Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein)
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Question 37: To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the date on which she will publish the new national children's and young people's strategy for the period 2012-2017. [19889/11]

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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The National Children's Strategy, Our Children - Their Lives, which was published in November 2000, was Ireland's first children's strategy. The goals of the strategy, that children will have a voice in matters which affect them, that their lives will be better understood and that they will receive quality supports and services to promote all aspects of their development, will inform the development of the new strategy for the period from 2012 to 2017. In April of this year I launched a nationwide consultation process with children and young people. Its purpose was to ask children and young people about what is good, what is not good and what they would change about being a child or young person in Ireland today. Their views have an important contribution to make to the new strategy.

The challenges facing children and their families today are very different to those that existed when the National Children's Strategy, Our Children - Their Lives, was published. There are a number of new and emerging issues such as childhood obesity, trends in child poverty and consumerism, which are impacting upon children's lives today. The development of the new strategy provides an opportunity to focus on these issues and how they may be addressed to improve the experience of childhood for this and future generations of children. It is planned that the new children's strategy will be published in mid 2012.

My Department is also currently developing a new Youth Policy Framework. The specific aims of the Policy Framework are to:

Articulate the policy objectives of the Department of Children and Youth Affairs in relation to youth;

Enhance the development, participation and support of young people in the 10 – 24 year age range;

Provide greater co-ordination and coherence in youth service provision and related services for young people.

Preparation of this new policy framework will, of course, link closely with the drafting of a new National Children's Strategy. It is envisaged that the new policy framework will also be published in 2012.