Podcasts about children's commissioner

Suhayra Aden and her two children are coming back to New Zealand.Aden was identified as an Islamic State terrorist by Turkey, when she was caught crossing the border from Syria in February.She's the woman who had Australian-New Zealand dual citizenship, which Australia revoked.Given there are two children involved with this case, Children's Commissioner Andrew Becroft told Kate Hawkesby we have a duty to stand up and help New Zealand citizens.“There are children who are New Zealand citizens who have nowhere to go, I think this is a chance to stand up and support them.”LISTEN ABOVE

The Children's Commissioner is warning that money-saving measures will result in the need for a second Royal Commission into abuse in care. Ministers removed the current inquiry's ability to investigate modern cases of abuse in April to save both cash and time. Andrew Becroft has now written to the government and warned that it will be handed an incomplete report if the inquiry isn't given the ability to properly examine what's happening now. Political reporter Katie Scotcher had this report.

The Children's Commissioner is warning that money-saving measures will result in the need for a second Royal Commission into abuse in care. Ministers removed the current inquiry's ability to investigate modern cases of abuse in April to save both cash and time. Andrew Becroft has now written to the government and warned that it will be handed an incomplete report if the inquiry isn't given the ability to properly examine what's happening now. Political reporter Katie Scotcher had this report.

The Children's Commissioner wants Oranga Tamariki to make public how it deals with staff found to have abused children in their care. Official figures - contained in the Ministry for Children's own publicly released reports - show there have been 40 instances in two-and-a-half years, where staff have physically harmed children. Andrew Becroft says those reports, and the monitoring undertaken by his office, means Oranga Tamariki should be well aware of the problem.

The Children's Commissioner wants Oranga Tamariki to make public how it deals with staff found to have abused children in their care. Official figures - contained in the Ministry for Children's own publicly released reports - show there have been 40 instances in two-and-a-half years, where staff have physically harmed children. Andrew Becroft says those reports, and the monitoring undertaken by his office, means Oranga Tamariki should be well aware of the problem.

The Children's Commissioner Judge Andrew Becroft is warning Pharmac not to play one group of children with a life threatening illness off against another. His comments come after RNZ revealed that Pharmac is likely to end the blanket provision of child cancer drugs. It says the move is in response to discrimination claim taken under the Human Rights Act. Fiona Tolich asked why Pharmac was funding all child cancer drugs but wouldn't fund Spinraza for 35 children with the deadly genetic condition SMA. As concern mounts about the move the Health Minister Andrew Little is being asked to intervene. Here is Guyon Espiner.

Monday 3rd May 2021 Duncan, Amanda and Mark spoke to the Children's Commissioner Andrew Becroft about the governments existing school lunches programme that only reaches one quarter of all schools, and the new free lunches in school campaign that started today. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Children's Commissioner Judge Andrew Becroft has stepped in after the thirteen-year-old boy asked for his help. The autistic teenager was removed from his Auckland school after a fight. Judge Becroft says the case is just one of many and families urgently need a regulatory body that can review schools' decisions. He spoke to Susie Ferguson.

The Children's Commissioner says there is "cause for real concern" over the practice of police taking photos of young people. Police are approaching innocent young people, photographing them, collecting their personal details and then using a phone app to create a database of this information. Last year RNZ reported on young Māori being stopped and photographed by police in Wairarapa. It has now been revealed this practice is taking place further afield as part of a crack-down on youth crime. Children's Comissioner Andrew Becroft told Morning Report people who are concerned should contact the Independent Police Conduct Authority, which is running an investigation into the practice. They could also contact the Children's Commissioner which would pass it on to the IPCA. [audio_play] "We need to get to the bottom of what's actually going on."

The Children's Commissioner is demanding to know whether Police nation-wide are routinely taking pictures of young people on the street.  He joins Wairarapa iwi, a criminologist and Community Law calling for an investigation, after the Police in the region admitted illegally taking pictures of young Māori. Hamish Cardwell reports.  

