CRC/C/70/Add.9
page 242
UNITEDNATIONS / CRC
/ Convention on the
Rights of the Child / Distr.
GENERAL
CRC/C/70/Add.9
12 November 2001
ENGLISH
Original: SPANISH
COMMITTEE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD
CONSIDERATION OF REPORTS SUBMITTED BY STATES PARTIES
UNDER ARTICLE 44 OF THE CONVENTION
Periodic reports of States parties due in 1999
SPAIN*
[1 June 1999]
CONTENTS
Paragraphs Page
INTRODUCTION 1 – 162 5
I. GENERAL MEASURES OF IMPLEMENTATION 163 – 416 25
II. DEFINITION OF THE CHILD 417 – 472 66
III. GENERAL PRINCIPLES 473 – 706 76
A. Non-discrimination (art. 2) 473 – 586 76
______
* For the initial report submitted by Spain, see document CRC/C/8/Add.6; for its consideration by the Committee on 6 and 7 October 1994, see documents CRC/C/SR.171, 172 and 173 and document CRC/C/15/Add.28. The annexes to the present report may be consulted in the secretariat of the Committee.
GE.01-46025(EXT)
Paragraphs Page
B. Best interests of the child (art. 3) 587 – 619 91
C. The right to life, survival and development
(art. 6) 620 – 649 95
D. Respect for the views of the child (art. 12) 650 – 706 99
IV. CIVIL RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS 707 – 825 106
A. Name and nationality (art. 7) 709 – 739 107
B. Preservation of identity (art. 8) 740 – 744 111
C. Freedom of expression (art. 13) 745 – 755 112
D. Freedom of thought, conscience and religion
(art. 14) 756 – 771 113
E. Freedom of association and peaceful assembly
(art. 15) 772 – 784 115
F. Protection of privacy (art. 16) 785 – 797 117
G. Access to appropriate information (art. 17) 798 – 816 119
H. The right not to be subjected to torture or
other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment
(art. 37 (a)) 817 – 825 123
V. FAMILY ENVIRONMENT AND ALTERNATIVE CARE 826 – 1090 124
A. Parental guidance (art. 5) and Parental
responsibilities (art. 18, paras. 1-2) 826 – 846 124
B. Separation from parents (art. 9) 847 – 883 128
C. Family reunification (art. 10) 884 – 916 134
D. Illicit transfer and non-return (art. 11) 917 – 933 139
E. Recovery of maintenance (art. 27, para. 4) 934 – 949 141
F. Children deprived of their family environment
(art. 20) 950 – 987 143
G. Adoption (art. 21) 988 – 1040 148
H. Periodic review of placement (art. 25) 1041 - 1047 157
Paragraphs Page
I. Abuse and neglect (art. 19) and physical and
psychological recovery and social
reintegration (art. 39) 1048 – 1090 158
VI. BASIC HEALTH AND WELFARE 1091 – 1201 164
A. Disabled children (art. 23) 1091 – 1113 164
B. Health and health services (art. 24) 1114 – 1154 168
C. Social security and child care services and
facilities (arts. 26 and 18, para. 3) 1155 – 1198 175
D. Standard of living (art. 27, paras. 1-3) 1199 – 1201 182
VII. EDUCATION, LEISURE AND CULTURAL ACTIVITIES 1202 – 1376 183
A. Education, including vocational training
and guidance (art. 28) 1202 – 1333 183
B. Aims of education (art. 29) 1334 – 1349 206
C. Leisure, recreation and cultural activities
(art. 31) 1350 – 1376 209
VIII. SPECIAL PROTECTION MEASURES 1377 – 1877 214
A. Children in situations of emergency 1377 – 1420 214
1. Refugee children (art. 22) 1377 – 1409 214
2. Children in armed conflicts (art. 38), including physical
and psychological recovery and social reintegration
(art. 39) 1410 – 1420 219
B. Children involved with the system of
administration of juvenile justice (art. 39) 1421 – 1482 220
C. Children in situations of exploitation,
including physical and psychological recovery
and social reintegration 1483 – 1573 228
1. Economic exploitation of children, including
child labour (art. 32) 1483 – 1497 228
2. Drug abuse (art. 33) 1498 – 1519 230
Paragraphs Page
3. Sexual exploitation and sexual abuse
(art. 34) 1520 – 1562 234
4. Sale, trafficking and abduction (art. 35) 1563 – 1567 240
5. Other forms of exploitation (art. 36) 1568 – 1573 241
D. Children belonging to a minority or an
indigenous group (art. 30) 1574 – 1577 242
INTRODUCTION
A. The regulatory and institutional framework of the second report
1. The regulatory framework
1. Pursuant to article 44, paragraph 1, of the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child, Spain submitted in 1993 its initial report on the implementation of the Convention, which had entered into force on 6 January 1991.
