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Czech Republic - Periodic reports of States parties due in 1999: Addendum [2002] UNCRCSPR 8; CRC/C/83/Add.4 (17 June 2002)
UNITED NATIONS
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CRC
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Convention on the Rights of the Child
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Distr. GENERAL
CRC/C/83/Add.4 17 June
2002
Original: ENGLISH
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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
CZECH
REPUBLIC[*]
[3 March 2000]
CONTENTS
Paragraphs Page
I. GENERAL MEASURES OF
IMPLEMENTATION 1 30 5
A. Introduction 1
17 5
B. Dissemination of the Convention in elementary
education
18 19 9
C. Dissemination of the Convention in
secondary
education 20 10
D. Educating professional groups on
the rights of the child 21 27 10
E. Cooperation with NGOs
28 12
F. Financing the Czech Republic’s participation
in
EU educational programmes 29 30 12
II. DEFINITION OF THE
CHILD 31 49 12
III. GENERAL PRINCIPLES 50
91 16
A. Nondiscrimination 50 72 16
B. Best interests of the
child 73 85 23
C. The right to life, survival and development 86
89 26
D. Respect for the views of the child 90
91 26
IV. CIVIL RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS 92 126 27
A. Name and
nationality 93 101 27
B. Preservation of identity
102 29
C. Freedom of expression 103 104 29
D. Freedom of
thought, conscience and religion 105 106 29
E. Freedom of association
and peaceful assembly 107 108 30
CONTENTS (continued)
Paragraphs Page
F. Protection of privacy
109 112 30
G. Access to appropriate information 113
119 31
H. The right not to be subjected to torture or other
cruel,
inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment 120
126 32
V. FAMILY ENVIRONMENT AND ALTERNATIVE CARE 127
202 33
A. Parental guidance 127 33
B. Parental
responsibilities 128 134 34
C. Separation from parents 135
138 35
D. Family reunification 139 141 35
E. Illicit transfer
and nonreturn 142 143 36
F. Recovery of maintenance for the child
144 145 36
G. Children deprived of their family environment 146
176 37
H. Adoption 177 188 44
I. Periodic review of
placement 189 46
J. Abuse and neglect, including physical and
psychological
recovery, including social reintegration 190
202 46
VI. BASIC HEALTH AND WELFARE 203 250 49
A. Disabled
children 203 219 49
B. Health and health services 220
242 54
C. Social security and childcare services and facilities 243
249 58
D. Standard of living 250 60
CONTENTS (continued)
Paragraphs Page
VII. EDUCATION, LEISURE
AND CULTURAL ACTIVITIES 251 291 60
A. Education, including vocational
training and guidance 251 274 60
B. Aims of education
275 66
C. Leisure, recreation and cultural activities 276
291 67
VIII. SPECIAL PROTECTION MEASURES 292
367 70
A. Children in situations of emergency 292
303 70
1. Refugee children 292 300 70
2. Children in armed
conflicts, including physical and
psychological recovery and social
reintegration 301 303 72
B. Children involved with the system of
administration
of juvenile justice 304 315 73
C. Children in
situations of exploitation, including physical
and psychological recovery
and social reintegration 316 367 75
1. Economic exploitation of
children, including
child labour 316 318 75
2. Drug abuse
319 341 76
3. Sexual exploitation and sexual abuse 342
353 81
4. Sale, trafficking and abduction 354
355 84
5. Other forms of exploitation 356 85
D. Children
belonging to a minority or an
indigenous group 357
367 85
IX. CONCLUSION: DISTRIBUTION OF THE INITIAL AND
SECOND
PERIODIC REPORT ON IMPLEMENTATION
OF THE CONVENTION 368
370 89
List of annexes 91
I. GENERAL MEASURES OF IMPLEMENTATION
A. Introduction
- The
Czech Republic came into being on 1 January 1993 as one of the two successor
States to the Czech and Slovak Federative Republic.
On 19 January 1993 it was
accepted as a member of the United Nations and assumed all the legal regulations
of the former State about
fundamental human rights, including all treaties on
human rights binding on the Czechoslovak State, and thus also the Convention
on
the Rights of the Child (the “Convention”).
- The
Convention was signed in the name of the Czech and Slovak Federative Republic in
New York on 30 September 1990. It came into
effect for the Czech and Slovak
Federative Republic on 6 February 1991. The Convention was published in the
Collection of laws under
No. 104/1991 Coll. Through the provisions of Act
No. 4/1993 Coll. on measures connected with the dissolution of the Czech
and Slovak
Federative Republic, the Czech Republic assumed all obligations which
the ČSFR had under international law as of the day it
ceased to exist.
This law went into effect on 31 December 1992, as a result of which the Czech
Republic is bound by the Convention
as of 1 January 1993.
- Under
article 44 of the Convention, the Czech Republic was required to submit its
initial report by 1 January 1995. The Czech Republic
submitted the report
through its Permanent Mission to the United Nations Office at Geneva on 29
February 1996; it contains information
on the fulfilment of the Convention in
19931994. On 3 September 1997, the report was supplemented with answers to
additional questions
from the Committee which the Committee gave to the Czech
Republic on 23 June 1997. The Committee made its final evaluation of the
Czech
Republic’s report at its meeting on 10 October 1997.
- The
Czech Republic hereby submits its second periodic report for 1995-1999.
Passages which directly respond to the final evaluation
of the Czech
Republic’s initial report and which answer the Committee’s questions
and comments are printed in bold in
the report.
- The
Convention is an international convention under article 10 of the
Constitution of the Czech Republic. That means that it is directly binding, and
takes precedence over domestic law. The content of certain articles
of the
Convention corresponds to the provisions of the Charter of Fundamental Rights
and Freedoms, published under No. 2/1993 Coll.
(the “Charter”),
which is part of the constitutional order of the Czech Republic. This means
that the Charter has the
force of a constitutional statute, and other laws must
be in accordance with it.
- The
rights of the child contained in individual articles of the Convention are
governed in the Czech legal order by the following
laws: Act No. 94/1963
Coll. on the family, No. 140/1961 Coll. the Criminal Code,
No. 141/1961 Coll. the Criminal Procedure Code,
No. 40/1964 Coll. the
Civil Code, No. 99/1963 Coll. the Civil Procedure Code, No. 65/1965
Coll. the Labour Code, No. 50/1973 Coll.
on foster care, No. 100/1988
Coll. on social security, No. 114/1988 Coll. on the responsibilities of the
Czech Republic social security
authorities, No. 29/1984 Coll. on elementary
and secondary schools (the Schools Act), No. 97/1963 Coll. on private
international
law and rules of procedure, No. 498/1990 Coll. on refugees,
and Act No. 117/95 Coll. on State social support, all as amended by later
amendments.
- At
the international level, the Czech Republic is bound, in addition to the
Convention, by the following treaties:
Convention concerning the Recognition and Enforcement of Decisions Relating
to Maintenance Obligations Towards Children (Decree of
the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs, No. 14/1974 Coll.);
International Labour Organization Medical Examination of Young Persons
(Industry) Convention, 1946 (No. 77) (Decree of the Ministry
of Foreign
Affairs No. 23/1981 Coll.);
International Labour Organization Medical Examination of Young Persons
(NonIndustry Occupation) Convention, 1947 (No. 78) (Decree
of the Ministry
of Foreign Affairs No. 24/1981 Coll.);
The Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction
(announcement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs No. 34/1998
Coll.).
- Legislative
power in the Czech Republic lies with the Parliament. Parliament is composed of
two chambers, the Chamber of Deputies
and the Senate. The Chamber of Deputies
has 200 deputies, who are elected for a period of four years. The Senate was
not elected
until 1996, when the first elections to the Senate took place
in November. The Senate has 81 senators, who are elected for sixyear
terms in office, with one third of Senate seats elected every two years.
- On
9 December 1998 the Government, by resolution No. 809, approved the
document “The Government’s Responsibility for Improving
Protection
of Human Rights” and established the Council of the Government of the
Czech Republic for Human Rights (the “Council”),
which became an
advisory and coordinating government body for issues of protection of human
rights and fundamental freedoms in the
jurisdiction of the Czech Republic.
