
Studies were being held on the current policies of the Government of the Solomon Islands in order to identify legislative changes, formulate new policies, and identify problems.
The extended family network was still extant in the villages, although less so in the cities, where this safety net for children was developing holes due to the greater cost of living in the towns.
There was no Government official record of incidents of torture, although reports of such had been provided unofficially. There was therefore no record that could be quantified to identify the number of people involved.

Questions on Basic Health and Welfare; Education, Leisure and Cultural Activities; Special Protection
Ms. Al-Thani, Rapporteur for the Solomon Islands, said she was not entirely satisfied with regard to the situation of children with disabilities, and believed that there was marked discrimination at many levels against them. The Committee had not sensed any serious efforts being made to provide children with disabilities with the bare minimum of requirements. Were any efforts being made at the level of the community to dispel this discrimination, she asked, and what was the form that that rehabilitation took. With regard to basic health, she asked how mortality rates were calculated with a lack of accurate information on deaths. She also asked how other similar health figures were calculated and whether they were correct, specifically in the case of HIV/AIDS, of which there was only one reported case since 1995. Further, what was being done to stem the rise of alcoholism, sexually transmitted diseases, teenage suicide, and teenage mothers.
The Experts also asked questions on such topics as ratification of international instruments on civil and political rights; child labour in the Solomon Islands; protecting children from economic exploitation; a possible re-activation of the Law Reform Commission; domestic workers, notably the phenomenon known as housegirls; juvenile justice; the Juvenile Court and whether the single court was sufficient; the minimum age of criminal responsibility; malnutrition figures in the report; imprisonment at the Governor General’s pleasure and whether this was unconstitutional; child prostitution; non-reporting as an obstacle for action; and the non-compulsory and fee-paying nature of education.

Response to Questions on Basic Health and Welfare; Education, Leisure and Cultural Activities; Special Protection
In response to the questions, the delegation of the Solomon Islands said that with regard to children with disabilities, this was a difficult area. Certain measures had been undertaken within the Ministry of Health, however there had recently been a shift towards an advocacy group that would support those with disabilities. The Disabled People Association for Solomon Islands had been formed in February 2003, and that body had been nominated by the Ministry of Health to receive funding assistance to help them in advocating and building capacity to help people with disabilities. A task force had been set up to identify the way forward for the disabled. Work was also being done to sensitise leaders towards seeing the disabled as persons rather than as statistics. Work was also being done in the community to provide support to the families of persons with disabilities, but this was deteriorating due to the lack of funds.
Health services provided had been gravely damaged by the ethnic conflict, and following the end of the conflict the whole country had been adversely affected. Infrastructure and supplies had been destroyed but with donor help this was being reversed. While restocking was underway, however, low payment and lack of morale had caused a slowing-down, and it was not known when the process would be completed. Progressive efforts were made to reestablish appropriate levels of health care.
With increasing education for mothers, women were eating better during pregnancy and while breastfeeding. A Church NGO also provided education for young mothers on this topic, and this was greatly encouraged. Adolescent reproductive health was being supported and the Reproductive Health Project helped to involve all actors from NGOs to Government sectors to work together to improve levels and standards in this area. Information on this topic was prevalent in the media.
HIV/AIDS figures were surprisingly low, and it was attributed to the possibility that the one case was due to outside infection. The HIV-positive person had since left the country, and this possibly kept the risk minimal for the population as a whole. The Government emphasis was mainly on education and surveillance of the phenomenon, and it was hoped that HIV/AIDS would be controlled.
As for the Law Reform Commission, it would be possible to reactivate it, said the delegation, but it had been left dormant due to the lack of recommendations transmitted to it. Juvenile offenders had no separate Juvenile Court, but a Magistrates Court sat as a Juvenile Court once a week.
Education was not compulsory, and school fees needed to be paid. However, this was recognized by the Government as an area for change, although this would be difficult for two reasons: the rapidity of the growth of the population, and the current economic situation. A study was being conducted on many levels to try to identify solutions. Much effort was also being put in to avoid ethnic armed conflict and to avoid the use of child soldiers in such a context.

Preliminary Concluding Remarks
Ms. Al-Thani, the Committee Expert who served as Rapporteur on the report of the Solomon Islands, in preliminary concluding remarks, said the concluding observations would reflect the concerns of the Committee and would make recommendations to help the Solomon Islands and their children to understand the Convention and to implement it further. There were concerns for the discrimination suffered by women, children born out of wedlock, and the disabled child. Many issues of concern had been addressed, and it was hoped that these would be resolved in the long term, and that they would be addressed with this in mind by the Committee. The Committee looked forward to the second report of the Solomon Islands to see what positive impact the first had had on its children.
Mr. Iniakwala, the head of the delegation of the Solomon Islands, thanked the Committee for contributing valuable information and comments which would be taken on board. The delegation had been concerned at the beginning as to the reactions of the Experts, but understood now that these were offered in a helpful spirit. The Government of the Solomon Islands regarded highly the non-governmental organizations of the Islands, and worked with them mutually to impact on the same people. Some questions were maybe answered inadequately, and this was due to a lack of quality information and data, however this was a challenge which would be addressed. The comments made by the Committee were most valuable in improving the situation, and as the situation improved, it was the Government's commitment to ensure that all children were looked after and were cared for.



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