2. The Committee on the Rights of the Child considered this initial report (CRC/C/8/Add.6) during its seventh session at its 171st, 172nd and 173rd meetings, held on 6 and 7 October 1994, and made some concluding observations (CRC/C/15/Add.28). These observations included some suggestions and recommendations. Spain responded to the recommendations in a document produced in April 1996.
3. Both the initial report and the Committee's recommendations were published in 1996 by the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs.
4. In accordance with its commitment under article 44, paragraph 1, of the Convention, Spain now presents, five years later, its second report.
5. In the preparation and drafting of the second report Spain followed the general guidelines (CRC/C/58) adopted by the Committee on the Rights of the Child at its 343rd meeting.
2. The institutions responsible for preparing the second report
6. The responsibility for drafting the second report was assigned to the Office for Social Action, Children and the Family of the Secretariat for Social Affairs of the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs.
7. Pursuant to Royal Decree 1888/1996 of 2 August 1996, which established the fundamental structure of the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs, the functions of this Office include the analysis, preparation, coordination and monitoring of action programmes for the protection and advancement of children and the family and for the prevention of the social problems which may affect them, as well as the analysis and monitoring of the application of the legislation on the protection and advancement of children and the family.
8. The Office planned the preparation process, established appropriate coordination arrangements for collecting information from the sources, created a database for organizing the information, and drafted the report.
B. The second report in the context of Spain's policies for children
in the 1980s and 1990s
9. Although the second report does indeed describe the situation of children over the past five years, from 1993 to 1997 inclusively, it is set in the context of the policies for children which began to be systematically organized and developed in the 1980s, policies already described in the initial report.
10. Material for the second report was accepted up to February 1999, so that it includes information on changes made in the regulations and on political and administrative measures introduced in 1998.
Thus, the information provided jointly by the initial and second reports offers a fairly complete picture of the evolution of Spain's policies for children in the 1980s and 1990s.
1. Policies for children in the 1990s
11. The main features of these policies, at least as far as the period 1990-1996 is concerned, were set out in Spain's National Programme of Action for Children in the 1990s submitted to UNICEF in 1996 in compliance with the commitment undertaken at the World Summit for Children held on 29 and 30 December 1990.
12. The Summit endorsed the Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted by the General Assembly on 20 November 1990, thus becoming the first world assembly to advocate the Convention's ratification and implementation.
13. For the year 2000 and beyond and with a view to securing the maximum priority for children and their welfare, the Summit adopted a World Declaration and Plan of Action which Spain signed and thus committed itself to this cause.
14. In paragraph 34 (i) of this Plan of Action all Governments are urged to prepare national programmes of action to implement the commitments undertaken. An advance copy of Spain's National Programme of Action for Children had already been submitted to the United Nations in 1992.
15. Features of this Programme of Action related to the situation of children and to the policies, strategies and measures covered by the second report are described below.
(a) Changed attitudes to children
16. As already mentioned in the initial report, in the latter part of the 1970s, in the 1980s and in the early years of the 1990s Spain underwent profound political and socio-cultural changes which caused a substantial transformation of life in society and in the way institutions were structured and functioned.