The Council’s task is to monitor the observance and implementation
of the Constitution, the Charter, and other legal norms governing
protection and observance of human rights. The Council also monitors domestic
implementation
of the Czech Republic’s international obligations in
the area of protection of human rights and freedoms, including the Convention.
Through the Government Commissioner for Human Rights (the
“Commissioner”), the Council ensures the fulfilment of its
obligations consisting of submitting reports under all the abovementioned
covenants and treaties. The Council is composed of the
Chairman, 10
representatives of government bodies, and 10 representatives of the public.
The representatives of the public are appointed
and recalled by the Government.
The Council’s composition guarantees a balanced view of human rights in
the Czech Republic.
In April 1999 the Council established eight expert working
groups, one of them being the Working Group for the Rights of the Child.
The
sections address legislative problems and inadequacies, and, as Council bodies,
assist adoption of executive measures by relevant
State bodies. After the
Council approves the
conclusions submitted by its working group, the materials are passed to
the Government through the Commissioner and the appropriate
vicepremier. (See
CRC/C/15/Add.81, paras. 9, 10, 11, 27, 28, 29.)
- The
Council established a Working Group for the Rights of the Child to address
questions connected with observing the rights of the
child under the Convention.
This section, like the Council, includes representatives of central bodies which
are directly connected
to observing the rights of the child (at present they are
especially employees of the Ministries of Education, the Interior, Labour
and
Social Affairs and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and representatives of the
public, both of representatives of nonprofit,
nongovernmental organizations
(NGOs) and of experts who have been involved with the rights of the child for a
long time. Members
of the section are nominated, appointed and recalled by the
Council. The section’s activities are coordinated by the Secretary
- an
employee of the Human Rights Department of the Office of the Government of the
Czech Republic. The Director of this department
is the government
Commissioner for Human Rights, who is also the Chairman of the Council.
The section handles matters which are
problematic from the viewpoint of
observing the Convention in the Czech Republic. The section members meet
as necessary. They submit
proposals and take part in developing proposals how
to solve specific legislative problems. (See ibid., paras. 9, 10, 11, 27,
28,
29.)
- In
its resolution No. 1 of 6 January 1999 the Government approved principles
of State policy for the young generation until the year
2002. It thereby
accepted responsibility for the healthy development of the young generation and
enhancing its participation in
the social, political and economic life of
the Czech Republic. At the same time, the Government charged its members to
secure fulfilment
of assignments arising from the principles and to develop
ministry programmes related to the support and protection of children and
youth
and to allocate funds in their budgets for implementation of these programmes.
(See ibid., paras. 9, 10, 11, 27, 29.)
- During
the monitored period, in respect of protection of human rights, including the
rights of the child, there was still no public
protector of human rights in the
country an ombudsman whose office, independent of the Government, could protect
natural persons
from illegal or otherwise wrong decisions or actions by
authorities or even courts. The draft law on the public defender of human
rights was approved in December 1999 and comes into effect as of 28 February
2000 under No. 349/1999 Coll. (See ibid.,
para. 28.)
- The
principles listed in article 10 of this report include a proposal to
establish a National Committee for the Family, Children and
Youth and
preparation of an act on youth by the year 2001. The Statute for the
National Committee was approved by the Government
on 7 July, in resolution
No. 696, and the Minister without portfolio became the Chairman of the
Committee. The task of this Committee
is interministerial coordination of
conceptual and methodical activities in the area of care for children and youth,
subsidy policies
of the ministries aimed at children and youth, and initiation
of systematic steps in the area of prevention and leisure time and
related
legislation.
- The
Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports ( the “MEYS”) cooperates
with NGOs, which largely provide opportunities for
leisure time for children and
youth, both in sports and in other specialized activities offered by civil
associations of children
and youth. It was for this purpose as well that the
MEYS created a consulting body to the First Deputy Minister, called the Chamber
of Youth, whose members are ministry employees, representatives of regional
State administration, independent experts and representatives
of NGOs, including
civic associations of children and youth, civic associations of the medically
disabled and religious groups. Moreover, in 1996 the Deputy Minister for
Youth and Physical Education created a consulting body, the Commission on
Mobility of Youth,
which includes civic associations as well as staff of
relevant State bodies. The task of the Commission is:
(a) To
submit proposals on an ongoing basis and jointly discuss topics concerning the
mobility of youth;
(b) To take part in preparing new legal regulations
in the area of mobility of youth;
(c) To take part in preparing a
position statement in approval proceedings for projects in the programme
for support and protection
of children and youth and to accept recommendations
for the directing committee of the programme Youth for Europe
III;
(d) To prepare materials on principles concerning the mobility of
youth;
(e) To conduct selection proceedings for events connected with
the activities of the Council of Europe and the European Union and
other
international events to which representatives of the Czech Republic are
invited.
- The
NGOs also actively take part in the State subsidy policy, because they are
members of the working team for creating rules for
the State subsidy policy and
its amendments visàvis NGOs. Representatives of the association(s) are
also members of commissions
which decide to award subsidies, both in the
selection process for programmes of support and protection of children and youth
(i.e.
the subsidy policy of the MEYS), and in the grant commission of the
EU community programme Youth for Europe. The number of representatives
of
NGOs in the commissions is approximately one third of the members in each
commission. The MEYS ensures provision of information through the
creation of web pages intended for youth (www.adam.cz). Since the beginning of May
1999 EURODESK the international information network for youth has been in
operation.
- In
the area of the rights of the child the MEYS works primarily with the alliance
of nongovernmental organizations for the rights
of the child in the Czech
Republic (ANO), which brings together the following organizations: the Czech
section of Defense for Children
International (DCI); Duha (Rainbow) the
association of children and youth for leisure time and fun; EAICY the European
Association of Institutions for Children
and Youth; FOD the Fund for Endangered
Children; Kruh (Circle) the association for children and youth; the
association Safety Hotline for children and youth; the Our Child Foundation
(Nadace Naše dítě); the Association for Observing the
Rights of Children and Parents of the Czech Republic; the Society for Social
Pediatrics of the
Medical Society of Jan Evangelista Purkyně; Justice for
Children; the Union of Catholic Women; the Fathers’ Union; the
Parents’ Union.
- In
accordance with the Committee’s recommendations, the MEYS supported the
publication and dissemination of the following documents
concerning the rights
of the child:
Documents on the Rights of the Child
(Práva dítěte v dokumentech) (Department of Crime
Prevention of the Ministry of the Interior, in cooperation with DCI and FOD,
Prague, 1998);
What is the Convention on the Rights of the
Child (Czech Helsinki Committee,
Prague, 1996);
Convention on the Rights of the Child
(the Pink Hotline (“Růžová Linka”),
1997);
The Gazette: From Bucharest to Lisbon, or the
relationship of Europe and the world to young people (Institute for
children and young people). The Gazette contains the results of
meetings of conferences of ministers responsible for youth
policy;
The Czech Society for the Protection of Children
periodically publishes additional documents on this theme: The Little
Encyclopedia of the Abused and Neglected Child; My Chicanery, Your Chicanery
(Šikanuji, šikanuješ); Mistreatment;
The Mistreated Child; How to
raise a child without blows (Jak vychovávat bez pohlavků); Being
Careful Pays (Osvědčení
opatrnosti) (See ibid.,
paras. 14, 31, 42.)
B. Dissemination of the Convention in elementary
education
- Information
on human rights, the rights of the child and related domestic legal regulations
are included in the social science section
of the standards for elementary
education (MEYS ref. No. 208195/9526). The specific content of teaching
materials for education
on human rights and legal and ethical education is
included in all approved educational outlines (elementary school, national
school,
grade school, alternative curricula). In the elementary school
programme these themes are included in the subjects basic nature
studies, Czech
geography and civic education. In the national school curriculum they are
included in the subjects basic nature studies,
Czech geography and civic and
family education and the elective subject reasoning skills. In the grade school
curriculum they are
included in the subjects basic nature studies, civic
education and drama. In many areas NGO employees and activists share in the
dissemination of the Convention and education on human rights in elementary
schools.
- Documents
valid for basic education are also used in the lower grades of a multiyear
academic secondary school (eightyear study plan,
sixyear study plan), in which
students complete compulsory education and basic education. Requirements
for basic education are contained in the standard for basic education and other
specific documents in individual educational
programmes. For the needs of
students in special schools the MEYS disseminated the brochure “What is
the Convention on the Rights of the
Child” (Czech Helsinki Committee,
Prague, 1996), which provides an explanation of the Convention’s basic
articles. (See
ibid., paras. 14, 31,
42.)
