COMMITTEE ON RIGHTS OF CHILD STARTS CONSIDERATION OF SECOND PERIODIC REPORT OF PORTUGAL

CRC
28th session
1 October 2001
Morning


Portugal Has Made Progress in Promoting and Protecting Child Rights,
Delegation Says



The Committee on the Rights of the Child this morning started its consideration of a second periodic report from Portugal with a Government delegation saying that progress had been made in the protection and promotion of children=s rights in the country.

Introducing the report, Jose Manuel dos Santos Pais, Director of the Cabinet of Documentation and Comparative Law of Portugal, said that the dissemination of human rights teachings had been expanded at the national level and a series of public campaigns had been launched towards the protection and promotion of the rights of the child.

Mr. dos Santos Pais also said that a number of laws had been revised, including the law on military recruitment, which now excluded the drafting of children below 18 years of age into the army. He said that his Government believed that it had made progress in the protection and promotion of the rights of the child since it had submitted its initial report.

Committee members raised a number of questions under the main topics of the general measures of implementation of the Convention; the definition of the child; and general principles. They asked, among other things, why Portuguese non-governmental organizations (NGOs) did not submit 'shadow' reports to the Committee as did other countries' NGOs; how the work of the 'commissions' in the country was coordinated; why there was no separate budget for activities concerning children; the achievements of the national plan of action for children; and the accessibility of the office of the ombudsman to children.

The Portuguese delegation was also made up of Dulce Rocha, from the Ministry of Justice; Joao Labescat, Deputy to the Cabinet of the High Commissioner for Immigration and Ethnic Minority; Paulo Antunes Ferreira, Director of the Cabinet of Studies and Planning, State Secretariat of Youth and Sport; Graca Fonseca, Director at the Ministry of Justice; Rosa Clemente, Member of the Council of the Direction of the Institute of Social Development of the Ministry of Labour and Solidarity; Virgina Bras Gomes, Head of Division, General Direction of Solidarity and Social Security of the Ministry of Labour and Solidarity; Joaquim Nunes, Principal Inspector, Ministry of Labour and Solidarity; Catarina Albuquerque, Expert, Cabinet of Documentation and Comparative Law; and Manuela Baptista Lopes, Expert at the Institute of Social Reinsertion of the Ministry of Justice.

Portugal is among the 191 States parties to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and as such it is obligated to submit periodic reports to the Committee on how it is implementing the provisions of the international instrument.

When the Committee reconvenes at 3 p.m., it will finalize its discussion of the report of Portugal.


Second Periodic Report of Portugal

The report, which is contained in document CRC/C/65/Add.11, enumerates the various administrative, legal and juridical measures undertaken by the State since its initial report was considered by the Committee in November 1995. It says that an important step was taken towards the adoption of a comprehensive strategy with the establishment of a working group with the view to bringing together all ministerial and inter-ministerial programmes relating to children. The Government considers it very important to enable young people to be involved in defining policies related to them. Another initiative was the first national conference on youth policy, held in May 1996, which produced a final document that was to form the basis of a 'strategic pact for the twenty-first century'.

The report notes that in early 1997, the Office of the High Commissioner for the Promotion of Equality and the Family launched a huge campaign, jointly with the 'Education for all' programme, to publicize the Convention in every school in the country. The campaign was extended to cover pre-school establishments in 1998. This campaign was also extended to primary establishments jointly with the Portuguese UNICEF committee, which published a poster and leaflet in time for the International Day of the Child celebrations.

Further, the report notes that most immigrants living in Portugal come from African countries whose official language is Portuguese and accordingly translating the Convention into other languages was not considered a priority. It is acknowledged that a large number of immigrant children have great difficulty understanding Portuguese; the situation needs further study so that a decision can be made about translating the Convention into other languages. The largest communities affirming their cultural identity through their language are those from Cape Verde, Guinea, India and Timor. The children from these communities speak their mother tongue at home and Portuguese at school and with other members of Portuguese society.

It was reported that the Gypsy community in Portugal faces severe problems of social, economic, cultural, and even political exclusion. The lack of occupational skills, low literacy levels and the failure rate among young people made for poverty and destitution among the Gypsies. This social situation, compounded by other phenomena, such as poor living conditions, lack of means of subsistence and high levels of drug use and involvement in drug trafficking, further stigmatizes the Gypsies. There were some 6,000 Gypsies in the Lisbon area; and only 62 per cent of the children were registered with schools and the attendance of half of these children was very irregular, with a very poor educational performance. Nearly 50 per cent of the children, from 10 to 14 years of age, did not attend school at all; where school attendance is concerned, performance was given to boys, for entrenched cultural reasons; and the vast majority of those children did not attend kindergartens or creches.


