Bringing Rights Home for Children: Arguing the UNCRC

Alistair MacDonald Barrister St Philips Chambers Birmingham

It is now widely accepted that children benefit from certain fundamental rights carrying the force of international law. However in respect of the one international legal instrument dedicated solely to enshrining those rights namely the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) there remains a stubborn distinction in practice between the acceptance of children's rights and the procedural capacity for children to enforce those rights.

To be of real value to children the rights articulated by the UNCRC must in concert with domestic legal provisions and procedure be capable of practical application and enforcement in order to ensure both the continued integrity of those rights and to achieve proper redress on those occasions when they are breached. As Fortin observes however this leap from the theoretical to the practical presents considerable difficulties within a domestic legal system that has yet to develop a comprehensive rights based-framework for children (J Fortin Children's Rights and the Developing Law (Cambridge 2nd edn 2005).

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