C. Dissemination of the Convention in secondary
education
- Requirements
for issues of upbringing and education arising from the Convention are contained
in the document Educational Goals and
Requirements for the Content of General
Secondary Education Related to the Area of Human Rights. Education on human
rights and the
rights of the child is specifically set in effect by basic
documents for secondary schools, including standard education in a fouryear
academic secondary school and standard fouryear occupational education.
Education on the rights of the child and human rights is
generally of a nature
which lies above any particular subject; it is included in various general
education subjects and in a number
of expert subjects. NGO employees and
activists also take part in disseminating the Convention in secondary schools.
Vocational
schools pay insufficient attention to human rights issues (in the
context of education on human rights, tolerance, and responsible
citizenship).
The development of standards is contained in educational outlines in effect for
secondary schools, under which the
aims of education on human rights are the
following:
(a) Knowledge of the
rights;
(b) Understanding their
significance;
(c) Acquiring the ability to exercise these rights
and to seek protection if they are not observed;
(d) Education on
responsibility and respecting the rights of all people.
(See
ibid., paras. 14, 31, 42.)
D. Educating professional groups on the rights of the
child
- The
set of pedagogicorganizational information for elementary schools,
secondary schools, postsecondary occupational schools and educational
facilities for the 1998/99 school year (ref. No. 18.509/9820) requires
all schools to respect the Convention in daytoday educational
activities.
- Pedagogic
centres and institutions of a consulting system created by the MEYS offer
regular teacher education. Annually there are
about 12 events at
6 pedagogic centres aimed directly at the issues of the rights of the
child. Participants in the courses in the
pedagogic centres are entered in it
on the basis of their interest and applications. The awareness of teachers and
students about
individual articles of the Convention, their explanation and
connection to the provisions of the Charter and the gradual change of
the
overall atmosphere of schools toward democratization and humanization is further
increasing with the help of several projects
such as Start Together
(Začít spolu) and Community School (Komunitní
škola), supported by the foundation the Open Society Fund. Several
programmes for education in human rights are applied which received
MEYS
accreditation and are used for educating
teachers:
(a) The project Education on Citizenship for elementary school grades 49,
which tries to inspire teachers to explain basic documents
on human, and thus
also children’s, rights;
(b) Education on the culture of
human relationships in a multiethnic environment; the programme is applied, for
example, in the Parochial
High School in Kutná Hora and at the University
of Pedagogy in Hradec Králové;
(c) The Democratic
School programme has been applied since 1995 in the high school in
Třeboň, the elementary school in
Kladno and the special school in
Rumburk, where a “school of human understanding” is
operated;
(d) Human relationships and the contemporary school;
the project is applied at the Secondary School of Pedagogy and the University
of
Pedagogy in Litomyšl and at the Faculty of Pedagogy of Jan Evangelista
Purkyně University in Ústí nad
Labem.
- To
help teachers teaching human rights, in 1997 and 1998 the MEYS distributed the
following materials through all school offices:
The Rights of the Child in
Documents (the text of the Convention), the text of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, Education
on Human Rights, the manual on education in human
rights, and others. (See ibid., paras. 14, 31, 42.)
- Since
1998 issues of children and youth under the Convention are included in the
educational programme of all healthcare workers.
This training is provided by
the Institute for Postgraduate Education in Health Care in Prague and the
Institute for Further Education
of HealthCare Workers in Brno. (See ibid.,
paras. 14, 31, 42.)
- In
military secondary schools, every year before the school year begins, as part of
the assemblies of the officerteaching body, preparation
of commanders,
caretakers and teachers on the theme of exercising the rights of the child is
conducted. The Convention is fully
observed in the life of students at the
secondary military schools. (See ibid., paras. 14, 31,
42.)
- Employees
of social affairs departments in district offices and municipal offices are
familiarized with the content of the Convention
and its effects in the Czech
legal order in special expert training, whose completion is a necessary
prerequisite for the performance
of their jobs in public administration. (See
ibid., paras. 14, 31, 42.)
- According
to the Czech Helsinki Committee, the Czech Republic has shortcomings in
education on human rights in terms of teachers and
caretakers in vocational and
secondary vocational schools, which primarily train skilled workers. The
inadequate human rights education
at these vocational schools results, among
other things, in the inclination of some of the students and apprentices toward
extremist
movements.
E. Cooperation with NGOs
- The
Committee on the Rights of the Child recommended that State authorities develop
close cooperation with NGOs. At present this
cooperation is primarily focused
on supporting these organizations through subsidies. The MEYS supports those
NGOs - civic associations,
foundations and other non-profit organizations in
whose articles of association issues of protecting the rights of the child
predominate.
These are DCI, the Czech UNICEF Committee, etc. The MEYS uses
some of the specialized organizations for training qualified teachers.
F. Financing the Czech Republic’s
participation in
EU educational programmes
- The
opportunity for the Czech Republic to participate in EU educational
programmes - Socrates, Leonardo and Youth for Europe III -
was officially
opened by Decision of the Council on Accession No. 2/97 of 30 September 1997
(97/655/EC), which followed after the
negotiation of the Additional Protocol to
the Europe Agreement between the European Communities and the Czech Republic.
The year
1998 was thus the first full year when these programmes operated under
conditions of full membership. Participation has continued
successfully in
1999, which is the last year for this phase of the programmes.
- In
1997 the Czech Republic paid to the European Union the entry contribution fully
from the national budget, in a total of CK 141,950,250
(ECU 3,639,750). For
1998 it asked the European Commission for the opportunity to cover part of the
expenses of entry contributions
in subsequent years from PHARE funds. The MEYS
also paid the entry contribution for the programmes in 1998, in a total of CK
161,329,311.
The Czech Republic paid entry contributions for the European Union
educational programme for 1999 in the same ratio. Of the total
amount of all
three entry contributions, some CK 186 million was paid on 11 May 1999
and support from the PHARE programme was approximately
CK 115 million.
II. DEFINITION OF THE CHILD
- The
term “child” was defined in the introductory report. For better
orientation we specify a more detail information
below.
Capacity for rights and obligations
- Under
section 7 of the Civil Code (as amended) the capacity of a natural person to
have rights and obligations arises by birth. Under
section 8, paragraph 1 of
the Code a natural person’s full capacity to acquire rights and assume
obligations through his/her
own actions (legal capacity) arises at the age of
majority. Under paragraph 2 of the same section of the Code a person reaches
the
age of majority upon turning 18. Before reaching that age, one can acquire
majority only, being 16 and older, by court decision
in connection with
entering marriage. Majority thus acquired is not lost through termination of
the marriage or proclamation that
the marriage is invalid. Under section 9 of
the Civil Code minors have capacity only to such legal acts which are, by their
nature,
proportionate to the maturity of intellect and will corresponding to
their age.
- Also
related to reaching majority are the provisions of section 13 of the Act on
the Family (Act No. 94/1963 Coll., as amended by
Act No. 91/1998
Coll.), which states that a minor cannot enter into marriage; however,
exceptionally, if it is in accordance with
the social purpose of marriage, the
court may, for important reasons, permit a minor over the age of 16 to enter
into marriage.
Without such permission the marriage is invalid and marriage
cannot take place with a minor under the age of 16 at all.
- Under
section 36 of the Act on the Family, parents represent a child in legal actions
to which the child does not have full capacity.
The rights and obligations
specified here are held only by parents who have full parental responsibility.
The regulations do not
apply to cases where minors themselves have capacity to
perform legal acts in a particular extent. For example, under section 11,
paragraph 1, of the Labour Code (Act No. 65/1965 Coll., as amended) the
capacity of a natural person to have rights and obligations
in labour law
relationships and to acquire these rights and assume these obligations through
his/her own legal acts arises, unless
specified otherwise, on the day when the
natural person reaches the age of 15. A child over the age of 15 also
has capacity to perform
legal acts in a criminal trial, if he/she is in the
position of the accused. In contrast, in custody matters the child has only
limited capacity to perform legal acts, even though there may be an extremely
serious effect on the child’s rights, position
and subsequent life (being
committed to institutional upbringing, being entrusted to the care of one of the
parents).
