Posts tagged ‘Children Rights’
President Putin: «We should see the family as our national heritage»
On February 9 President Putin addressed a political conference of a neo-Communist-type movement, which had, among other topics, protection of parental rights and state education issues on its agenda. Mr Putin’s speech came as a sort of response to concerns about attempts to introduce legal methods giving the state, under the pretext of protecting the rights of the child, too broadly defined, sweeping powers to intrude in family life, parent-child relations, and education of children being voiced by many Russians. Mr Putin referred to these concerns as “a strong public reaction [that] was caused by the draft laws proposing direct or indirect regulation of relations between parents and children”. Many commentators took this speech as policy statement of sorts.
Throughout 2012 Russian pro-family oriented experts kept attacking one of the governmental bills considered by the State Duma (Parliament) which gave the state vaguely rationalized sweeping powers to intrude in family life. The draft legislation faced both criticism from pro-family oriented experts (our own FamilyPolicy.ru Group was among them with an analytical report on the bill critical of the proposed law) and mass opposition by the public, including protests, letters to the President demanding to throw out the bill, and so on. In his address, Mr Putin noted that “the draft laws’ provisions … may be ambiguous and contain explicit social risks. Most importantly, they do not take Russian family traditions fully into account”.
He also criticized some of the internationally promoted methods of child protection More…
Russian opinion poll says citizens are firm: protecting children is the job of the parents, not the state
On February 8 the results of a national poll by the Russian National Opinion Research Centre targeting 1600 people in 138 communities across 46 localities (variation under 3.4%) have arrived. Russian citizens were asked who, in their view, must play the key role in protecting the children and what did they think about the adoption of heavily intrusive methods of child protection prevalent in some Western countries.
It shows that the majority (76%) of those interviewed think the key role in protecting underage children should be played by their family, their parents. Only 16% think the state should intervene in the matter first. A minority (4%) or interviewees said protection of children and adolescents should be the responsibility of community-based organizations.
71% of the Russians oppose the rights of the child being priority over the rights of the parents. 60% argue children should not be given a right to bring their parents of teachers to court on their own.
Opinions on mandatory reporting of suspected child abuse are split. 49% of those interviewed are against the introduction of this policy, with 41% in favour.