Home > National strategy on children and young people’s participation in decision-making 2015 – 2020.

Ireland. Department of Children and Youth Affairs. (2015) National strategy on children and young people’s participation in decision-making 2015 – 2020. Dublin: Government Publications.

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The goal of this first National Strategy on Children and Young People’s Participation in Decision-making is to ensure that children and young people will have a voice in their individual and collective everyday lives across the five national outcome areas. The strategy is primarily aimed at children and young people under the age of 18, but also embraces the voice of young people in the transition to adulthood up to the age of 24. The strategy is guided and influenced by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) and the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.
The strategy focuses on the everyday lives of children and young people and the places and spaces in which they are entitled to have a voice in decisions that affect their lives. Accordingly, the strategy identifies the following objectives and priority areas for action:

1. Children and young people will have a voice in decisions made in their local communities.
2. Children and young people will have a voice in decision-making in early education, schools and the wider formal and non-formal education systems.
3. Children and young people will have a voice in decisions that affect their health and well-being, including on the health and social services delivered to them.
4. Children and young people will have a voice in the Courts and legal system.

The strategy contains a series of additional objectives, which include:
5. Promoting effective leadership to champion and promote participation of children and young people.
6. Development of education and training for professionals working with and on behalf of children and young people.
7. Mainstreaming the participation of children and young people in the development of policy, legislation and research.

Underlying all objectives in this strategy are the following key fundamentals:
• recognition that children and young people have a right to participate in decisions that affect their lives;
• ensuring the protection and welfare of children and young people in accordance with Children First: National Guidance for the Protection and Welfare of Children4;
• improving and establishing mechanisms to ensure the participation of seldom-heard and vulnerable children and young people in decision-making;
• collection of data, monitoring and evaluation of children and young people’s participation initiatives.


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