- Parents
represent children in personal and property matters. In purely personal
matters, such as a consensual declaration of paternity
of a child or the consent
of a minor parent to the adoption of his/her child, one of the parents cannot
act on behalf of the minor.
- Under
section 31, paragraph 3, of the Act on the Family, which was amended in 1998, a
child who is capable, in view of his/her degree
of development, of forming
his/her own opinions and evaluating the effect of measures affecting him/her has
the right to obtain needed
information and freely express himself/herself about
all decisions of the parents concerning significant matters about him/her and
to
be heard in all proceedings in which such matters are decided. According to
information from NGOs the amendment of the Act on
the Family narrowed this
“participation right” of children, as the ability to form
one’s own opinions and evaluate
the effect of measures affecting the child
require a higher degree of development than the ability to formulate one’s
own opinions
as provided by article 12 of the Convention. Under section 67,
paragraph 2, of the Act on the Family a minor has the right to express
consent or non-consent to the adoption of his/her child.
Inheritance
- Minors
who have reached the age of 15 can make a last will in the form of a notarial
deed (provisions of section 476d, para. 2, of
the Civil Code). Under
section 479 of the Civil Code minor descendants must receive at least as
much as their inheritance share under
the law. If a will provides otherwise, it
is invalid in that part, if the descendants named have not been
disinherited.
Criminal responsibility
- Under
section 11, of the Criminal Code (Act No. 140/1961, as amended by later
regulations) a person who has not reached the age of
15 at the time of
committing a crime is not criminally liable. Sections 74 to 87 of the Criminal
Code contain special provisions
on the prosecution of minors (i.e. persons 15-18
years of age). For example, the provisions of section 79 state that
sentences of
prison terms provided in the Act are reduced to one half for
minors, provided that the upper limit of the sentence may not exceed
five years
and the lower limit one year. If a minor committed a crime for which a special
section of the Act permits imposing an
exceptional sentence, and if the degree
of danger of the crime is unusually high, the court may impose a prison sentence
of up to
10 years. Under section 81 persons who have not reached the age
of 15 serve prison sentences separately from other sentenced persons,
in
separate prisons or departments. In criminal law matters, under section 34 of
the Criminal Procedure Code a legal representative
has the right to assist a
minor defendant (select a defence attorney, file requests and appeals on behalf
of the minor, etc.). In
the interests of the minor the legal representative can
also exercise these rights against the defendant’s will.
- Under
section 86 of the Criminal Code, under the specified conditions, a person who
has reached the age of 12 and is younger than
15 can be sentenced to
reformative upbringing in civil law proceedings.
- The
Criminal Procedure Code does not contain any provisions which would restrict or
prevent questioning a minor as a witness. If
criminal proceedings are conducted
against a minor, i.e. a person over 15 and younger than 18, the authorities
conducting the criminal
proceedings act according to the provisions of sections
291 to 301 of the Criminal Procedure Code, which govern special proceedings
against minors. A minor must have a defence attorney from the beginning of the
criminal proceedings. It is also necessary in the
proceedings to determine, as
thoroughly as possible, the minor’s degree of development in intellect and
morals, his/her character,
situation and the environment in which he/she lived
and was raised, his/her behaviour before committing the crime and afterwards,
and other circumstances important for choosing suitable means for correction, in
particular for evaluating whether reformative upbringing
is to be ordered for
the minor (the provisions of section 292 of the Criminal Procedure Code).
Determining the situation is generally
done by a childcare authority (in
District Offices). The provisions of section 293 of the Criminal Procedure Code
contain the principle
that keeping a minor in custody is only a means of
securing his/her person, if other methods of achieving this aim are not
available
(see part VIII, chap. B).
Compulsory education
- Under
section 34 of the Schools Act (Act No. 29/1984 Coll. on elementary schools,
secondary schools, and post-secondary occupational
schools) compulsory education
begins at the beginning of the school year following the day when a child
reaches the age of six.
Compulsory education lasts nine years, and students
fulfil the requirement by completing the school year in which they reach the
last year of compulsory education.
Employing children
- According
to section 11 (1) of the Labour Code (Law No. 65/1965 Coll.) the age limit at
which a child can be employed is 15 years.
According to section 11 (2), a
person, who completes compulsory school education in a remedial school before
reaching the age of
15 can be employed as of the day when she/he completes
the compulsory education; however, she/he must be at least 14 years old.
The
Labour Code governs conditions for employing minors (that is, persons aged 15-18
years of age) in part three, sections 163 to
168. The legal regulation
states that an employer is required to ask for the legal representative’s
consent to conclude an
agreement with a minor employee. The employer may not
assign minor employees overtime work and night work. In exceptional cases
minors aged 16 or more may perform night work not exceeding one hour, if it is
necessary for their professional training. Minors
may not be given work
underground mining minerals or digging tunnels and shafts; minors also may not
be given work which, taking
into account the anatomical, physiological and
psychological features at that age are disproportionate, dangerous, or damaging
to
their health. (See ibid, para. 23.)
Conscription
- Under
section 11 of the Military Service Act (Act No. 92/1949) the duty for compulsory
military service arises on 1 January of the
year in which a man reaches the
age of 18. Under section 14 of the Act, anyone who voluntary takes on a
service duty which he would
not otherwise have enters the armed forces
voluntarily. A voluntary duty to serve arises only if the person in question is
found
capable of active military service. Permission for voluntary entry into
the armed forces may be given to a citizen beginning on
1 January of the
year in which he reaches the age of 17. Minors require the consent of their
legal representatives for voluntary
entry into the armed forces.
- On
1 December 1999 the Act on the extent of compulsory military service and on
military administrative offices (the Military Service
Act) came into effect,
replacing the previous Act No. 92/1949 Coll., the Military Service
Act. The new legal regulation prohibits
the duty to compulsory military service
before a person reaches the age of 18.
Court proceedings
- Under
section 119 of the Civil Procedure Code (Act No. 99/1963) a person who has
capacity to have rights and duties, or to whom the
law accords it, has capacity
to be a party to proceedings. Under section 22 a citizen who cannot act
independently before the court
must be represented by a legal representative.
Section 178 of the Civil Procedure Code governs the court’s ability,
if it
considers it appropriate, to hear the opinion of a child on the
suitability and purposefulness of proposed or intended measures.
Under
section 182 of the Code the court shall hear a child being adopted if the
child is able to understand the significance of
adoption and the hearing is not
in conflict with the child’s interests.
Association
- Under
section 6 of Act No. 83/1990 Coll. on association of citizens, as amended
by Act No. 68/1993 Coll., an association is created
upon registration. An
application for registration can be filed by at least three citizens, at least
one of whom must be at least
18.
Religion
- Under
section 3 of Act No. 308/1991 Coll. on freedom of religion and the status
of Churches and religious societies, legal representatives
decide the religious
education of children until they reach the age of 15.
Consuming alcoholic beverages
- Under
section 218 of the Criminal Code serving alcoholic beverages to person
under the age of 18 is a criminal offence. The provision
of section 4 (1)
of the Law No. 37/1989 Coll. on protection from alcoholism and other addictions
forbids serving, selling or otherwise
providing to persons younger than 18 years
of age any alcoholic beverage. The law also bans selling tobacco products to
persons
younger than 16 years of age. According to section 4 (3), the
offices of government authorities can in their districts limit or
ban the sale
of addictive products, or other products which include these, to persons under
the age of 18. According to section
5 of the Law, anyone who
sells or serves alcoholic beverages is obliged to refuse the sale of them to a
person who does not seem
to fulfil the age condition, unless such a person
proves her/his age by an official ID. The legal representatives of the
child are
obliged to follow all the abovementioned bans as
well.
Age of consent
- Under
section 242 of the Criminal Code intercourse with a person under the age of
15 is a criminal offence.
III. GENERAL PRINCIPLES
A. Non-discrimination
- In
the period under review the principle of non-discrimination was newly included
in Act No. 1/1991 Coll. on employment, which was
amended by Act No.
167/1999 Coll., which went into effect on 1 October 1999. The provision of
section 1 of this Act states that
a citizen has a right to employment.
