It has been 30 years since the UN’s Convention on the Rights of the Child came into being, yet it has been said that while Malta had ratified it, the Convention itself is not fully within Maltese law. What happened?
The convention was drafted by the UN in 1989, and Malta was one of the many countries that signed and ratified it. The Convention per se however, is not part of Malta’s internal law.
Over the years, we took on-board what the Convention said, such as establishing the Office of the Commissioner for Children, and Children’s rights, and they were reflected in local laws. But since the Convention is not incorporated per se in Maltese laws, there are certain actions where for example, if someone feels they were affected badly, they cannot take certain steps. The same Convention also has a number of protocols that one can adopt in Maltese law.
Many of the recommendations have already been implemented, but we are going to take the next step to incorporate the whole Convention as an integral part of Maltese law.
Do you have a time-frame?
What I can say is that it will be a relatively short time-frame, although I cannot give a fixed date. Now the Children’s Act will come into force in a few weeks’ time, then we will go for this.
When it comes to child migrants who reach Malta by boat, how are they processed and how are they treated differently from adult migrants?
The organisation of that falls more under the Agency for the Welfare of Asylum Seekers (AWAS) rather than our ministry.
With regards to children under 16, EU Directives provide, and we wholly abide by them, that they are not to be kept in open or closed centres with adults. If the children are between the ages of 16 and 18, they may be kept with adults. In fact this was one of the issues during the recent incidents (referring to the protests at the Hal Far centre where some youths under 18 were also taken to court).
An issue in this particular case is the practicality of it. It comes down to the assessment of their age, how are they to be assessed. In most cases they do not have documentation on them. So the issue then arises. How can one tell if a person is under 18, or under 16, excluding the obvious cases of course. There is an assessment process, and if they are found to be under 16 they will not be kept with the adults, and in certain cases care orders are issued by us but through AWAS.
When they are being relocated, then the care issue would be revoked and they would be placed in the custody of the receiving country. The new Child Protection Act will go a step further in this regard, and provides that in certain instances the courts, aside from the usual protection granted under law, can also appoint a special guardian for the child. It is not purposely just for such children, but is for the most vulnerable. It allows the possibility to give them even further protection.
What happens to unaccompanied minors after initial processing, are they placed in foster care?
No, unaccompanied minors are not normally placed in fostering. There are obviously the exceptions but normally they are relocated to different countries, as they would say for example have a relative in that country. Fostering and alternative care is more focused on more longer-term care, but again it depends, there is no hard and fast rule.
Sometimes certain separation proceedings in court turn ugly, and one parent would try to turn the child against the other. What is the role of social workers in such situations?
When it comes to separation proceedings, one can have peaceful separations, consensual ones without any blame placed on either of the two parties for example. In the vast majority of cases, I do not think that children are used in that way, but yes sometimes the child would end up favouring one party and in most of these cases it is due to parental influence. Care workers or social workers would come in if the child is at risk.
The fact that a couple is separating does not mean that the child is taken under alternative care. If however, the circumstances and the general environment where the child is being brought up has deteriorated and been brought to the notice of the social workers, then yes there may be cases where the child is taken into care.
One must also keep in mind that there are a myriad of situations. Separations may be due to financial issues, may be due to one party having an addiction, but the separation in itself is not a reason to put children into alternative care. If the child is put at risk then yes but not on the basis of separation – for example if the child is not well-looked after or is abused.
There are also a number of instances where one of the parties claims for example, that the other party is abusing drugs, and the court would then say that further investigation is needed. Until that investigation concludes, the Court would order that when that parent meets the child, there would be a supervisor present from Agenzija Appogg. These children would not be under the care of the state and would still be under the care of the other parent for example.
When it comes to domestic abuse cases, is there anything government is doing to try and minimise the number of cases, and to help educators recognise when a child is the victim of such circumstances?
When it comes to domestic abuse cases, firstly it is worth mentioning that we are also seeing cases where the minors are abusing their parents. It is not a national phenomenon and is not common, but there have been instances of this, where the under-18 person has physically or emotionally abused their parents or other carers.
Back to your question, if there is physical or sexual abuse then steps will be taken. It is not just Appogg that work in this field. For example school teachers can be the ones to ring the alarm bells. There are social workers in the education field, and there is cooperation between the ministries. If an alarm bell is rung where, for example, a child repeatedly goes to school with his uniform torn, no lunch, and the attention of Appogg is sought, then they investigate the case.
