Steven Sweeney 9 hours ago
Last week, we introduced a Rights-Informed Public Health Approach. Here are some ideas from our CEO, Steven Sweeney, on how decision-makers across the UK can advance this framework to prevent disadvantage for Forces children before it arises.
If we accept that the predictable experiences of military life should not become predictable disadvantage, then the question is no longer whether children from Armed Forces families need support. It is whether the systems around them are designed to anticipate their lives rather than react to their challenges.
A Rights-Informed Public Health Approach offers a different way of thinking. But new ways of thinking require collective local and national civic leadership. What would it take to embed this approach, not just in Scotland but throughout the UK, across defence, education, health, local government and the voluntary sector?
Our governments’ first duty is of course to keep the British people safe. But as we transition to conflict, how do we ensure that mature conversation and constructive dialogue about children’s best interests takes place? Could the children from Armed Forces families themselves become part of the primary considerations in decisions about postings, housing, education and transition? What structures, relationships and accountability are needed to create continuity across organisational and constitutional boundaries? How do we meaningfully include children and young people in the design and delivery of the solution? And who has the convening power, who is responsible for bringing these partners together?
We do not yet have all the answers. We know in time that others will be best placed to lead this piece of work too, but we want to play our part. Before anybody starts proposing new governance structures or programmes, we believe there is value in testing and refining this idea with those who have the authority to shape policy and practice.
Forces Children Scotland is therefore inviting senior leaders from the Ministry of Defence, the Office for Veterans’ Affairs, the devolved governments, local government, education, health and the third sector to join a roundtable discussion. Movements that build momentum from the ground up need membership communities, too. We are proud members of The Confederation of Service Charities (COBSEO) and the Service Children’s Progression Alliance (SCiP). In a Scottish context, Veterans Scotland, Together and Children in Scotland are key membership communities too, there will be others across the UK.
We hope that this proposed approach will be of interest to Calvin Bailey MBE MP (Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State), Jamie Hepburn MSP (Minister for Parliamentary Business and Veterans), and Siobhan Brown MSP (Minister for Children, Young People and The Promise), and indeed other Ministers across the Home Nations.
Together, we can explore whether a Rights-Informed Public Health Approach could provide a shared framework for preventing disadvantage and improving outcomes for children and young people from Armed Forces families across the UK.
The Forces Children’s Rights Charter has already shown us what children need. The question now is whether we have the will to redesign our systems around those needs.
The conversation starts here.
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