This right cannot be denied for reasons of race, skin colour, gender, sexual
orientation, language,
faith or religion, political or other belief, membership
or activity in political parties or political movements, trade unions and
other
associations, nationality, ethnic or social origin, property, clan,
health, age, marital and family status or family responsibility,
with the
exception of cases where the law so provides or there is a material reason for
it consisting of the prerequisites, requirements
and nature of the employment
which the person is to perform and which are necessary for performance of this
employment. Parties
to legal relationships arising under this Act are forbidden
to make offers of employment which are in conflict with the provisions
of the
above. Sanctions for violating this section are governed by Act
No. 9/1991 Coll. on employment and the jurisdiction of the
authorities
of the Czech Republic in the employment sector. The provisions of
section 8 and section 9 of this Act regulate the inspection
activity of the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs and the Labour Office and
the ability to levy a fine of CK 2,000-CK 1 million
on the
employer.
- In
June 1999 the Minister of Education submitted to the Government of the
Czech Republic a topic outline of the new Schools Act.
It is proposed that
this Act, governing the area of pre-school, elementary, secondary,
post-secondary vocational and non-school education,
should include provisions on
the rights of students and protection of children from all forms of
discrimination, and on observing
the child’s right to dignity and
observing equality between boys and girls.
- The
Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women criticized the
creation of so-called “household management”
schools in the Czech
Republic because, in its opinion, these schools serve to raise girls with
traditional stereotypical concepts
of men’s and women’s
roles (A/53/38, para. 193). The Minister of Education closed schools with
education programmes
which could support this concept on 5 February 1997 by
a decision on provisions relating to the termination of this field of study.
The last students to be admitted began this fouryear course in 1996. The
field was replaced by three new fields of study relating
to “household
management”: social services, economic-administrative services and public
administration services. The
original four-year course was also transformed in
this way in private and parochial schools. The original two-year course exists
in a very limited extent in places where there is interest in it - in the entire
Czech Republic there are now 31 students in the
second year. The representation
of girls among students in pre-school education and in compulsory elementary
school education (nine
years in length with attendance beginning at the age of
six) consistently reaches about 48 per cent, which corresponds to their
representation
in the population group. There are no differences between girls
and boys in finishing elementary school. Opportunities for further
education
are open to all.
Romani children
- The
Committee, in its final evaluation of the initial report, recommended starting
special programmes for Romani children. Changes
in the education system related
to Romani children have been taking place since 1992. Romani children can
prepare to enter grade
1 of elementary school in preparatory classes. At the
instructions of MEYS, these classes are established for children from socially
and culturally disadvantaged environments, for Romani children, for children
with a different native language, but also for Czech
children for whom
compulsory education has been postponed. They can be established in an
elementary school, a special school, and
in exceptional cases in a kindergarten.
Preparatory classes in elementary schools have been the most successful. The
result is improved
attendance, and better cooperation with parents. Attendance
is free of charge, and the child can become familiar with the environment
where
he/she will be educated. The aim of preparatory class activities, regardless of
the type of school in which they are established,
is to prevent the failures of
Romani and other children from socially and culturally disadvantaged
environments at the beginning
of their education. A high percentage of
preparatory class graduates are successful at the beginning of their attendance
in elementary
school.
Preparatory classes created in the Czech Republic since
1992
|
1992
|
1993
|
1994
|
1995
|
1996
|
1997
|
1998
|
1999
|
Total
|
Elementary
|
1
|
8
|
4
|
5
|
1
|
3
|
2
|
26
|
50
|
Special elementary
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
4
|
4
|
Special
|
10
|
4
|
6
|
1
|
7
|
3
|
0
|
15
|
37
|
Kindergarten
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
8
|
9
|
- In
the 1998/99 school year there were 100 preparatory classes with 1,237 students
in the Czech Republic.
- To
more easily overcome communication, adaptation and other obstacles for children
in preparatory classes and in further education,
the position of a Romani
teaching assistant can be established in a school. The assistant’s work
is aimed at:
Assistance for teachers in the teaching
activity itself, in communication with
Romani children, in individualizing teaching and removing behavioural and
educational difficulties;
Assistance with activities outside the
classroom and outside the school;
Cooperation with
parents;
Cooperation with the local Romani community.
An assistant must be at least 18 and must complete a 10-day
course of basic teaching skills training. As of 1 September 1999 there
were 146 Romani assistants in schools; their salaries are reimbursed by the
MEYS.
- An
application to establish the position of an assistant is filed by a school
principal; the School Office approves the principal’s
application and
recommends it to the Ministry of Education together with an application for
funds. The school principal proposes
the assistant’s pay scale. The
Statute for experimental testing of preparatory classes (14 169/98-22)
cancelled the requirement
for Romani teaching assistants to have completed
secondary education. In 1998 the New School Foundation, Prague arranged the
organization
and financing of a basic teaching skills training course for 35
teaching assistants. Humanitas-Profes, o.p.s. Praha won the competition
for
organizing basic teaching skills training courses. In April 1999 a course was
held for 22 assistants, and 28 assistants were
trained in October.
Another course for assistants will be held in January 2000 and subsequently
courses will be gradually organized,
so that every assistant will be trained.
The courses are reimbursed out of the budget of the MEYS. The work of Romani
assistants
has received very positive evaluations from school principals. After
initial mistrust from teachers the assistants have become partners
in the
childrearing work of schools and parents. Student absence from schools has
significantly decreased, and parents’ interest
in the success and
behaviour of their children has increased.
- All
District Offices have consultants for minorities or specifically Romani
consultants; part of their agenda is work with children.
(See ibid, paras. 15
and 32.)
Special school
- A
special school is defined in the Schools Act as a school which educates students
with intellectual deficiencies due to which they
cannot be educated in an
elementary school or a special elementary school. The graduates of a special
school can thus attain only
such education as would permit them to enter a
vocational school or a practical school intended only for the graduates of
special
schools. Only children with slight mental retardation should attend the
special schools. However, other students with special education
needs (for
example, students afflicted with several defects simultaneously, students with a
medical diagnosis of autism or features
of autism, students with more severe
forms of light brain dysfunctions, students with severe health problems, e.g.
epilepsy, diabetes,
allergies, etc., students with learning and behavioural
disabilities, and students from a socio-culturally disadvantaged environment,
particularly Romani students) also attended the schools.
- On
10 October 1997 the Committee expressed dissatisfaction with the inadequate
provisions for prevention and the fight against all
forms of discriminatory
practices aimed against minority children, including Romani children. It
recommended that the Czech Republic
make greater efforts to reduce
discriminatory practices against the Romani population and that it start to
implement special programmes
for raising the standard of living and the standard
of education and health of Romani children. The Committee for the Elimination
of Racial Discrimination (CERD) also addressed the matter of Czech special
schools in its evaluation of the Czech Republic’s
initial and second
periodic report on the fulfilment of the International Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
CERD pointed with
dissatisfaction to the marginalization of the Romani community in education,
evidence that a disproportionately
large number of Romani children were placed
in special schools, leading to de facto racial segregation, and
significantly diminished
representation by the Roma in secondary and higher
education; these provided grounds for doubts about the full implementation of
article 5 of the Convention (CERD/C/304/Add.47, para.13).
- The
European Roma Rights Centre in Budapest (an NGO) also pointed out the gross
disparity between practice and the rights guaranteed
by the Czech constitutional
order and the European Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and
Fundamental Freedoms. It succeeded
in persuading the parents of Romani children
to file constitutional complaints against the placement in special schools.
The complaint
is based on the fact that the parents were not warned
adequately about the consequences of completing special school instead of
elementary
school as far as further education and placement in the job market
are concerned. On 15 June 1999, Romani parents in Ostrava filed
a complaint with the Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic concerning
12 Romani children placed in special schools in violation
of regulations or
through deception, i.e. a complaint in a matter of violation of human rights.
On 8 November 1999 the Constitutional
Court rejected the complaint,
stating that it did not have jurisdiction over part of the complaint, and it
evaluated the part of
the complaint against specific decisions by principals of
special schools as clearly unsubstantiated. Nonetheless, the Constitutional
Court recommended that those parts of the complaint over which it did not have
jurisdiction be addressed by the appropriate administrative
bodies of the Czech
Republic.