The Children's Commissioner is demanding to know whether Police nation-wide are routinely taking pictures of young people on the street.  Judge Andrew Becroft is calling for an investigation after the Police in the Wairarapa region admitted illegally taking pictures of young Maori. The actions have also raised legal concerns. Simon Judd, a barrister and chairperson of YouthLaw Aotearoa, which provides legal advice and assistance for people aged under-25 speaks to Māni Dunlop.  

Bold action is being urged to prevent Covid-19 making life even tougher for children living in deprivation. Income and hardship data in the latest Child Poverty Monitor out today show the country was roughly on track to meet the Government's 2021 targets under the Child Poverty Reduction Act 2018. Treasury has warned Covid-19 may increase poverty and hardship rates further. Susie Ferguson speaks to Children's Commissioner Andrew Becroft.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Children's Commissioner Judge Andrew Becroft talks with Karyn about why the police must stop pursuing young drivers. 

The Children's commissioner is calling for a debate on allowing witnesses to remain silent when it comes to child abuse. Judge Andrew Becroft talks to the Panel about his concerns about the law.

The Children's Commissioner has launched a big push to get the criminal age of responsibility raised to 14. At the moment, a 10-year-old child can be charged with murder. Many in the sector are backing the commissioner's view, but say it's important to consider who would then be responsible for very young offenders. Rachel Thomas reports.

Jonathan Ashworth, Labour's Shadow Health Secretary on the Quarantine 'failures that let in 10,000 infected people' as Boris Johnson urged to put schools first amid second wave fears. Anne Longfield, Children's Commissioner for England discusses her comments that we should shut pubs and shops if it means schools can re-open. Julia is also joined by Richard Spencer, Middle Eastern Correspondent for The Times whose home was destroyed in the Beirut explosion. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Minister for Children Tracey Martin joins us again and discusses with Lillian her position on parallel governance systems following the announcement of a possible Māori Health Authority. As well as this, a recent report by the Children's Commissioner's office has highlighted again the traumatic process that occurs during the uplifting of a child by Oranga Tamariki, a process that disproportionately affects Māori. 

There are concerns that universities are still churning out social workers who don't have the skills to work well with Māori.  It comes as report by the Children's Commissioner reveals harrowing stories of Māori mothers experiences with social workers in the state care system.  Oranga Tamariki says their social workers work hard and are trained to understand colonisation and their Treaty of Waitangi responsibilities.  But a lecturer in social work at Massey University Dr Paule' Ruwhiu told our Māori news correspondent Leigh-Marama McLachlan that social work degrees lack cultural training. 

On the podcast today, Maori mothers describe their experiences with Oranga Tamariki in a new report by the Children's Commissioner which he's described as "distressing"And an Australian NRL commentator under fire for her racist remarks of Pacific Islander names.

Māori mothers of newborns involved with Oranga Tamariki say the child welfare system is dangerous, brutal and racist. Their experiences have been detailed in a report from the Children's Commissioner, released today. Judge Andrew Becroft is now calling for fundamental change at the Children's Ministry.  He speaks to Kim Hill.

Māori mothers of newborns dealing with Oranga Tamariki say the child welfare system is dangerous, brutal and racist.  Their experiences have been detailed in a report from the Children's Commissioner, which was released today.  Judge Andrew Becroft is calling for fundamental change at the Children's Ministry, saying the system is racist and marred by some poor social workers.  RNZ Māori news correspondent Leigh-Marama McLachlan reports. 

Guest: Christina Nomdo, Children's Commissioner

The Children's Commissioner for England joins Vanessa Feltz to answer the question. Producer: Ryan Wilson.

