Page 4226 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 21 September 2010
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MS HUNTER (Ginninderra-Parliamentary Convenor, ACT Greens) (3.54): The rhetoric that exists within Canberra is striking when we hear all the time that children are our future. The truth is that children and young people are here and now and involved in the community on many levels. Not consulting with children and young people suggests that they should be seen but not heard, a draconian view of children in our community.
We are not talking about consulting children and young people on the colour of the paint and the placement of clocks. We are talking about meaningful processes where children and young people get to give us ideas about policies and things that could improve their life—urban design, planning issues and education initiatives—to help them navigate positive pathways, and ideas about more ways they can participate in the community they live in.
Children and young people use health services, education, housing and employment. They use public transport, urban environments like parks, shopping centres, cycle paths and much, much more. So why are we so frightened about what they might say, how they might influence a process and what they are looking to gain from the world?
The environments in which children grow up in send many messages to them about how they are valued in our community. So when the Chief Minister chooses to omit the participation of children and young people in the development of a safe routes to school project and the Leader of the Opposition comments, “I think our focus as parents is to get them to keep their rooms tidy and do their homework,” we end up sending a very clear message that we are being patronising and dismissive of their involvement in our community.
Or is it a mixed message? For example, one of the key goals of the ACT young people’s plan 2009-14 is to “encourage and support young people to participate in building our community”, with the plan also “ensuring that young people have a say about issues that affect them”. It is concerning, then, that there are many instances where children and young people are supposed to be engaged in Canberra—the development of the children’s plan, the young people’s plan and the ministerial Youth Advisory Council—their opinion and thoughts were valued then, so what is different about urban and social planning and meaningful consultation with children and young people? We are happy to pull young people and children out of the box and tout them as our successors when it suits us, but when it comes time for them to make a claim and have input we can run scared. The question is: why?
Part of Canberra’s commitment to being a child-friendly city as defined by UNICEF is providing children and young people with opportunities to influence decisions about their city, express their opinion on the city they want and participate in family, community and social life, amongst other things. Canberra has adopted this program during a time when many societies and communities are reconstructing young people as “intruders” and a “threat” in public spaces.
There is a need to determine the issues and the impact of aggressive social interventions and exclusionary practices on young people’s experiences of urban life.
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