- On
28 July 1999 the Government passed a resolution on a draft law proposed by
several members of Parliament which would change the
currently valid Schools
Act. The change is to increase the flexibility in transferring within the
school system and allowing all
those who completed compulsory education a free
choice in their further education and a free choice of occupation. Once the
amendment
has passed, in addition to applicants who have successfully completed
elementary school, all applicants who have fulfilled the conditions
for
acceptance by proving suitable abilities, knowledge and interests, and the
conditions required for the chosen field of study
- i.e. also graduates of
special schools - are to be accepted to study in secondary schools. The draft
was submitted by several
members of Parliament from opposition parties, headed
by Monika Horáková (Freedom Union). The Government recommended
the draft to the Chamber of Deputies. On 9 December 1999 the Chamber of
Deputies approved the draft and passed it to the Senate.
Children without Czech citizenship
- The
education of children of foreigners who are not citizens of the Czech Republic,
with the exception of citizens of the Slovak Republic,
whose education is
governed by the treaty between the Government of the Czech Republic and the
Government of the Slovak Republic
on cooperation in education of 29 October
1992, is governed by the instruction of the MEYS on the education of foreigners
in elementary
and secondary schools and post-secondary vocational schools,
including special schools (ref. No. 18 062/96 - 21, Bulletin of the
MEYS
No. 7, volume 1996). The instruction states that the following
categories of foreigners will be educated in elementary and
secondary
schools under the same conditions as citizens of the Czech Republic:
foreigners with a permanent or long-term residence
permit, foreigners who were
granted temporary asylum and foreigners who are applying for or have been
granted refugee status on the
territory of the Czech Republic. Children facing
deportation are excluded from education. Children who find themselves in the
position
of illegal immigrants through no fault of their own are thereby
excluded from education.
- Minor
and juvenile applicants for refugee status who have not completed elementary
education are provided free education if they are
of the age for compulsory
education, including education for children in institutions and reformatories.
Children’s centres
are established in all refugee camps for pre-school-age
children. The centres are equipped similarly to kindergartens. Here children
have an opportunity to spend their leisure time actively, improve in abilities
appropriate to their age and develop their language
skills. Before entering
elementary school the children in refugee camps complete a course in the Czech
language of one to three
weeks. This category of juveniles does not have access
to secondary school during the asylum process. Applicants for refugee status
have an opportunity to attend a course in the Czech language in refugee
camps.
- The
new law on asylum does not address the issue of educating foreigners in
elementary and secondary schools. Under the proposed
regulation asylum-seekers
will be considered foreigners who have been granted permanent residence, and in
view of this fact they
should be given the most favorable
status.
- Two
protocols to the treaty of 1992 have been concluded between the Ministry of
Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic
and the Ministry of Education
of the Slovak Republic, on cooperation in the area of education for the
years 1995-1998 dated 20 April
1995 and for the years 1998-2001
dated 15 January 1999.
- Under
section 3, paragraph 6, of MEYS decree No. 291/1991 Coll. on
elementary schools, a school principal assigns children of foreigners
to the
appropriate grade after determining the level of their prior education and
knowledge of the language in which they will be
taught.
- The
method instruction of the MEYS on education against racism, xenophobia and
intolerance ref. No. 14 423/99-22 (see annex 1) was
issued in 1999. The
instruction is addressed to school principals and teachers of all types of
schools and school facilities. The
Czech school inspection will consider its
observance in inspection reports.
Children with disabilities
- Protection
of disabled children is given by the appropriate legal regulations, and a
government resolution publishes the National
Plan for Equalizing Opportunities
for Citizens with Medical Disabilities (see annex 2), which sets clear, specific
assignments for
individual ministries for protection of disabled children. The
Government passed this plan by resolution No. 256 of 14 April 1998.
The
National plan contains the following aims of education:
(a) To
attain a situation where each child with medical disabilities acquires the
maximum possible education;
(b) In accordance with the recommendations
of international declaration and standards, to consider it natural and a
priority to place
children with a disability in a normal school with special
teaching support;
(c) To preserve the solid level of special education,
but to use its capacity more and more only for children with the most severe
disabilities;
(d) To create all necessary conditions for increasing the
number of persons with medical disabilities who attain secondary and higher
education;
(e) To support secondary educational programmes including the
maximum amount of experience directly usable in real life in the open
labour
market;
(f) To expand the number of opportunities for life-long
education of those with medical disabilities;
(g) To remove from our
legal order the institution of “exemption from compulsory
education”; to address meeting the right
to education for children with
severe mental disability by, among other things, the institution of
“exemption from the duty
to attend school” if, in exceptional cases,
the child’s regular presence in school is not possible;
(h) To
provide education for severely mentally disabled children primarily through
fulfilment of an individual educational plan while
providing regular
transportation for them to special schools or facilities where special
pedagogical care is arranged under the jurisdiction
of the Ministry of
Education, Youth and Sports.
- Individual
aspects of protection of disabled children are affected by, for example,
Act No. 29/1984 on elementary and secondary schools
(the Schools Act), as
amended by later amendments, and Act 76/1978 on school facilities, as amended by
later amendments. On the
one hand, these laws provide the basic legislative
framework for accepting children with medical disabilities; on the other hand,
some of them contain provisions which directly apply to disabled children.
These school acts are then followed by decrees, above
all decree No. 127/1997 on
special schools and special kindergartens.
- On
28 October 1993 the United Nations adopted the Standardized Rules for the
Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities.
These rules
represent a very important document, which disabled persons’ organizations
can use in campaigns for equal rights.
Of course, they do not have the validity
of international law, nor are they antidiscrimination legislation.
- The
opportunity to supplement elementary education at the level of the elementary
school (method instruction ref. No. 17 908/95-24)
and special school (ref. No.
18371/96-24) has been expanded for citizens with more severe medical
disabilities, effective 1 September
1998, by decision of the Deputy Minister of
Education, ref. No. 19096/97-24 on supplementing education provided by remedial
school.
Education is supplemented by, among other things, courses for acquiring
the education provided by a remedial school (implemented
as an experiment under
section 58 (a) of the Schools Act). Study in the cited courses is also
considered, for purposes of government
social support and pension insurance, as
systematic preparation for a future occupation, and participants are therefore
financially
supported by the State.
- Barrier-free
facilities for handicapped children are gradually being created in schools of
all levels. Centres for visually disabled
students function in some
universities and are financially supported by the MEYS. For
example:
(a) The Institute for the Rehabilitation of the
Visually Disabled in the School of Physical Education and Sports of Charles
University
organizes courses in basic rehabilitation and spatial orientation for
instructors of the visually disabled, provides education and
training to the
visually disabled and their family members, conducts expert seminars and other
forms of education and services for
the visually disabled, and participates in
awareness-raising activities (exhibitions, radio broadcasts). The Institute has
foreign
cooperation with expert organizations in the Netherlands, Ukraine and
Humboldt University in Berlin. The average annual subsidy
from the MEYS is
around CK 1,480,000;
(b) The Laboratory Carolina at the School of
Mathematics and Physics in the Czech Technical University (České
vysoké učení technické) in Prague provides
counselling and organizes half-year basic computer courses for the blind, as
well as courses for those with
limited vision and specialized courses in programming and work with the
Internet. After completing the basic courses those with severe
visual
disabilities can use the laboratory on their own. The average annual subsidy
from the MEYS is around CK 460,000;
(c) The Laboratory Tereza at the
School of Nuclear Physics and Engineering is a special study room for the blind,
which serves not
only students in the Mathematics Department of the school, but
all blind students in Prague universities and secondary schools.
It is equipped
with special technology and software. Department employees transfer certain
teaching texts into digital form and
organize expert seminars. The average
annual subsidy from the MEYS is around CK 550,000.
B. Best interests of the child
- Authorities
for the social and legal protection of children (District Offices,
municipalities, Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs)
are aware that they
should be guided in the care of children and provision of social and legal
protection by the principle of the
best interests of the child, which is
contained in, besides the Convention, the Act on the Family. This principle is
also contained
in the new law No. 359/1999 Coll. on social and legal protection
of children, which emphasizes that social and legal protection is
protection of
the child’s right to healthy development, proper care in the family and
other justified interests, and that prevention
is part of protection. The new
law addresses the right of the child - but also the right of a parent - to
obtain help, the right
of the child to express his/her opinion and to speak with
a social worker in private, to have his/her opinions taken into account
in
considering upbringing measures, etc. A child has a right to ask for help even
without the knowledge of parents or other persons
responsible for raising the
child. The law comes into effect as of 1 April 2000.