One thing I want people to understand is that issuing a care order is not a political decision. People tend to believe it is, believe that it is the political person who decides on such orders. There is a set procedure, there are reports that are drawn up by different professionals including social workers and at times psychiatrists. It is not just an issue of someone simply one day deciding to take a child away. The reports go through the standards authority and then it finally ends up at the ministerial stage.
With the incoming new laws, it will no longer be a political person who signs such orders, but the decision will be taken by a magistrate, so we are removing the issuing of care orders from the ministerial post and moving it to a judicial process, which I think is very good. In addition, under the new law every decision taken is appealable to a court of law, so the aspect of a final administrative intervention will no longer exist. Having said that, occasionally we do face instances where we need to quickly remove a child, such as where there is sexual abuse. We would be failing society if we have someone in imminent danger, or at great risk, not being protected.
Presently legislation, in cases where children are at risk, only provides for the issuing of a care order, and one would need to take the child. The child in the end suffers because of this.
The new law however will provide for five different kinds of orders and so will not just revolve around taking the child away, although that option will remain. For example we will introduce treatment orders where the difficulty might be the psychological attitude, and can be issued in situations where the environment is not healthy but not bad to the point where one needs to uproot the child. There will also be emergency orders.
What effects are there on children whose parents are either drug addicts, gambling addicts or alcoholics?
Addiction, not in all cases, could lead to an environmental risk for the child. A family environment where addictions are present is one of the causes for the issuing of care orders, but there are of course others.
At times it’s a chain, where one vicious circle leads to another, and then another. One could start by being an addict, which will lead into physical abuse, and then usury, followed by prostitution, for example.
I am not criticizing anybody, don’t get me wrong, but addiction is one of those vicious circles. Unfortunately some go from one vicious circle to another and at times it is even inter-generational, particularly with prostitution.
There are prostitutes who went into that line of work because their parents were involved in the sex work industry. Technically prostitution isn’t illegal. So can the government do anything in those situations for the children?
Soliciting is illegal but technically prostitution isn’t. You go back to the same basic rule. Is the child at risk? So if a child is being brought up in a brothel then obviously the child is in a certain element of risk, so there you can issue a care order, and if it is a case of risk you should.
But you can never generalise. Circumstances may be so different. If we are talking about prostitution, we might find a case, and they aren’ t common but do exist, where the child is encouraged to prostitute her or himself, at times to subsidise the parent’s addiction, or at times because it is a way of life which is acceptable for the persons involved. But again there is no hard and fast rule.
The question is whether the child is at risk, and whether the risk is of such a degree that the State needs to protect that child. It’s a never ending myriad of circumstances.
Since you are moving these orders to be handled by the court, as well as making them capable of being appealed, should there be a separate court for cases involving children?
There is already the family court, and for certain instances there is the Juvenile court. The thinking is that rather than having necessarily a separate court, is that while the child is testifying for example, the environment should be more child friendly. This is something has been developed and is referred to as a children’s house. Not all the proceedings need to be handled there, but when the child is directly involved, testifying, it has been proven that children will be more at ease, and the intention is that they deliver more precise evidence.
This is something we are heading towards and the new law already provides for it. Whether this will be brought into force immediately is another issue, as obviously there you would not just need this ministry’s commitment, but also the Judiciary, social workers etc. We need to get all the stakeholders onboard.
You mentioned that there are cases where children abuse their parents. What happens in such cases, are the children removed from their parent’s custody, is there psychological care involved?
These cases are not that common, but mostly it is psychological help.
On 20 November, a national conference on International Children’s Day & the European Day on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse is taking place at the Corinthia San Gorg, organised by the Family ministry. George Nikolaidis, Chairperson CoE Lanzarote Committee will be speaking.
There are a number of courses available to help parents who would like to improve their parenting skills. At Agenzija Appogg they deliver free positive parenting courses to anyone interested. There is also another course on co-parenting, offered to couples who are separating, and they learn how to be co-parents to their children. Another initiative is called Għaqal id-Dar, Ħajja Aħjar and consists of courses provided freely through local councils, during which people can learn how to budget, cook healthy food with that budget, and other skills.
