Britain and US are "failing children"

[faceless]

UN: Britain failing children
14/02/2007 17:03 - (SA)

London - Britain rejected charges on Wednesday that it is failing children, after Unicef ranked the country as the worst among 21 rich countries for children's well-being. The Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Finland topped the standings in the Unicef report into which were the best countries for children in the world's 21 industrialised powers. The United States was 20 and Britain 21 on the list. Britain and the US were in the bottom third of the rankings for five of the six dimensions reviewed, namely children's material well-being; health and safety; educational well-being; relationships; behaviour and risks; and their own subjective assessment of well-being.

A British government spokesperson said: "We recognise that Unicef does vital work in this area. But in many cases the data used is several years old and does not reflect more recent improvements in the UK such as the continuing fall in the teenage pregnancy rate or in the proportion of children living in workless households." The opposition Conservative Party accused chancellor Gordon Brown, who is expected to succeed Tony Blair as prime minister this year, of "failing" a generation of children. "This report tells the truth about Brown's Britain," said finance spokesperson George Osborne.

The government hit back at the charges saying: "Nobody can dispute that improving children's well-being is a real priority for this government., we are working hard to improve all children's life chances and the report confirms that children's educational attainment at 15 in the UK compares well with many other EU countries. Great progress has been made but we know there is more to do to make sure that every child has the best start in life and has an equal opportunity to fulfil their potential."

Bob Reitemeier, chief executive of The Children's Society, disagreed with government claims that the information was outdated, saying figures taken from 2001 to 2003 were usual for a study of this kind. "I think what it shows is the trend, the direction of travel we are witnessing across 21 countries," he told BBC radio. Reitemeier called the report a wake-up call. "Despite being a rich country, the UK is failing children and young people in a number of crucial ways," he said.

Sir Albert Aynsley-Green, children's commissioner for England, said Unicef's findings were disheartening but not surprising. "There is a crisis at the heart of our society and we must not continue to ignore the impact of our attitudes towards children and young people and the effect that this has on their well-being," he said. "I hope this report will prompt us all to look beyond the statistics and to the underlying causes of our failure to nurture happy and healthy children in the UK," he said.

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The saddest part of this news is that there are many who will never believe it's true simply because they don't see the poverty that exists on their own doorsteps. Too many just choose not to see it because it would make them have to consider their own part in those other people's troubles.

[Skylace]

This was on the news here a few days ago. I'm not surprised really. Looking at a lot of the kids that I work with it's pretty obvious.

[harry perkins]

George has had a good discussion on this tonight, linked it in with the South London shooting tradgedy. He pointed out that us and the USA, the most rapaciously capitalist developed countries, are also the worst developed countries in which to raise a child.