“YOU FEEL LIKE you’re NOTHING” The UN study on violence against children A contribution to the UN Violence Study from the Children’s Rights Alliance for England and the NSPCC 2 “YOU FEEL LIKE you’re nothing” FOREWORD ‘‘ No violence against children is justifiable; all violence against children is preventable.” These are the first words of the independent study commissioned by the United Nations Secretary-General on violence against children, presented to the General Assembly on 23 August 2006, and they are the principles on which this report is founded. The UN study describes forms of violence that no longer exist in the UK. We do not execute children, we do not beat them in schools, and we do not break children’s bodies under conditions of hazardous labour. Of course these horrors used to exist in this country, quite legally, until brave and energetic people campaigned for their abolition. We must therefore be hopeful that the same rejection of violence against children will continue around the world. There are certainly no grounds for complacency in the UK. Some of the barbarous treatment of children overseas is a direct legacy of the British Empire. This includes corporal punishment in schools, or the maintenance of the age of criminal responsibility at seven years in many ex-colonial states. Where our own country is concerned, we must feel a deep sense of shame at the violence against children revealed in this report. Living in the fifth richest country in the world, in a country that has enjoyed 200 years of social reform, children in the UK are still being killed, tortured, bullied, commercially sexually exploited, and physically and mentally scarred by violence. None of this violence is reasonable and much of it could be prevented, or at least diminished, by state action. While we may be optimistic that the world is progressing away from the violent treatment of children, we cannot – must not – be satisfied with a “steady” pace of change. While we wait for parents to reject corporal punishment, or for the electorate to realise that prison is no solution to juvenile crime, the lives of children are being sacrificed. Children cannot wait: they need protection and positive intervention while their minds and bodies are still growing, not apologies and compensation when they are adults. We must stop this violence now. Dame Mary Marsh Carolyne Willow Director and Chief Executive National Co-ordinator National Society for the Children’s Rights Alliance Prevention of Cruelty for England (CRAE) to Children (NSPCC) “YOU FEEL LIKE you’re nothing” 3 AUTHORS This report was compiled by many people, including, principally: Serena deCordova Rachel Hodgkin Louise King Sharon Rustemier ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS A special thanks to all those who have contributed to this piece of work: Winnie Ayuk, Susan Ball, Ruth Breslin, Helen Brookes, Charlotte Moss, Davina deCordova, Anna Goy, Elizabeth Jones, Joanne Pogorelsky, Michelle Rodgers and Ahsan Shah. Facilitators and staff who have supported children and young people’s involvement: Sadie Drummond, Jason Austin, Sue Woudstra, Paul Ryan and Jackie Raymond. The parents and carers of all the children and young people Children and young people core group Some photos of the core group: Ruhina, Matthew, Sarah, Ellena, Lauren, Taijaan, Cassie, Billy, Daisy, Joel, Meisha, Terry, Scott, Eddie, Katie, Jahnika, Kirstie, Alexandra, Leon, Razia, Hissack, Mohammed, Muhid and Phillip. Groups and organisations: Boyhood to Manhood Foundation Bridge Group, NSPCC Leeds British Youth Council Brownies Croydon Respect Project Dulwich Hamlet Junior School Eastwood Park Prison New Forest District Council Hastings Young People’s Centre Rotherham Women’s Refuge St Thomas Moore School, Bristol St Mary Magdalen’s Catholic Primary School, London Southampton Young People’s Advisory Group (Hype) The Level Young People’s Centre There4me.com UK Youth Parliament Windsor Fellowship Women’s Aid 4 “YOU FEEL LIKE you’re nothing” CONTENTS FOREWORD 3 AUTHORS 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 4 INTRODUCTION 8 THE OVERALL PICTURE 11 1. RESEARCH INTO VIOLENCE AGAINST CHILDREN 13 1.1 What children say 15 1.2 What needs to be done 15 2. CHILD DEATHS 17 2.1 What children experience 18 2.2 What children say 19 2.3 What needs to be done 20 3. VIOLENCE IN THE HOME 22 3.1 Physical violence, including corporal punishment 23 What children experience 23 What children say 24 3.2 Sexual violence 25 What children experience 25 What children say 26 3.3 Emotional violence 26 What children experience 26 What children say 26 3.4 Witnessing violence between adult partners in the home 27 (domestic violence) What children experience 27 What children say 29 3.5 What needs to be done 30 4. VIOLENCE AND CHILDREN LIVING AWAY FROM THEIR PARENTS 36 4.1 Private