An expansion of the free school lunches scheme has been welcomed by principals who say they expect more students to turn up without food after the Covid-19 lockdown.Budget 2020 included $221 million to rapidly scale up the free lunch programme from 8000 children to 200,000 children at disadvantaged schools by mid-2021.Pat Newman, principal of Hora Hora Primary School in Whangārei, said schools in hard-up areas would be "leaping up and down" to be included in the scheme."It was already needed," he said. "And it is very, very clear that we are going to have much higher employment and it will be needed even more when we go back."His decile 1 school already provided breakfasts and lunches to around 10 per cent of 400-student roll with the help of local businesses.Hora Hora Primary School principal Pat Newman said free lunches would be welcomed by schools because more parents would be jobless after the Covid-19 lockdown. Photo / Michael Cunningham"It makes a huge difference," he said. "It calms this place down. The kids want to learn. You don't have lunches stolen, You don't have kids threatening others because they're hungry. They are kids that content and happy."Kimi Ora Community School in Flaxmere, Hastings, is one of the schools already being funded to provide free lunches."It has a huge impact on kids' learning and just on kids' mental wellbeing," said principal Matt O'Dowda.Because all students at the primary school took part, it removed the stigma of poverty: "It just levels the playing field." And it had reduced truancy because families of children used to be embarassed to send their children to school without lunch.Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who also holds the Child Poverty Reduction portfolio, said a full stomach made all the difference to a child's learning."Providing a free and healthy lunch at school is one way to help make New Zealand the best place in the world to be a child and to make that difference immediately," she said.The previous National government also supported free meals in schools and invested in the Kickstart programme run by Sanitarium and Fonterra.National was against a universal rollout of the scheme. Leader Simon Bridges said today that the message to parents of children getting free lunches in schools was that they didn't need to provide their kids with food.O'Dowda rejected this argument."It's never a 5 year-old's fault that they don't have food. Do we punish the kids for things that other people are responsible for?"Education Minister Chris Hipkins said the size of the expansion meant work would be scaled up during Term 3. Around 21,000 students in Years 1-8 will get lunches by the end of this year.Hipkins estimated about 2000 jobs in local communities would be created by expanding the programme.Another $32 million would also go towards responding to the increasing demand and pressures on foodbanks created by the Covid-19 crisis.A new bulk food distribution - dubbed the New Zealand Food Network - will be set up to support food banks and other community food providers.

The Children's Commissioner says it's about time benefits rose in line with wages - but the increase does not go far enough. Benefits will increase by more than three percent from April, linked to the net average wage rather than inflation.Sole parents will get almost $10.50 more a week, nearly twice the increase they would have otherwise got this year.Andrew Becroft told Kate Hawkesby benefits should be treated like superannuation, which goes up as wages go up."If there's growth in the country, both superannuation and benefits for children reflect that growth and keep in step."He says  benefits haven't kept pace with wages and economic growth."Poor children were the ones that missed out. You could argue that growth has been at the expense of children, so keeping them locked in to wage growth is the right thing to do."However, Becroft says there's a lot of damage to make up, since benefits were slashed in the 90s."The Government's own welfare expert advisory group said benefits would need to increase between 12 to 47 per cent, depending on the benefit, to make up that damage."LISTEN ABOVE  

The inaugural National Children's Commissioner Megan Mitchell has released her final report on children's rights in Australia. It's described as a “full and frank look” at how Australia is faring on a range of areas related to children and young people, and makes over 80 recommendations to improve our record. This episode, Lisa, Leanne and Liam have a discussion about how the early education sector is engaging with issues of children's rights, before we hear from an interview Liam conducted with Megan Mitchell on her report and her time as the first Children's Commissioner. Find the full shownotes at earlyeducationshow.com.

There is hope that the abolition of the right to silence in child abuse cases will get the backing in election year.The Children's Commissioner has called for the rule change, after a brutal assault of a four-year-old in Flaxmere.Victim's Rights Advocate Ruth Money says she doesn't like it when law and order gets thrown around in an election year.But she told Kate Hawkesby that this time, she wants change."We're in an election year and I hope for all the children out there someone grabs this and runs with it and fixes this."The little boy remains in Auckland's Starship Hospital, while police investigations continue.LISTEN TO THE AUDIO ABOVE