17. The role and place of children in Spanish society and their relations with adults were also transformed during this period.
18. At the same time, similar changes have been transforming adults' experience of children, the nature of their parental and educational functions and responsibilities in the socialization process, the interactions inherent in the common spaces of shared family life, the position of institutions with regard to the rights and needs of children, and the social representations of the role, position, needs and rights of children in society.
(b) Children as holders of rights
19. In this climate of change the role of children in Spanish society has taken on new dimensions, and children have become an object of attention and study as never before. This greater social visibility has prompted discussion of children and has enhanced awareness of them among the public at large and among professionals, institutions, the communication media and social organizations.
20. In their social representations children have become accepted as a social category with specific needs and as members of society with the capacity to intervene actively in their own development and environment and to alter them. There is also a growing consensus to regard children as holders of human and other rights ranging from protection to independence which they are competent to exercise, save only
for the limitations imposed by their age. There is no great difference between the requirements of protection and the requirements of independence, and in fact the best way of ensuring the social and legal protection of children is to promote their independence as holders of rights.
(c) Children as a political priority
21. Awareness itself is an insufficient condition for changing the existing situation and attitudes and ways of communicating with children or the adverse conditions, risk factors, needs and problems that affect them. It is also necessary to spell out the existing policies for children, recognize the impact on children of the various sectoral policies, encourage the coordination of these policies, speed up the policies and strategies under preparation, and promote other new ones which respond to the needs and rights of children and enhance their welfare and quality of life.
22. As will be seen throughout this second report, children have in fact occupied an important place in the development of the policies of the General Administration of the State and of the Autonomous Communities, in the development of law and in the strategies and programmes of social organizations, especially with respect to children in situations of social difficulty and children lacking protection.
(d) The intersectoral approach in policies for children
23. This approach derives from an awareness that children's growth and development and their relations with adults in the socialization process take place within a context of interaction with the social environment and that the scenarios which affect children's socialization and development are many and varied but have broad areas in common.
24. It is important to adopt an intersectoral approach in order to be able to mobilize the resources, opportunities and means of protection existing in the different contexts and to reduce the defects and the adverse and risk factors which impair children's growth, development and learning.
25. Although it cannot be said that a general intersectoral framework for policies for children has existed within the Administration over the past two decades, in certain areas separate sectors have come together to carry out specific measures.
26. The problems of maltreatment of children have been tackled in many of the Autonomous Communities and municipal administrations, and there has often been coordinated action by the social, education and health services.
27. NGOs and professional associations have played and continue to play a key role through their work for children under programmes addressing issues common to several social sectors at the same time.
28. The institutions providing social protection for children and the judicial authorities have also made considerable progress in the formulation of joint measures. The health and education departments of many of the Autonomous Communities have established joint working plans to provide assistance and preventive measures and treatment for children suffering from AIDS and to encourage healthy behaviour and life styles by means of health-education programmes.
29. Several NGOs, as will be seen later in the report, run combined health and education programmes for children confined to hospital by long-term illnesses.
30. Obviously, introducing an intersectoral approach is not the same thing as achieving intersectoral action. Such action is not something given in advance but a continuous commitment and task. The second report highlights the efforts made and the difficulties encountered in trying to secure authentically intersectoral policies and measures for children.
(e) The areas covered in the National Programme of Action for Children
31. The policies for children set out in Spain's National Programme have several axes or areas which are delineated in one way or another in the second report:
(a) The protection and promotion of the rights of the child as an institutional commitment:
(i) The initial report described at length the influence of Spain's 1978 Constitution in the emergence of a new concept of the rights of the child and their protection;
(ii) There is no doubt that the ratification of the Convention provided a stimulus for society at large and for institutions in the protection of children's rights;
(iii) In its ruling of 14 February 1991 in favour of legal guarantees in proceedings involving juvenile offenders the Constitutional Court based its arguments on the guarantees established in the Convention;