The Children's Rights Alliance Annual Report Card, now in its eighth edition, scrutinises the Government on its key commitments to children in the Programme for Government. For the fourth year in a row, the Government is awarded an overall ‘C’ Grade, as assessed and graded by our independent panel of experts, and reflecting a number of positive developments. However, there are also a number of key areas within which the government has continued to fail the most marginalised groups and these need to be urgently addressed.

One ‘A’ grade appears in Report Card 2016, namely the section on ‘Inequalities in Family Life’. This is as a result of much-needed, comprehensive family law reform during 2015. The Chapter on Education fared well: ‘School Buildings’ received an ‘A-’ and ‘Child Literacy’ gained a ‘B+’. The Right to Protection from Abuse and Neglect also did well receiving an overall ‘B’ grade. These were all dragged down by poor grades for ‘Child Poverty’ awarded an ‘E-’ grade and ‘Child and Youth Homelessness’ which dropped to an ‘F’. The situation for ‘Traveller and Roma Children’ and ‘Migrant Children’ only slightly improved, receiving an ‘E-’ and a ‘D-’ respectively.

P.63 Alcohol, Smoking and Drugs
‘Alcohol, Smoking and Drugs’ gets a ‘B’ grade in Report Card 2016, an increase from the ‘C-’ awarded in Report Card 2015. 2015 saw the long awaited publication of the Public Health Alcohol Bill 2015, the successful passage of the Public Health (Standardised Packaging of Tobacco) Act 2015 and a commitment to develop a new Drugs Strategy in 2016.