- The
Czech Helsinki Committee Report on the Status of Human Rights in the
Czech Republic in 1998 says concerning the legal regulation
preceding the
new law:
“Social and legal protection of children is handled today by
Departments for Family and Child Care in District Offices. These
departments
record more than half a million cases a year. The most frequent activities of
social workers (it is in large part women
who work in this profession) include
representing children in the role of a custodian in court sessions in
proceedings to arrange
the situation of minors, in determining or denying
paternity, in deciding on alternative family care and in other situations which
concern children... However, the social workers are not always fully qualified
to represent children’s rights. They are not,
nor can they be, a fully
qualified adversary to the other side’s attorney.”
- The
following table presents the number of children represented by workers in the
departments for family and childcare:
|
1995
|
1996
|
1997
|
1998
|
Number of children
|
129 887
|
128 802
|
125 280
|
124 977
|
- During
the period under review, social and legal protection of children was covered by
regulations on social security and the Act
on the Family, in which it is defined
as protection of the child’s rights to healthy development, proper
upbringing and protection
of the legitimate interests of the child, including
protection of his/her property. The aim of the new Act is to strengthen
protection
of the rights of the child and his/her position in relation to
principles sketched out in international documents, in particular
the
Convention, and respond to new social threats to the child from various negative
influences, such as expressions of violence
against children and addiction
(alcoholism, drug addiction, gambling, pornography, commercially directed sexual
abuse).
- The
Act specifies a circle of children to whom the social and legal protection
bodies need to devote special attention, and defines
instruments for protecting
children. The Act regulates cooperation not only between bodies for the social
and legal protection of
children, but also other entities which operate in the
area of care for children, such as school, medical, and other similar
facilities.
Clear rules are set out for arranging adoption and foster care
(organization, procedures, cooperation between individual entities,
content of
consulting for substitute family care). The monitoring of development of
children in institutional upbringing is new.
The Act also regulates assistance
to children who do not have permission for permanent or long-term residence on
the territory of
the Czech Republic and children who find themselves on the
territory of a foreign State unaccompanied, under the European Union Council
resolution of 26 June 1997 on unaccompanied minors who are
citizens of third countries.
- The
Act also governs establishing facilities for social and legal protection -
facilities for expert counselling on care for children,
facilities for
social-educational activity, facilities for children needing immediate
assistance, educational-recreation camps and
facilities for foster care. The
Act permits non-State entities to perform a specified range of social and legal
care activities
under certain conditions. Nevertheless, activities which
represent a basic intervention in the position of the child or persons
responsible for him/her remain restricted to State bodies.
- The
Act also amends other legal regulations, of which the most significant is the
amendment to the Act on misdemeanours that introduces
new elements of
misdemeanours, which should better protect children from mistreatment, neglect
and abuse through physical work.
The new Act on social and legal protection of
children should have a specific distinctive position in addition to other legal
regulations
which protect children, such as the Act on the Family, the Civil
Code, the Civil Procedure Code, the Criminal Code and the Criminal
Procedure
Code.
- In
practice social and legal protection of children is performed by social workers
(employed in the Department of Social Affairs at
District Offices or in the
Department for Family and Child Care) who, however, cannot simultaneously
perform preventive, curative
and punitive functions, as they are very few in
number.
- A
child’s education is a State-protected right. Under article 33, paragraph
1, of the Charter, everyone has a right to an education.
School attendance is
compulsory for the period set by law. This creates an obligation for legal
representatives to register a child
to complete
compulsory education. The legal regulations governing Czech schools are
derived from the text of the Constitution and the Charter. The basic legal
framework of the current school system consists of five basic laws:
− Act on the system of elementary, secondary and post-secondary
occupational schools (No. 29/1984 Coll., as amended);
− Act on pre-school and school facilities (No. 76/1978 Coll., as
amended);
− Act on state administration and local government in education (No.
564/1990 Coll., as amended);
− Act on universities (No. 111/1998 Coll., as
amended).
- NGOs
for children and youth communicate with the MEYS and address their needs through
the following:
(a) The Chamber of Youth - a consulting body to
the Deputy Minister, which holds regular meetings roughly once a
month;
(b) The Commission for Mobility of Youth - a consulting body to
the Deputy Minister for International Youth Exchanges (including
information
from youth representatives in nonState structures of the Council of Europe which
represent youth organizations);
(c) Cooperation with civic associations
of children and youth in creating subsidy procedures and State policy for
youth;
(d) Participation by representatives of civic associations of
children and youth in MEYS decision-making on providing subsidies (about
CK 160
million) to programmes for the support and protection of children and
youth;
(e) Permanent cooperation with NGOs and their support in the area
of minorities (Polish, Romani);
(f) Exchange of information with
DCI;
(g) Children’s and youth parliaments.
- School
Offices, teaching centres, special teaching centres and the appropriate
principals of schools organize additional education
for teachers who have
completed university studies. This education is divided according to individual
subjects. The issues of the
Convention are included in the subjects civic
education and family education.
- Employees
in children’s institutions and reformatories are schooled by the Ministry
of Education in issues relating to the application
of the Convention in these
facilities. The basic rights of children arising under the Convention are an
inseparable part of all
internal regulations of these facilities. Training the
employees of these facilities takes place at two levels: on the one hand,
through standard educational events held by teaching centres in the area, and on
the other hand, specialized seminars organized by
the Department for Special
Education in cooperation with Humanitas Profes, o.p.s. and the Centre for Human
Rights Education of the
European Information Centre at Charles University,
Prague; an average of three specialized training seminars have been held
annually
since 1997.
- In
teachers’ pre-graduate university studies, information about the
Convention is included in the area of civic education, as
well as in various
lectures and seminars for all future teachers, such as social politics or
fundamentals of education. Information
about the Convention for teachers and
others involved in human rights teaching is published through the Centre for
Human Rights Education
or the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR).
C. The right to life, survival and development
- At
the end of 1998 the Czech Republic had 525,542 residents aged under 19. This
age group is 25 per cent of the total population
of the Czech Republic. A
declining birth rate is one of the characteristic features of current
demographic development. The birth
rate has been declining since 1975, with the
exception of 1988 and 1990. In 1994 the smallest number of children were born
in the
Czech Republic since 1785. In 1997 and 1998 the decline in the birth
rate stopped.
- A
significant positive feature is the decline in abortions. Since 1989 the number
of artificial terminations of pregnancy has been
gradually declining as a result
of the increase in the number of women who use medically monitored
contraception.
- Primary
health care for children aged up to 18 is provided by children’s and
adolescents’ doctors, of whom there were
2,202 in 1998. These
doctors conducted a total of 17,500,253 treatments of children and
adolescents and work closely with other
specialists in the area of paediatrics
and adolescent medicine.
- So-called
integrated early care for newborns and infants with various kinds of
disabilities is developing in the Czech Republic again.
As a rule these are
outpatient facilities and they provide, apart from necessary medical care,
social services and the services
of clinical psychologists, both for children
and for the entire family. This is a set of services and programmes provided to
children
who are endangered in their social, biological and psychological
development and children with health problems and their families.
Their aim is
to anticipate disability and prevent or mitigate its consequences, create the
requirements for social integration,
and minimize the negative effects of
affliction on the development of the child and his/her family and their
dependence on social
care.
D. Respect for the views of the child
- The
Amendment to the Act on the Family newly regulated the right of a child who is
able to form his/her own opinion and evaluate the
effects of measures which
concern him/her to be
heard and the right to express himself/herself freely about all his/her
parents’ decisions concerning significant matters about
the child in all
proceedings where such matters are decided, as well as the right to obtain
necessary information.
- Respect
for the child’s opinions is regulated by the provision of section 8 of the
Act on social and legal protection of children, which states that a child who is
able to formulate his/her own opinions has
the right, for purposes of social and
legal protection, always to express freely these opinions in the handling of
matters which
concern him/her, even without his/her parents or other persons
responsible for his/her upbringing being present. These expressions
are to be
paid due attention to, in a manner appropriate to the child’s age and
intellectual maturity.
IV. CIVIL RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS
- Civil
rights and freedoms are protected, in particular, by the Charter.
