Saskatchewan Children's Advocate Office National Child Day Media Release

For Immediate Release:

November 20, 2009



National Child Day — The Way Forward: Transforming ‘Paper Rights’ into ‘Lived Rights’ for Saskatchewan Children and Youth



SASKATOON — As Canada celebrates National Child Day and joins the world in commemorating the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Saskatchewan Children’s Advocate continues to urge the provincial government to develop a Children and Youth First Vision and Action Plan.

“We need to ensure that there are clear implementation plans in each child-serving ministry to incorporate into policy, practice and legislation the Children and Youth First Principles that were adopted by the Government of Saskatchewan this past February,” said Marvin Bernstein, Saskatchewan Children’s Advocate. “The Principles are based on those provisions contained in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, deemed most critical to the well being of Saskatchewan children and youth.”

The development of a Children and Youth First Vision and Action Plan was one of the recommendations included in the Children’s Advocate Office’s report on foster home overcrowding and is the logical next step after the provincial government has stated that ‘these Principles will act as a guide in examining policy and legislation and in developing and implementing both policy and legislative changes’.”

“There are children and youth, who are living in deplorable conditions of poverty, abuse and/or neglect in our province,” said Bernstein. “The harm these children and youth experience can affect them for the rest of their lives, as well as future generations. We need look no further than the staggering over-representation of Aboriginal children in care in our province, at nearly 80 per cent compared to 25 per cent of the total child population, to realize that we have a significant problem close to home.”

Bernstein believes that while it is vital for Saskatchewan citizens to consider and address the plight of children and youth across the globe, we must also recognize that many of Saskatchewan’s own sons and daughters have not been afforded the basic human rights set out in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

“Acknowledging these rights does not infringe on parents’ rights to decide what is best for their child and is not a matter of placing children in conflict with adults, but of securing the survival, development, protection and participation of our most vulnerable citizens,” said Bernstein..

“The content of the Convention is not radical–that children have a right to proper nutrition, shelter, an adequate living standard, medical services, education, play, culture, access to information, freedom of thought, freedom of expression, and to be safeguarded against all forms of abuse, neglect and exploitation,” said Bernstein. “These are basic human rights that are afforded most every other group of people in our country, and if recognized and promoted, can afford children increasing opportunities to participate in the activities of their society and prepare them for responsible adulthood. That is good for all of us, and it is certainly good for a government that has to deal with the alternative issues and pressures that arise when children and youth are marginalized.”

“Here in Saskatchewan, we must provide additional community supports to prevent children from coming into care in the first place, properly fund kinship care in those circumstances where children must leave the homes of their biological family, and develop ‘open’ and ‘custom’ adoption options, so that more of our waiting Saskatchewan children can be moved into loving permanent homes, rather than drifting in foster care, while international adoptions continue to flourish and disproportionately benefit children from other countries,” said Bernstein.

The Children’s Advocate Office recognizes that there has been a shift in the recognition and elevation of the human rights of children in our province in 2009. This was realized through a series of events that included the adoption of the Children and Youth First Principles in February, followed in September by the announcement that the Governments of Saskatchewan, Canada and the Saskatchewan Federation of Indian Nations had reached a tripartite agreement on an interim process to implement Jordan’s Principle, and more recently, the Government of Saskatchewan’s initiation of the broad–and what has been called a “landmark”–review of child welfare in our province.

“These three events demonstrate a commitment to our young people and present real opportunities to transform the ‘paper rights’ of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child into ‘lived rights’ for all Saskatchewan children and youth,” said Bernstein. “So as we celebrate the near universal ratification of that document this November 20th, we also have a unique opportunity to mark the significant strides we are making in Saskatchewan.”

“Ultimately, we will be defined and judged as a society by the legacy of how we have shouldered our greatest responsibility,” continued Bernstein, “which is to ensure the well being of our children and to promote respect for their fundamental human rights.”

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For more information contact:



Laura Beard

Director of Public Education and Communications

Children’s Advocate Office

(306) 933-6700





The Saskatchewan Children’s Advocate Office was established in 1994 as an independent office under the Ombudsman and Children’s Advocate Act.