foster care 37 What children say 38 4.2 Local authority foster care 38 4.3 Residential care 38 What children say 39 4.4 What needs to be done 39 “YOU FEEL LIKE you’re nothing” 5 5. VIOLENCE ON THE STREET AND IN OTHER PUBLIC PLACES 42 5.1 Children as assault victims 43 What children say 44 5.2 Children who are being commercially sexually exploited 45 What children say 47 5.3 Child abduction 47 5.4 Child trafficking 48 5.5 What needs to be done 48 6. VIOLENCE IN SCHOOLS 53 6.1 Staff violence 54 6.2 Violence between students 54 6.3 Violence in sports education 56 What children say 56 6.4 What needs to be done 58 7. VIOLENCE IN THE JUSTICE SYSTEM 59 7.1 The unnecessary incarceration of children 60 7.2 Anti-social behaviour orders and “naming and shaming” 61 What children say 62 7.3 Violence by staff in locked institutions: illegal assaults 62 7.4 Painful and harmful forms of restraint: approved assaults 62 What children say 64 7.5 Violence by other children in locked institutions 64 7.6 What needs to be done 65 8. VIOLENCE AGAINST IMMIGRANT AND ASYLUM-SEEKING CHILDREN 70 8.1 Locking up immigrant and asylum-seeking children 71 What children say 72 8.2 Children sent back to violent or unsafe situations 72 8.3 Violence and hostility towards immigrant and asylum-seeking children 72 What children say 73 8.4 What needs to be done 73 9. CHILDREN IN THE ARMED FORCES 74 9.1 What children experience 75 9.2 What needs to be done 76 10. VIOLENCE IN THE TOY AND GAME INDUSTRIES, AND IN THE MEDIA 77 10.1 What children experience 78 10.2 What children say 78 10.3 What needs to be done 79 6 “YOU FEEL LIKE you’re nothing” 11. HARMFUL TRADITIONAL PRACTICES 80 11.1 Female genital mutilation 81 What children say 81 11.2 Male circumcision 81 11.3 Forced marriage 82 What children say 82 11.4 Children tortured as witches 82 11.5 Violence in Muslim madrassas (mosque schools) 83 11.6 What needs to be done 83 CONCLUSION 86 APPENDIX 1 87 Recommendations of the UN study on violence against children to the General Assembly APPENDIX 2 94 The NSPCC project to promote the participation of children and young people in the UN violence study REFERENCES 96 “YOU FEEL LIKE you’re nothing” 7 INTRODUCTION ‘‘ For the first time, a global study on children involved children themselves” 8 “YOU FEEL LIKE you’re nothing” The UN study The report In 2002, the then United Nations This report has been prepared in parallel Secretary-General appointed Paulo Sérgio with the UN study and, like the study, Pinheiro as independent expert to provide looks at the different settings in which a global picture of violence against violence to children occurs – the home, children and to propose recommendations alternative forms of care, schools, public for the prevention of violence. Many spaces and the criminal justice system. The member states, including the UK last section focuses on forms of violence Government, provided detailed perpetrated by minority cultural groups information to the study, as did expert through “traditional practices prejudicial to bodies. For the first time, a global study on the health of children”, as stated by the children involved children themselves. Convention on the Rights of the Child.3 Nine regional consultations were held, The views and experiences of particular where children had the opportunity to groups of children who are more express their views to their own vulnerable to violence because of age, race, government ministers and disability, sexual orientation and so forth, parliamentarians, as well as those preparing are included throughout the document the study. In May 2006, some of these rather than in separate sections. children met in New York to consolidate Most sections have three parts: recommendations for further action. • What children experience The study defined a child as being • What children say and anyone under the age of 18. Its definition • What needs to be done of violence drew on Article 19 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, stating: “all forms of physical or mental What children experience violence, injury and abuse, neglect and aims to provide sufficient information negligent treatment, maltreatment or about prevalence and analysis of various exploitation, including sexual abuse”, and forms of violence suffered by children in on the World Health Organisation’s particular settings to give a snapshot of the definition: “The intentional use of scale of the problem. We have tried to be physical force or power, threatened or as up-to-date and accurate as possible, but actual, against oneself, another person, or inevitably there are gaps and against a group or community, that either contradictions, and even, very occasionally, results in or has a high likelihood of a superabundance of information which resulting in injury, death, psychological has had to be pared down.