New Gutenberg, just written last week by yours truly. I'm back on an well-trodden path; children's rights. The Council of Europe launched the latest four year plan this week, and this was my bit to tell the world.The very next day the Guardian reported that 40 kids had been granted £2m compensation because the British government imprisoned them. For absolutely no identifiable reason. Many of them had been tortured, imprisoned and abused in the countries they were fleeing from. They just got more of the same.
This a long and stony path. 1996 saw me running the press room at the first World Congress against Sexual Exploitation. Nobody knew much about it at the time. In the meantime, the whole issue became mega. Paedos were the target du jour, with News of the World editor Rebekah Wade (then Brooks) making her mark as the baddie hunter who roused the crowd against the innocent. Scores of Catholic priests were outed as abusers; internet grooming took over from the man with a mac and sweeties in the park.
Oh how clever and sophisticated we are now. We look after kids, have international treaties to protect them, question our right to smack them, give them education and opportunities and the chance to build a better life.
Oh yeah?
Here I am 16 years later working with Roma girls who are expected to get married when they are barely out of puberty, thrown out of schools and stigmatised; reading reports about kids kept in prison.... and still hearing the same stories - children and young people fear violence, daren't speak about sex abuse and face a grim future created by the greed and mendacity of their elders.
Yes, it's us adults that need to get our act together. It's easy to chuck money at a problem, or react with anger. But come on, what are we doing?
Small person still equals smaller rights, it seems.
