UNCRC Strategic Implementation Board minutes: April 2025

Attendees and apologies

• Lucinda Rivers, UNICEF UK
• Juliet Harris, Together Scotland
• Amy Woodhouse, Parenting Across Scotland
• Jennifer Davidson, Institute for Inspiring Children’s Futures
• Laura Pasternak, Coalition of Care and Support Providers Scotland
• Craig Morris, Care Inspectorate
• Eleanor Deeming, Scottish Human Rights Commission
• Emma Hunter, Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland (CYCPS) – deputising for Gina Wilson
• Laura Caven, COSLA

Scottish Government supporting officials 

• Liz Levy, Unit Head, Children’s Rights Unit (Chair – Deputising for Deputy Director for Children’s Rights, Protection and Justice)
• Andrew Preston, UNCRC Programme Assistant, Children’s Rights Unit (secretariat)
• Lyndsey Saki, Embedding Children’s Rights in Public Services Programme Lead, Children’s Rights Unit
• Paul Gorman, Empowering Children and Young People Programme Lead
• Luiza Leite, Embedding Children’s Rights in Public Services Team (minutes)
• Ezhilarasi Mahadevan, Embedding Children’s Rights in Public Services Team (minutes)

Guests

• Elaine Park, Embedding Children’s Rights in Public Services Programme (for item 4)
• Allan Lindsay, Toni Andrews, and Sara Daniels, Young Scot (for item 5)

Apologies

• Kay Tisdall, The Observatory of Children’s Human Rights in Scotland
• Joe Smith, Right Reporting and Monitoring Programme Lead, Children’s Rights Unit

Items and actions

Item 1: welcome and apologies 

Liz Levy (LL) welcomed members to the new ‘slimline’ UNCRC Strategic Implementation Board. The group will now be chaired at Deputy Director rather than Directorate level to reflect that we are now moving into a steady state phase. LL explained she’s chairing in this instance due to prior diary commitments in Deputy Directors’ diaries.

Action: Secretariat will update the SIB membership list (including the version on the SIB website) to clarify that Jennifer Davidson (JD) will be attending for the Institute for Inspiring Children’s Futures, and Kay Tisdall (KT) will be joining on behalf of the Observatory of Children’s Human Rights Scotland and to reflect any other membership changes.

LL welcomed Eleanor Deeming (ED) from the Scottish Human Rights Commission (SHRC) as this is her first time attending the SIB. ED noted that it will be either herself or colleague Caitlin Fitzgerald who will attend future meetings.

LL explained that to ensure that SIB continues to hear the voice of a wide range of public authorities, there will be work to strengthen the link between SIB and the Embedding in Public Services Reference Group. This will be done by scheduling the meetings of the Embedding Group for shortly before each SIB meeting and having a standing item that updates SIB on any key messages that Group would like to share, especially about the need for additional support and/or resources. LL explained that we are working to bring the meetings of the two groups into closer synchronisation in the future.

Members were invited to let the SIB secretariat know if there was anything that would potentially make future meetings more accessible for them in future.

Item 2: minutes and actions from previous meeting 

The minutes of the last incarnation of SIB were circulated on 5 February with no amendment requests received. Once minutes have gone through the relevant clearance process with SGLD they will be published on the Strategic Implementation Board webpage.

There were 2 new actions raised at the January meeting, both of which were actioned (as detailed within the action tracker circulated on 22 April). There were no outstanding actions.

Item 3: Programme Highlight Report 

The Programme Highlight Report was shared with members on 22 April and sets out progress against previous activities, priorities for the next quarter and the current status of deliverables.

Emma Hunter (EH) asked if Maria Galli could be replaced with Gina Wilson on the circulation list for the development of the Pathways resource (including sending the final drafts of the Pathways resource to the original working group for comments, edit drafts, and then publication).

Action: Gina Wilson to replace Maria Galli on list for Pathways resource feedback.

EH also asked for more detail about the planned engagement with courts and tribunals stakeholders to scope where CRU may be able to provide some proportionate support on taking a children’s human rights approach. Lyndsey Saki (LS) explained that consideration of this is still at a very early stage. She noted that there is to be new training for child welfare reporters, which may also be helpful to include wider UNCRC training.

