North Edinburgh Young Peoples Forum launch Rights Respecting Community Charter
North Edinburgh Young People’s Forum has launched a Rights Respecting Charter in North Edinburgh. Their charter protects and enhances the human rights of young people and the Forum plans to encourage groups, organisations and individuals across the area to pledge their support by signing up.
NEYPF have been working on the project for a considerable time, trawling through UNICEF’s Charter on the Rights of the Child document and then selecting key articles for specific adoption across North Edinburgh.
Launching the document at West Pilton Neighbourhood Centre recently, NEYPF’s Brandin explained: “The UK has signed the United Nations Charter on the Rights of the Child – this means that all children and young people living in North Edinburgh have rights, and NEYPF want these rights to be respected in our community.
“We enjoy many rights – to education, language, nationality – but not of all us enjoy all of our rights and some need strengthened. By signing this Charter you are agreeing to help make sure that all children and young people living in North Edinburgh enjoy their rights.”
NEYPF has selected the following as their key articles:
(15) We have the right to meet safely in our shopping centres, parks, community centres, clubs, libraries schools and sports centres – but bullying is still an issues in North Edinburgh which means that some of us can’t enjoy this right. Bullying is not okay and it will not be tolerated in this community.
Will you help us challenge bullying behaviour and support vulnerable young people?
(39) Children and young people who have been bullied or have suffered a bad experience have the right to be helped to recover.
Mental health can be an issue for us and we deserve better support and services. We need to talk more about mental health. We need earlier support before things get so bad they are in bits.
Children who don’t cause problems can become invisible and don’t receive praise or attention. These children need support to build their self-esteem and resilience so that they don’t experience bullying in the first place.
Will you help support children and young people earlier?
(27, 6) We have a right to a good enough standard of living; we have a right to survive and develop and the government should give as much help as needed.
Not all children living in North Edinburgh have a good enough standard of living, despite this being their right. There is real poverty in North Edinburgh and families need more support. Cuts mean less money. which means less staff, which means less support.
We want fewer cuts and more support.
(3, 26) Children and young people have the right to their opinion and to have their say in decisions that affect them. Anyone making decisions that affect children and young people should make children and young people’s interests a priority.
We feel children and young people don’t have enough say and we don’t feel listened to or respected. We don’t feel we are taken seriously. For this to happen we want workers who really listen to us and respect us, who make good relationships and stick with us, who are genuinely interested in us, give us time and enjoy their work.
It’s workers like this who will make sure we are able to enjoy or rights. Will you be one of these workers?
Total Craigroyston manager Christine Mackay praised the Forum members for their efforts and CLD worker Sarah Neal, who supported the introduction of the Rights Respecting Schools initiative in North Edinburgh, also felt the Forum have done a great job. “This really was a major task with a lot of hard work involved. The Forum has been incredible: the young people stuck with it and went above and beyond what they had originally planned – and then put together this presentation and organised the launch in a matter of days. Brilliant!”
Building on ideas gathered during discussions at the launch event NEYPF will now decide on the best ways to get the Charter out into the wider community. Watch this space!
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