UN Committee on the Rights of the Child: Concluding Observations on New Zealand

5 February 2011

The advance unedited edition of the Committee on the Rights of the Child's Concluding Observations (CRC/C/NZL/CO/3-4) on the government’s performance in implementing the Convention on the Rights of the Child (the Convention) and the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict is now available at http://www.converge.org.nz/pma/crc56.htm

The Concluding Observations follow the standard format of UN human rights monitoring bodies' Concluding Observations with three main sections:

A. Introduction, comprising a brief introductory paragraph;

B. Follow-up measures undertaken and progress achieved, comprising three paragraphs; and

C. Main areas of concern and recommendations, comprising fifty three paragraphs listing concerns and recommendations on a range of children's rights, two paragraphs on follow-up and dissemination of the Concluding Observations, and a paragraph inviting the government to submit its next periodic report by 5 May 2015.

The paragraphs listing concerns and recommendations are grouped into twenty nine sections: the Committee's previous recommendations; the government's reservations on certain Articles of the Convention; recent legislative developments; the absence of a coordinating mechanism specific to children's rights; the National Plan of Action; allocation of resources to eradicate poverty and address inequalities; dissemination and awareness-raising about the Convention; training on child rights; child rights and the business sector; discrimination and unequal access to services; respect for the views of the child; corporal punishment; follow-up to the United Nations study on violence against children; assistance to families; adoption; child abuse and neglect; access to health and health services; breastfeeding; adolescent health; standard of living and the level of child poverty; education and vocational training; rest, leisure, recreation and cultural activities; economic exploitation including child labour; sexual exploitation and abuse; children's helplines; administration of juvenile justice; protection of witnesses and victims of crimes; the rights on indigenous children, and ratification of international human rights instruments which New Zealand is not a state party to - the Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography; the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families; the International Convention for the Protection of all Persons from Enforced Disappearance; the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; and the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

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