EH asked whether there is a timeframe for adding the exemption to compatibility duties. LL explained that the Bill which will include this exemption will be introduced to Parliament imminently.

Amy Woodhouse (AW) noted that the refreshed Parent Club UNCRC page has launched and that while there has been some positive feedback, but some of the messaging is still not quite right. AW explained that the parent club team are aware of this and that she is liaising with Paul Gorman (PG) separately about this.

Juliet Harris (JH) asked whether there is a proposed peer review process for UNCRC children’s rights reports. LS explained that’s something the Embedding in Public Services reference group are considering. The group recently considered a  paper about a sampling approach and other potential options. This will be considered at the next Embedding group meeting. There could potentially be a peer review process but conversations are ongoing to establish what would be most proportionate. LS noted that Public Health Scotland have recently met with SG colleagues and are also interested in child rights reporting.

JH highlighted the importance of children and young people being involved in the child rights reporting process, and called for a way of mainstreaming children and young people’s views in these reports.

JH also highlighted that with RRSA funding coming to an end, it would be good to explore the learning on this. LL explained that an item on this was considered for the current meeting but, to avoid crowding the agenda, it was decided to discuss this at the next meeting of SIB. Lucinda Rivers (LR) noted that Unicef UK are still to submit the final report to SG but are happy with the outcome of this funding.

Action: Reflections on the national funding for the RRSA and next steps to be included as an agenda item for the next SIB meeting.

JH also asked about the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO) new complaints process, and whether there is a way to gather insights (whilst maintaining privacy) to help prioritise action on some of the key children’s rights issues. LS explained this was covered at the last Child Rights Regulation and Improvement action group meeting. Although the focus of complaints have been varied, evolving capacities and best interests of the child are recurring themes.

JH shared a helpful note by the UN Committee on evolving capacities.

Action: LS to share the minutes of the last Child Rights Regulation and Improvement action group meeting with SIB once ready.

JH asked about the procurement of a digital and interactive version of the Skills & Knowledge Framework, as Together’s members are still keen to see this. LS explained that the SG will evaluate the current Skills & Knowledge Framework before assessing how much added value could be provided by a digital, interactive version and how this could be delivered in a way that meets accessibility standards.

Item 4: support for public authorities on commencement

Elaine Park (EP) provided a presentation on the Children’s Rights Skills and Knowledge Framework which was  launched on 12 March 2025 with the help of: Together Scotland, Children’s Parliament, Just Right Scotland, JRS Knowhow & the Observatory of Children’s Human Rights Scotland. A children and families panel and a professional panel were also involved throughout the development of the Framework.

EP explained how the Framework can be used flexibly alongside the tools in the Training Plan, allowing members of the public authority workforce to assess the level of skills and knowledge they need for their role or their organisation and access the Framework content they need to help make learning about a broad subject area more manageable.

The Framework approach has built on the Right Way – a children’s rights approach from the Children’s Commissioner of Wales. The Framework is structured around five principles identified in the Welsh approach. These are embedding, equality and non-discrimination, empowerment, participation and accountability.

The learning journey through the Skills and Knowledge Framework is intended to be progressive, continual, cumulative, and lifelong. There are three levels of learning: informed, skilled and enhanced. Users can use the Framework to deepen their knowledge and move from one level to the next as desired. EP noted that everyone using the framework should be aiming to reach at least informed level.

The accompanying Training Plan also gives organisations information on how to plan, design, and deliver training.

The Skills & Knowledge Framework and Training Plan are being hosted by Together on their website on a temporary basis. EP confirmed that the Embedding team are currently working with SG procurement team to identify a long-term host.

Next steps are to understand how organisations are using the Framework and how we can help them to get more out of it and to raise awareness among who haven’t used it fully yet.

There has been some really positive feedback about the framework since it was launched.

Item 5: feedback from children and young people on the draft commitments in the Children’s Rights Scheme

LL reminded members on the engagement with key stakeholders (SHRC, CYPCS, Together and UNICEF) in producing the draft Children’s Rights Scheme (CRS) so far. The latest draft of the CRS was shared in the papers for this meeting, along with an account of the feedback received and whether and how this has been addressed.

LL confirmed that the aim is to send the next version of the CRS, once revised to reflect feedback from children and young people, to members by close on 9 May with an invitation for any written feedback by 20 May. Thereafter the aim is to publish the draft CRS by 26 June, and lay it formally before Parliament as soon as possible after summer recess.