Introduction of Report

JOSE MANUAL DOS SANTOS PAIS, Director of the Cabinet for Documentation and Comparative Law of Portugal, said that the report was full of detailed information and it was prepared in accordance with the guidelines of the Committee. Several efforts had been made in the areas of health, education and social services concerning children.

Mr. dos Santos Pais said that the Government continued to cooperate with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in several fields. In addition, the NGOs were consulted in the process of the preparation of the report which was now before the Committee. There was also a major shift in Government policies in the social areas and in cooperation with non-governmental organizations.

The dissemination of human rights teachings had been expanded at the national level, Mr. dos Santos Pais continued to say. In addition, a series of public campaigns had been launched for the protection and promotion of the rights of the child. A website was also being operated with the aim of reaching a wider public sector in disseminating human rights teachings. The Government had made known the provisions of the Convention in a number of ways, including publications, which were distributed in the form of brochures.

Mr. dos Santos Pais said that the Government had been conducting a number of seminars and workshops to disseminate the work of the Committee and to make known the last concluding observations of the Committee on the initial report of Portugal.

In addition, a number of laws had been revised, including the law on military recruitment, which excluded the drafting of children below 18 years of age into the army, Mr. dos Santos Pais said. With regard to non-discrimination, the Government had also taken measures towards protecting vulnerable children. Portugal believed that it had made progress in the protection and promotion of the rights of the child since it had submitted its initial report.


Consideration of Report

Following the presentation of the report, Committee members raised a number of questions under the main topics of the general measures of implementation of the Convention; and the definition of the child. The Experts asked, among other things, why Portuguese non-governmental organizations (NGOs) did not submit 'shadow' reports to the Committee as did other countries' NGOs; how the work of the Acommissions' in the country was coordinated; why there was no separate budget for activities concerning children; the achievements of the national plan of action for children; and the accessibility of the office of the ombudsman to children.

Responding to the queries put by Committee Experts, the members of the Portuguese delegation said that the reasons why NGOs did not supplement reports to the Government's report might be that everything that they had to say was included in the report and they did not find the need to submit 'shadow' reports of their own. Non-governmental organizations in Portugal were very active.

Asked about sexual exploitation, the delegation said that last August, a new criminal act had been enacted in order to protect children from any sexual abuse within and outside the family. By adopting that law, the country's parliament had emphasized the need for the protection of children from crimes of sexual exploitation.

The Portuguese officials said that the Government had created a national commission for the protection of children and young people at risk to promote their rights. It also aimed to ensure that the protection was monitored and their rights implemented. Such a system of monitoring had enabled the agencies concerned in the promotion of child rights to intervene on behalf of the children at risk. The commission also had the role of coordination of social action and auditing.

The fact that there were a number of commissions had resulted in the achievement of positive results in many fields, the delegation said, adding that their large number had helped to share the tasks and to accomplish more within a few years. Since there were different kinds of non-governmental organizations and they were diversified in their activities, there was no umbrella organization which embraced all of them.

There had been a reduction in the number of juvenile detainees during the last eight months since the entry into force of the new judicial reform, the delegation said. The reason could be attributed to a variety of factors, including the decisions of courts not to make recourse to systematic institutional detention of young offenders.

The delegation said that the office of the ombudsman played an important role in the promotion of the rights of the child. It operated independently and most of its recommendations concerning children's rights were accepted by the Government agencies.

The age for sexual consent was fixed at 14 years, however, in some exceptional cases, viewing the maturity of the child, 16 years of age was considered to be the minimum age, the delegation said. A child's opinion could be considered by courts from the age of 12 years, but courts could decide otherwise.

The Portuguese Government had been extending assistance to developing countries, particularly to East Timor, Mozambique, Cape Verde and Angola in educational and social fields. In 1999, half of Portuguese international assistance went to East Timor to assist that region in its self-determination process to independence.

Committee Experts continued to query the Portuguese delegation under the main subjects of the general principles; civil rights and freedoms; and family environment and alternative care. They asked, among other things, about adoption and placement of children; statistical data on juvenile detainees; the manner in which child abuse was monitored in placements and other institutions; the rights of privacy in child care centres; the experience of joint custody system in the process of divorce; and if there were specific anti-discrimination legislative provisions concerning Gypsies and migrants.



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