Ms Tanya Ward:

I thank the committee for the invitation to speak here today. The Children’s Rights Alliance is a national movement for children with more than 100 member organisations. It is our goal to promote the rights of children in our laws, policies and services. For us, Brexit poses profound implications for the future of the European Union and for peace and stability on the island of Ireland. In particular, Brexit raises serious issues for, and poses threats to, children and young people.

We have been working closely on the implications of Brexit with our colleagues in Northern Ireland, including the Children’s Law Centre. We have also been working on this issue with our colleagues on the National Advisory Council for Children and Young People, comprising the National Youth Council of Ireland, the ISPCC, Barnardos, Early Childhood Ireland and Scouting Ireland. As members of the joint committee will know, the last is an all-island organisation.

The EU's structured dialogue, a group of young people that is consulted on EU matters, has also been working on these issues. It is deeply concerned about the implications of Brexit for the future of Ireland, including its children and young people.

We want to focus on five key areas, the first of which concerns the status of the European Convention on Human Rights and the Good Friday Agreement. The committee will be aware that membership of the EU permeates the Good Friday Agreement. It is a pre-existing condition for peace on the island of Ireland. One of the important building blocks for peace on the island of Ireland, and particularly in Northern Ireland, is the European Convention on Human Rights, ECHR. It was passed in 1948 following the Second World War and is the main human rights treaty for the Council of Europe. It is fundamental to the institutional and policing changes that have occurred in Northern Ireland. It is one of the core threads of the agreement.

One of the reasons that human rights abuses by the state occurred in Northern Ireland was because there was no instrument to hold the state accountable for things like internment, inhuman and degrading treatment, and the non-prosecution of non-state actors for human rights abuses. The ECHR and the fact the British Government agreed to adopt the Human Rights Act was an assurance for all of us on the island of Ireland that we would never go back and that this would never recur.

Another important aspect of the Good Friday Agreement is the requirement to have equivalent human rights protections North and South. That has led to a lot of positive developments for both parts of the island. We now have an Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission in the Republic, as well as a Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission in Northern Ireland, and an equality body also. The Irish Government gave further effect to the ECHR through the European Convention on Human Rights Act in 2003. Ireland was one of the last countries in the Council of Europe to do so. The positive benefits of the Good Friday Agreement, including human rights and equality guarantees, can be seen.

It is important for politicians North and South to ensure the ECHR can in no way become a casualty of Brexit. While she was British Home Secretary, Theresa May called for the UK to withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights.

It is of grave concern to us, particularly when one looks at the Good Friday Agreement, that this is a possibility. The negotiators, the Government, and politicians in Northern Ireland must come to the forefront in stating that this is a non-negotiable item. The European Convention on Human Rights cannot become a casualty. The other issues we wanted to raise were in the area of child poverty. I want to bring my colleague, Ms Saoirse Brady, in to cover that.