LL explained that the CRS has been restructured around the principles of taking a children’s human rights based approach. Although the earlier feedback has been addressed as much as was considered possible, LL is also happy for members to record any strong feelings about what we haven't been able to address.

Laura Pasternack (LP) asked if the commitment to collect data to understand children’s experiences of raising a rights concern will be used to help understand the sufficiency of advocacy provisions being made available across Scotland. She highlighted her concerns that this was not yet sufficiently available and that this is an important provision for children’s whose rights are most at risk. LP confirmed that she is already engaging with Paul Gorman about this. LL commented that the intention is to use the data to inform recommendations about the need for further support, whatever that may be. JH offered to share any notes from a previous advocacy meeting which may be relevant to members.

LL invited Allan Lindsay (AL), Toni Andrews (TA), and Sara Daniels (SD) from Young Scot to outline the methods used and key findings from their engagement with children and young people on the commitments in the draft CRS.

Presentation from Young Scot

Two key strands of activity were delivered. The first was a short survey for children and young people aged 9-18. This gave information on the proposed CRS and asked for opinions and feedback. The responses to this survey then informed the design and delivery of in-person sessions for children and young people aged 9-18 aimed at exploring the findings from the national survey in more depth and giving young people the opportunity to share their views and experiences directly.

The survey ran from 17 February 2025 to 24 March 2025, and was promoted through Young Scot stakeholder channels, (Twitter/X; LinkedIn, Bluesky, Threads) and through paid ads on Meta sites (Facebook, Instagram).

The survey attracted 195 completed responses: 68 from 9-13 year olds; and 127 from 14-18 year olds. Responses were received from:

• 29 Local authority areas
• 20% in most deprived SIMD quintile
• 23% Young Carers
• 14% Care experienced
• 74% White / White Scottish / White British

Young Scot delivered a full engagement day with YSHive volunteers, covering 4 in-person engagement sessions with 11 to 13 year olds, and 14 to 18 year olds, and one stand alone primary school session with 9 and 10 year olds. A total of 29 children and young people engaged with the in-person sessions, with 14 taking part aged 9 to 13, and 15 taking part aged 14 to 18.

Overall survey responses were positive about the direction of travel proposed by SG. However a key theme throughout both sets of responses was scepticism about schools and other institutions genuinely implementing a children’s rights approach.

Other key points made by children and young people included: particular attention should be given to vulnerable froups of children (i.e. those with additional support needs, mental health conditions, struggling with school, etc); the SG should engage with children directly to find out if their rights are being protected; and adults should  be supported to know how to talk to children in a way they understand.

JH comments that that much of this chimes with what Together hear from children and young people and could also be used to prioritise progress on the concluding observations and other requests for action that the CRU are collating.

Children and young people were asked how the CRS should refer to people under the age of 18. Most favoured the term “children and young people”.

LP and JH highlighted that babies and infants hadn’t been included in the engagement.

LP appreciated how the young people’s views were presented, reflecting that it was clear that there is a desire for independence for their rights, for example not having adults listening in to conversations, etc. LP reiterated the need for independent advocacy when accessing children’s rights.

EH asked about the definition of strategic decisions (which would trigger the required for a child rights and wellbeing impact assessment) and which definition was provided in the survey. LL explained that the consultation with children and young people didn’t ask for views on this definition. Instead it focused focus on commitments that were considered to be of most interest to children and young people, taking into account their evolving capacity to engage in specific detail.

Next steps

LL explained that the CRU would use Young Scot’s report to distil the views from children and young people into key themes/ requests from them and explain how this feedback is already being addressed or will be used to shape the final CRS. LL asked members for help in capturing what their organisations are already doing that’s relevant.

Action: LL will use Young Scot’s report to distil the views from children and young people into key themes/ request from them and explained how this feedback is already being addressed or will be used to shape the final CRS. She’ll then circulate to members by close on 9 May, requesting any contributions by 23 May.

Item 6: any other business

LL suggests meeting again towards the end of June (a month early to avoid the summer holiday period). That would also make it easier to bring the SIB and Embedding Groups into synchronisation.

The Board agree to meet again on the last Tuesday in June.