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Source:
www.gov.sg |
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SPEECH BY DR VIVIAN BALAKRISHNAN,MINISTER FOR
COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT, YOUTH AND SPORTS AND 2ND MINISTER FOR TRADE AND
INDUSTRY, AT THE 6TH ASIAN REGIONAL INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR PREVENTION
OF CHILD ABUSE AND NEGLECT (ISPCAN) CONFERENCE |
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An Excerpt |
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Last year, my Ministry conducted a survey on
the well-being of children and the quality of parent-child relationships
in Singapore. |
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Almost all of the 2,300 plus children
surveyed, who were between 10 and 14 years of age, felt that their
parents showed them love and concern. |
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On average, 8 out of 10 children agreed that
their communication with parents was open and meaningful. This augurs
well for parent-child relationships here. |
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Children are our future |
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This year marks the 10th anniversary of
Singapore¡¯s ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights
of the Child (CRC). |
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This convention is one of the most supported
conventions amongst all the countries in the world. To date, 192
countries have ratified the Convention. This underlines the
international commitment towards promoting children¡¯s rights. |
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Since we ratified the Convention in 1995,
Singapore has achieved several milestones in the promotion of children¡¯s
well-being. I must say children in Singapore today have never been more
fortunate. We have established good laws and their rights are well
protected. |
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For instance, we amended our Employment Act
last year to raise the minimum working age for children and young
persons from 14 to 15 years. |
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This is in line with a key International
Labour Organisation (ILO) convention that restricts the minimum age of
children in employment which Singapore has recently ratified in November
2005. |
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We amended the law and ratified the
Convention to ensure that our children will not be exploited or be
denied of their right to have a fulfilling childhood. |
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This year¡¯s ¡°The State of the World¡¯s
Children¡± report by UNICEF, which surveyed 133 countries, ranked
Singapore together with Sweden, as having the lowest infant mortality
rate for children under the age of 5. |
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Our children¡¯s life expectancy has also
increased. Their quality of life has also improved. And with all the
improvements in medicine and technology, I would say that there is hope
that we can all live longer and enjoy a better quality of life. |
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Every Child is Precious |
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Yet, there remain a very small percentage of
children who will need protection because they are not safe from harm,
either from their own families or from adults who are supposed to care
for them. |
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But let me emphasise that the number of
children who are abused is small. |
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Over the last 5 years, my Ministry
investigated an average of 188 complaints of alleged child abuse each
year. Only in 40% of cases did our investigations reveal real evidence
of abuse. |
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Granted, the number of cases with evidence
of abuse increased by about one and a half times from 61 in 2000 to 90
in 2004. This is due largely to greater awareness among those who have
regular contact with children and who reported the incidents to the
authorities for intervention. |
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What is significant is that the number of
physical abuse cases has gone down between 2003 and 2004. This is a good
sign. |
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Our challenge now is to strengthen the
avenues of help available for children suffering from emotional and
psychological abuse. |
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When we amended the Children and Young
Persons Act in 2001, we expanded the definition of abuse to include
emotional and psychological abuse. While we know that it is difficult to
detect emotional and psychological abuse, there can be far more serious
and long-term damage to a child¡¯s healthy development. |
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When it comes to protecting children, we
adopt a pro-child approach. We listen to what they say, or rather more
tellingly, what they are afraid to say. We want to help children build
trusting relationships with adults, and help them heal where they have
been hurt. Ultimately, we want to restore their sense of self-worth and
confidence, even if it takes time. |
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Child abuse and neglect are problems that
every society must tackle. Child abuse and neglect are often treated as
private affairs that do not warrant public attention. Families tend to
under-report incidents of child abuse because they do not wish to ¡°wash
their dirty linen in public.¡± Neighbours also tend to turn a blind eye
to such instances, so as not to ¡°affect good neighbourly ties¡±. |
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We have to find the right mechanisms that
will help us to safeguard the well-being of our children. Evidence from
other countries has shown that mandatory reporting can be
counter-productive. |
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Over-zealous reporting of child abuse can
subject families and children to substantial stress, especially if the
alleged abuse turns out to be unsubstantiated. It can result in
professionals themselves under-reporting child abuse cases out of fear
that it will do more damage to the families and children concerned. |
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What is important, then, is for people who
have regular contact with children to be knowledgeable about how to
detect and report child abuse. |
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In Singapore, we have strengthened the child
abuse reporting system by regularly training professionals at child care
centres, kindergartens, schools and polyclinics on the detection and
reporting of child abuse... |
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Full Text of Speech |
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Source:
www.gov.sg Media Release 16 Nov 2005 |
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FrontPage Edition: Thu 17 Nov 2005
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