Children Webmag - Editorial

A couple of months ago we reported the proposal for a National Commission to consider the role of children and young people in society. We are offering a fundamental point for the debate. It’s a point we have made before, but that does not make it less important.

More than ever before, children and young people are growing up in a world where what is happening anywhere else in the world may have a direct impact on them, and looking to the future, this can only increase.

It used to be stated as a philosophical point that a butterfly falling to the ground in China affected a person in England, the other side of the world. In days gone by, the point may have been philosophical only, emphasising the unity of the planet on which we all live, but today it affects our everyday lives.

When we play with a cheap football, it may be because it has been sewn by a child in Pakistan. If we drink cheap coffee or eat cheap chocolate, it could be because of low wages paid to West African or South American children. If we buy cheap clothes, they may have been made by people in China working on wages which would be unacceptable in the United States or Western Europe. A person who collects child porn on the internet in this country is contributing to the creation of a market which leads to child abuse world-wide.

When banks from the developed countries seek the repayment of loans from poor countries, it is the education and health care of the powerless – including children – which suffer. When there are trade wars the rich and powerful nations ensure their own economies are protected first, and it is the poor countries which are the casualties.

So we suggest to the National Commission, when it is set up, that its first assumption is that it will have to consider the needs of children and young people internationally in the first instance, and see the needs of those in this country in the wider context of the world community. For the whole of their lives, today’s children and young people will be affected by the lives of their peers in other countries. Whether they are fellow-voters in Europe, economic migrants, people met on holiday, backpacking students or terrorists, their lives will impinge on the lives of children in this country.

We will only have a safe and secure world when no-one is exploited, when everyone gets fair shares for their contributions, and in particular, when children do not have to pay the price.