Child Poverty, Family Law and Human Rights

Child Poverty, Family Law and Human Rights Presented by: Prof. Dr. Graovac Date: 8 October 2023 Demographic Catastrophe - main causes: • the fertility rate in Croatia is 1.4 • economic migration to EU countries of couples in fertile age • economic crisis (pandemic, war in Ukraine) • the Central State Office for Demography and Youth has set a target fertility rate in Croatia of 1.8 children per woman by 2030, but Demographic strategy has not been accepted yet • in need for efficient demographic policies • we need more child-births, large families • it is associated in negative sense with child poverty Poverty - Leading factors affecting child poverty: • household composition (greater risk for single-parent families and families with two adults with three or more children - 48%) • parental employment status • parental education level • inadequate income support from the welfare system Poverty Effects On Children? - Children in poverty encounter difficulties: • to do well in school • enjoy good health and realize their full potential later in life • face a higher risk of becoming unemployed, poor and socially excluded as adults • their human and children's rights are endangered Need For Family Law Intervention? - living in conditions of poverty can be a risky circumstance for the occurrence of a number of problems, including - • disturbed family relations, • neglecting of the needs and interests of children, and • inadequate parental treatment of children but, from the data obtained in UNICEF Croatian research on children's poverty (2015) can not be concluded that the measures to protect the rights and well-being of the child have been significantly imposed according to the participants of poverty-study - in order to be able to reach a more specific conclusion, it is necessary to have further research to obtain data in what proportion these measures are imposed in relation to the material status - the measure most often imposed by the social welfare service was a measure of supervision of the exercise of parental care - (more often imposed on families with three or more children and single-parent families, which means that almost every sixth or seventh child (i.e. his siblings) has a parent who has been given supervision over the exercise of parental care - placing a child into public care was imposed only in a few cases Bronfenbrenner Ecological System - Child development is a complex system of relationships affected by multiple levels of the surrounding environment, from immediate family and school settings to broad cultural values, laws, and customs Human Rights Of Parents - the right to respect for private and family life - the right to decide freely on number and space of birth of children (Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination of Women) - the right to fair trial (in family law procedures and other procedures) - social rights - social protection, family benefits Big Families: Blessing Or Burden For Society? - parental responsibilities - parents are primary caregivers, first responsible for children - children have right to be cared for by his or her parents - right to standard of living - placing children in public care due to poverty is contrary to right to family life and right to respect family life - more children is necessary if we want to stop demographic disaster - it has to stay parents' free choice - states have duty to protect families legally, economically and by different policies Supporting Families - Leading factors affecting child poverty: • household composition (greater risk for single-parent families and families with two adults with three or more children - 48%) • parental employment status • parental education level • inadequate income support from the welfare system