Rachel Clarke is a doctor working at a hospice. She’s a palliative care doctor and says the “currency of a hospice is kindness”. She's talking about sweet and thoughtful gestures that make a difference to dying patients and their loved ones. She’s also a great believer in talking to patients and relatives about how death comes, and says the reality of it is normally not as awful as we fear. Sixty thousand children stay at home for their education and do very well. They're taught by dedicated mums and dads. However, there are fresh concerns about home schooling due to a couple in Northamptonshire who are now in jail for child cruelty. They told their son's school that they wanted to teach him at home but he suffered four years of abuse. There's been a Serious Case Review into what happened and it concluded that home-schooling regulations in England and Wales need ‘urgent care’. We discuss with the Children's Commissioner, Anne Longfield. Do you have a criminal record for a relatively minor offence from years ago. Is it stopping you doing the jobs you'd like to do, like being a nurse, caring for children or working in a library? Two legal charities have launched a campaign called #FairChecks. They want the government to reform the way people have to disclose criminal records. Jenni talks to two women who've had DBS problems and to Rachel Tynan, from the charity Unlock. Georgie Codd, author of We Swim to the Shark, is really really scared of fish. She suffers from ichthyphobia – a fear of fish. She joins Jenni to talk about the drastic steps she took to overcome her phobia.

There are expected to be challenges for schools in reporting every incident of bullying.The Children's Commissioner and Race Relations Commissioner want mandatory reporting, and for schools to adopt anti-bullying measures.PPTA president Jack Boyle told Kate Hawkesby there's a moral obligation to make schools safe and get things right for children.But he's got some reservations about the idea."I'm not sure whether administrative burden for already busy teachers around every single event is by itself going to deal with bullying."He says school staff would have to be soliciting that information from young people."What the evidence shows us is that their not comfortable or actually able to tell you that that's going on."Boyle says schools need to respond to bullying with something that's evidence-based and will make a difference."Explicitly teaching pro-social values and behaviours, they have an impact on how people treat each other."  

The Children's Commissioner is once again urging police to give up pursuits if young people are behind the wheel.It's believed five teenagers were in a car being pursued by police in Christchurch yesterday.Their vehicle crashed into another, killing an innocent motorist.Judge Andrew Becroft told Chris Lynch many young offenders seem to enjoy the thrill of the chase. He says offenders want Police to chase them so they can photograph the action and gain instant fame amongst friends.

John Cowan interviews Children's Commissioner, Judge Andrew Becroft. 

Listen episode 2 of our podcast series - recorded for Care Day 15 February 2019. Our young people M and JK meet the Children's Commissioner for England, Anne Longfield. They are intrigued by Anne's claim to have superpowers to defend the rights of children that are often overlooked by policy makers in government. "Isn't it scary to stand in front of government and tell them what to do?" they ask? Find out Anne's answer to this and other very relevant questions about issues affecting the lives of our young people in care.

The Children's Commissioner Andrew Becroft says banning smoking with children in the car will see 100,000 kids no longer dealing with second-hand smoke.The Government has announced it will pass legislation by the end of the year, banning smoking in vehicles when children under 18 are present.A select committee gave the estimation while unanimously recommending the law in 2015.Children's Commissioner Andrew Becroft told Kate Hawkesby exposure to second-hand smoke has known negative impacts on health - including respiratory and bronchial problems, and cancer."[It] increases the risk of sudden infant death syndrome, it increases the risk of respiratory (bronchial) problems, the risk of cancer [and] meningococcal infection.""If they weren't exposed to second-hand smoke, those issues would all drop, there would be huge health benefits to the system as a whole. It would be a really positive step forward."He said a recent survey of year nine and 10 students showed around 20 to 30 per cent of them were exposed to second-hand smoke within the last week."If everybody stopped, that many children would benefit," he said.In terms of policing the ban, Becroft said, "no one is saying it's an easy law to enforce"."We don't speed because, at the end of the day, we know it's against the law.""We don't use our cell phones, although we may be tempted to, because it's against the law.""I hope a law like this will shift social norms [and] the police will be able to enforce it in the same way as when they stop cars for breath testing, seatbelt checks, license and registration checks, the can check for smoking as well, so I don't see it as an extra burden."He said good education should be at the forefront of the law change.

