Children's rights and residential care in England. Principles and practices

Any discussion on the development of children's rights must consider the role of the state in actively promoting children's rights, as it is the state which is the signatory to the U N Convention on the Rights of the child. It is the state which is in legal terms one of the "parties" to the convention and which therefore has obligations towards children. There have been developments in children's rights in England, particularly for children who are in state care, since New labour came to power in 1997. The change in government has created an unprecedented opportunity to effect significant progress in this area of social policy. This paper looks specifically at how the Quality Protects initiative, launched in September 1998, aims to implement the rights of children in the care of the state in England. "Quality Protects" represents an explicit statement by government about their expectations of the quality of services delivered to children and their families by local authorities. Its provisions are examined a they relate to the three pillars of Protection, Provision and Participation round which the the UN Convention structures the rights of the child