News

1 June 2023

It is the First of June again and the sky of Bulgaria will once again be filled with colourful balloons symbolising the happy childhood of the Bulgarian children. Songs and dances will ring across stages and squares, there will be hundreds of congratulations and they will wish all the best for the children – progress, support, opportunities, rights, quality education, accessible healthcare, policies for children with priorities, resources in support of families, integration of measures and spheres, sport playgrounds, safe environment and many smiles! Yet, this should only be a part of the celebration! Today, it is more important that we, as institutions and a society, will confirm our commitment to help, protect and guarantee the observance of the rights of every child.

This is why today, in my capacity of the national Ombudsman and an independent authority protecting the rights of children, I would like to draw the attention to the problems and barriers child policies, children and families face. It is today that is ever more important to pay attention to the vulnerable groups of children – children in poverty, children with disabilities, children from marginalised communities, refugee children and children whose parents who live and work abroad on a long-term basis.

In the same way as our predecessors from the Union for the Protection of Children in Bulgaria who led a procession on Children’s Day in the streets of Sofia in 1928. It was led by Prime Minister Andrey Lyapchev together with Sofia Metropolitan Stefan, Members of Parliament, mayors and public figures but it was not for celebrations and merriness. The participants’ appeal was not to forget the poor children, the children who were victims of the earthquake. The calls to the people were “to fulfil the public duty to the children and to show little has been done for the children of Bulgaria.” For the first time in Bulgaria, public figures and politicians came together to look for answers to the questions: How much and what is known about children? How many of them suffer in hunger? How many of them are forced to work? How do children develop? Who takes care of the abandoned children and the children orphaned because of the wars? Child mortality, disease, malnutrition – problems which were not covered by effective public efforts while the state care for children was very limited. The Union for the Protection of Children tried to attract public attention to a whole new attitude to the children in Bulgaria as a duty of all adults and a responsibility to the future of a country.

Today, as a society, we are again faced with the need to find solutions to similar problems – the demographic data are frightening: the child population aged below 14 are down by more than 40%; the risk of poverty and social exclusion for children is more than 33%. In this situation, the children in Bulgaria can achieve a mere 61% of their abilities, according to data of the World Health Organisation. This means that Bulgaria needs comprehensive policies to ensure adequate development for every Bulgarian child.

Despite the progress the State has achieved in certain areas of children’s rights, it remains partial; account should also be taken of the fact that still few of the recommendations from the Concluding Observations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child for Bulgaria from 2016 and 2018 have been implemented satisfactorily. This situation shows that there are a number of problems and challenges which can be outlined in relation to the state of child policies in the country.

The levels of discrimination and violence against children, of abuse, continuing segregation against Roma children, decrease in the children’s learning skills after the pandemics and the absence of compensatory and alleviating measures for its adverse consequences are still troubling. The phenomenon of child and generational poverty resulting in social exclusion; as well as children with no legal representation because their parents live and work outside the country on a long-term basis.

Today, just like a hundred year ago, there is still no policy to improve the process of data collection; there is a particular issue with disaggregated data and, more specifically, data about children with disabilities, children living in marginalised environments and situations and Roma children. There are also substantial problems with data collection regarding child welfare and the protection of children. A number of examples show discrepancies in the data in terms of the number of children who are victims of the gravest crime – premeditated murder, where the information of the institutions involved differs up to 10 times as well as the cases of children who are victims of violence, the number of unaccompanied refugee children and others.

The lack of shared and adequate data hampers the formulation and performance of appropriate monitoring of policies and programs to apply the rights of children. The creation, application and evaluation of policies are seldom based on reliable quantitative data; most strategic documents refer to the official statistics collected by the National Statistical Institute and Eurostat. In most cases, there is no direct connection between the data cited in one document or another and the measures and expected results set out in it. Most national documents lack adequate sets of indicators to monitor and assess implementation which could show the existence or absence or progress of certain policies or an assessment of the risk of poverty for children, social exclusion, violation of their fundamental rights.

Today, more than ever, we need togetherness and sharing which could outline a clear vision of reforms and a comprehensive approach, first in support of children in their family environment. There are disconcerting data that the share of children in public care is still too large in comparison to the overall child population in the country.

There is still no evidence that the budgeting process related to child policies takes into account the amount and effectiveness of public expenditure as an investment in children. Key processes such as foster care and the support for the capacity of the professionals working in the protection system remain funded by European programs. The instrument developed by the National Network for Children to assess the financial investments in children is not used.

The pillar of the Child Protection Act is the protection system but, unfortunately, it is also in a precarious situation. Urgent actions to make changes are needed so that the system would not remain so ineffective and overburdened in its work. To approve adequate professional standards of social work, to guarantee targeted and systemic investment for the people employed in the social sphere because this is the only way to achieve professional support for vulnerable and traumatised children and protection of the rights of children in Bulgaria; to actually improve the working conditions and the remuneration of social workers; to plan and implement specific measures which would result in strengthening the important role of the protection system and social work in which the citizens will invest their trust.

Despite the partial attempts at reform in the area of juvenile justice and the directions of actions identified, in practice, there are no specific and real activities to implement this commitment of the State. There is institutional resistance and a significant delay to finalise the reform in the system of juvenile justice which has a negative impact on the situation of the children in conflict with the law and on the children who have a contact with the judiciary. Partial guarantees are introduced for child-friendly proceedings in the criminal justice system but such are missing in the system of the obsolete Combating Anti-Social Behaviour of Minors and Underage Children Act which still results in criminal treatment of children below the minimum age for this, punishing them even for violations for which adults bear no liability. The national system of child protection does not work with children in conflict with the law and does not treat them as children at risk.

I call for urgent actions which would implement in practice the reform in the area of juvenile justice. There is an urgent need to adopt a new special law in this area in line with the international standards which will introduce the principles of restorative justice and standards for protection against arbitrary detention and will ensure fair trial, accessible and quality legal aid, including adequate legal representation of children in conflict with the law. 

Parents and citizens reach out to me every day because the rights and interests of children with disabilities are not catered for in the best possible way. There is certain satisfactory yet insufficient progress in the fulfilment of the commitments of the State in relation to the rights of children with disabilities. The actions the State has taken have not yielded the necessary overall effect on this group of children while they have numerous problems – restricted access to inclusive education, to quality healthcare; they are often the object of discrimination and inequality; there are no early intervention services for babies and young children with impediments in their development; children struggle with an inaccessible environment in terms of its architecture. There are insufficient services for children with disabilities at the local level. Certain financial benefits in support of families of children with disabilities have been increased but it is important to implement an overall effective approach combining a series of targeted measures to change the lives of children with disabilities and protect their dignity.

I would like to continue with the problem and challenges for children, their rights and their families but many of them are reflected in the Ombudsman’s 2022 Annual Activity Report together with the findings and recommendations.

Today, on this day when we celebrate children and we take on our most important promises to them, I would like to believe that all of us, as a society and institutions, have sufficient motivation to work on every problem, to have a vision about the changes, where we want to go as a society. What do we want to achieve for our children? We, the adults, need to find working solutions in support of children and to put them together in a meaningful jigsaw puzzle of child policies which will guarantee real and measurable change in the life of every child. It is the only way in which we can be sure that we place children and their interests first!

Today, and not only today, it is important for every one of us to look a child in the eyes and see the future there! The future we need to provide care for and to work every day for! To come to understand that the protection of the rights of children requires not only political will and statements but also mobilisation of all public resources, care and responsibility!

Dear children of Bulgaria, happy International Children’s Day!