Episode 121 - It's been another one of those week's in British politics when the best way to sum things up is by loudly screaming while smacking your head into a large wooden pillar. Yes there's a Brexit Agreement, no, no one likes it, not even one person and if they say they do they're lying. This week Tiernan (@tiernandouieb) delves into why everyone be hatin' on May, plus a look at the UN rapporteur's report into poverty in the UK and a chat with Jen Persson (@TheABB) at Defend Digital Me (@defenddigitalme) about the Children's Commissioner's report into children's digital rights. Donate to the Patreon at www.patreon.com/parpolbroBuy me a coffee at https://ko-fi.com/parpolbroWatch Tiernan's comedy specials on Next Up Comedy at: www.nextupcomedy.comJoin Tiernan's comedy mailing list at www.tiernandouieb.co.uk/contactFollow us on Twitter @parpolbro, on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/ParPolBro/ and the fancy webpage at http://www.partlypoliticalbroadcast.co.ukMusic by The Last Skeptik (@thelastskeptik) - https://www.thelastskeptik.com/ - Subscribe to his podcast Thanks For Trying here. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

This week we have an interview with Megan Mitchell, the inaugural National Children's Commissioner. Commissioner Mitchell discusses why a Children's Commissioner is so important, the successes and areas of improvement for Australia in relation to children's rights, and what she will be working on over the next two years. Episode Times 01'07" News Chat 15'12" Megan Mitchell Interview 34'43" Recommendations Find the full shownotes at earlyeducationshow.com.

Over the next 18 months Children's Commissioner Judge Andrew Becroft will oversee the latest shake up for the ministry responsible for the wellbeing of children and more broadly families. The Ministry for Child Youth and Family will morph into Ministry for Vulnerable Children. It's a massive undertaking. While Judge Becroft has been outspoken in his dislike of the Ministry's new name, he is committed to making the new entity achieve more for our children. In his first six months on the job he's also welcomed a rise in the youth justice age to 17 and shared his concerns about the findings of the 4th Child Poverty Monitor.

Maggie Atkinson, the Children's Commissioner for England, says pets and adults will continue to receive better protection unless parents smacking their children is outlawed.This woman and her like are helping to cause the misery which has now allowed children to become monsters. Get rid of this silliness..Punish the bad parents. These are the parents who are NOT checking their children. So what do parents do? An unnamed single mother has had both of her sons removed after posting an advert on Craigslist listing a baby for sale which she claims was a 'silly, silly joke. Could food be the cause of childrens' crying. It is an important issue especially as obese children have been taken away by social workers after being overfed by their families. We highlight a horrible case of child murder from America. On a lighter note a Labour MP, Shadow transport secretary Mary Creagh, has criticised Thomas the Tank Engine. She said that more female characters should be introduced to encourage girls to become train drivers! The press informs us that England has overtaken the Netherlands to become second only to tiny Malta as the most densely populated nation in the EU. This was early in the week and today they give us "After immigration controls are lifted this week, Britons could find their jobs are squeezed in some areas – while community tensions could rise as the new wave of migrants fight for work with other Eastern Europeans." Waste is on the agenda and Wolverhampton City Council has been accused of spending a fortune on producing leaflets, sent to residents asking them to sift through their waste for every scrap of wrapping paper after Christmas. One man without too much worry over expenditure is Bernard Gray, who was appointed as the Ministry of Defence to help manage the Waste budget, enjoyed 106 stays in London and Bristol hotels, for £23,000, despite living less than 60 miles from both.

Paddy O'Connell explores a subject that reflects his own experience: the effect of great emotional upheaval on family life. When Paddy was 11 his father died, and in this week's programme -- in order to explore what impact this can have -- he meets Professor Sir Al Aynsley-Green who, at the age of 10, lost his own father. Almost immediately he decided that, when he grew up, he would become a doctor so that other children "didn't have to lose their mummies and daddies". This passion for helping children has continued throughout his career: Sir Al was the first Children's Commissioner for England (2005-2010), having also been involved in the political arena of Children's Services since 2000. He was appointed Chair of the NHS Taskforce for Children and then the first National Clinical Director for Children in government. He believes strongly that the topic of childhood bereavement should be spoken about more openly. Producer: Karen Gregor.