A. Name and nationality
- Registration
of a child immediately after birth is governed by Act No. 268/1949 Coll. on
birth, death and marriage registers, as amended
by later regulations. Section
10 lists the facts which are recorded in the register of
births:
(a) Name, surname and sex of the
child;
(b) Day, month, year and place of the child’s birth, as
well as the order of birth, if the child was born together with another
(twins)
or several children;
(c) The child’s State
citizenship;
(d) Name, surname, day, month, year and place of birth,
occupation and residence of the parents, as well as the names and surnames
of
the grandparents;
(e) The parents’ agreement on the child’s
surname, if the parents’ surnames differ;
(f) The date of the
record.
- Section
13 stipulates the duty of the person who assisted in the birth (doctor, midwife)
to report the child’s birth within seven working
days. The mother may
fulfil the reporting duty later, as soon as she is able to make the report.
- Section
16 states that if someone finds a child who is not able to provide data
necessary to identify him/her, that person is required to fulfil
the reporting
duty without delay. The birth register office will conduct the necessary
investigation to determine the child’s
identity and record the birth
according to the results.
- The
Czech Republic ratified the Framework Convention for the Protection of National
Minorities (announcement of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs No. 96/1998 Coll.).
The Framework Convention went into effect for the Czech Republic on 1 April
1998. Under article 5,
paragraph 1, of the Convention the parties
undertake to support the conditions necessary for members of
minorities[*] so that they can preserve and
develop their culture and keep the fundamental elements of their identity,
particularly their religion,
language, traditions and cultural heritage.
- On
5 January 2000, the Government submitted to the Chamber of Deputies a draft of a
new law on birth registers, name and surname.
The draft includes, for example,
certain changes concerning a child’s name and surname, entry into the
register of births,
etc. The main change was that a child can have two names
recorded on his/her birth certificate. This would be based on the
parents’
request and the legal regulations in foreign countries. If this
law is passed, parents would gain the ability to determine the child’s
surname by agreement. Consent would be required from a child older than 15.
- Act
No. 194/1999 Coll., which amends Act No. 40/1993 Coll. on acquisition and loss
of the State citizenship of the Czech Republic,
contains several changes which
should improve the situation of children in the matter of State citizenship.
The changes mainly concern
the problems following the split of the Czechoslovak
Federation into two new and independent countries. A new provision, under which
every former Czechoslovak citizen living de facto (even if illegally) on the
territory of the Czech Republic since the division of
the Federation can acquire
Czech citizenship by declaration, regardless of whether he/she has Slovak
citizenship which they will
not have to give up, as they did before, also
applies to children.
- Section
18a, paragraph 3, permits parents who have lived on the territory of the Czech
Republic since before the division of the Federation
to include a child under 15
in the declaration on acquisition of Czech citizenship; they will also be able
to make an independent
declaration for the child. Section 18a, paragraph 5,
addresses the situation of certain children living in institutions and
children’s
homes: if both parents of a child under 15, living on the
territory of the Czech Republic, are stripped of their parental responsibility,
or the exercise of their parental responsibility is suspended or restricted, or
they do not have legal capacity, a court-appointed
guardian, or custodian of the
child can make the declaration; the consent of the parents is not required in
these cases.
- Finally,
the amendment to the Act on Citizenship provides in section 18 that persons
(including children) who were Czech citizens as of 1 January 1992 and chose
Slovak citizenship after the split of the
State did not lose their Czech
citizenship through this choice. Section 27c newly regulates the acquisition of
the State citizenship
of the Czech Republic in the case of children who
were adopted before the amendment to the Act on acquiring and losing State
citizenship
of the Czech Republic, No. 272/1993 Coll., was passed. The proposed
amendment to the Act also provides that in future those Czech
citizens who
acquire Slovak citizenship by naturalization will not lose their Czech
citizenship, provided that they were Czechoslovak
citizens; this too will apply
to children born before 1 January 1993. Romani or minority advisers at District
Offices provide consulting
services in matters relating to state citizenship.
(See ibid., paras. 16 and 33)
- The
process of accession to the Convention relating to the Status of Stateless
Persons of 1954 and the Convention on the Reduction
of Statelessness of
1961 is currently taking place in the Czech Republic.
B. Preservation of identity
- Refer
to chapter IV. A (Name and nationality).
C. Freedom of expression
- In
June 1999 the Government submitted to the Chamber of Deputies a draft of an Act
on the rights and duties of publishers of periodicals
(Press Law), which
approves the ban on censorship and the freedom of speech. One of the
draft’s basic features is provisions
to ensure the protection of society
in cases where the contents of the periodical press violate the constitutional
order of the Czech
Republic or the democratic order of human rights and
fundamental freedoms guaranteed by the Charter. In these cases protection is
entrusted to an independent court, which will be authorized to impose on a
publisher who permits the content of a periodical published
by him/her to be in
violation of the law, an obligation to pay monetary satisfaction to the State.
The court may also decide on
a temporary ban on publication of the periodical in
question, or a ban on its distribution in the Czech Republic. The Chamber of
Deputies approved the draft on 7 December 1999 and passed it to the Senate. At
its first session in 2000, the Senate Committees
recommended to return the draft
to the Chamber of Deputies.
- We
also refer to data on the Act on Freedom of Access to Information in chapter IV.
G.
D. Freedom of thought, conscience and religion
- Under
section 1 of Act No. 308/1991 Coll. on freedom of religion and the status of
Churches and religious societies, each person has the right to
freely express
his/her religion or faith alone or together with others, privately or publicly.
Each person has the right to change
his/her faith or to be without a religious
affiliation. As of 30 September 1999, 21 Churches and religious societies were
registered
in the Czech Republic.
- Freedom
of religion is also protected by section 236 of the Criminal Code, which says
that anyone who through force, threat of force,
or threat of other severe
injury
(a) Forces another to participate in a religious
act;
(b) Prevents another from such participation without authorization;
or
(c) Otherwise prevents another from the exercise of freedom of
religion;
will receive a prison sentence of up to one year. However, the
same law states that legal representatives decide on the religious
education of
children up to the age of 15 (sect. 3).
E. Freedom of association and peaceful assembly
- Under
section 6 of Act No. 83/1990 Coll. on association of citizens, an association is
created by registration. An application for
registration can be filed by at
least three citizens, at least one of whom must be over 18. This indicates that
citizens under 18
may participate in founding an association.
- The
Criminal Code protects freedom of association and assembly in section 238a,
which states that anyone who restricts another through
force, threat of force,
or threat of other serious detriment in the exercise of his right of association
or assembly will receive
a prison sentence of up to two years or a
fine.
F. Protection of privacy
- The
right to protection of privacy is governed by the Civil Code, which states in
section 11 that a natural person has a right to
protection of his/her
person, particularly life and health, civic honour and human dignity, as well as
his/her privacy, name and
personal expression.
- In
the review period Act No. 256/1992 Coll. on protection of personal data in
information systems was in force. This Act governs
protection of personal
data, the obligations of entities which handle personal data, and the liability
of operators of information
systems. This Act also specified special categories
of data which are considered sensitive. However, Act No. 256/1992 Coll. is
not compatible with the legal regulations of the Council of Europe and the
European Union in this area, primarily because no independent
body to monitor
protection of personal data has been established yet, and the Act does not set
penalties for its violation. Therefore,
the Government decided to develop a
draft of a new act, which will be harmonized with European Parliament and
Council Directive 95/46/EC
and with Council of Europe Convention No. 108. After
the necessary legislative process the Government approved the new draft law
on 22 September 1999. It is expected that the new act on protection
of personal data will go into effect in the course of 2000.
- The
Act on the Family authorizes an employee in social and legal protection or
another person entrusted with the protection of a child
to visit the minor in
his/her home, determine in his/her home, school or place of work whether he/she
is duly cared for, and to investigate
the conditions of his/her upbringing. In
this way, the State carries out its obligation to ensure a child such protection
and care
as is necessary for his/her well-being (art. 3 of the Convention) and
its obligation to take the necessary legislative, administrative
and
upbringing-related measures to protect the child from maltreatment (art. 19 of
the Convention). Therefore, the Act on the Family
and Act No. 114/1988 Coll. on
the social security authorities in the Czech Republic, as amended, break through
the constitutionally
guaranteed protection of privacy. Under the Act on social
and legal protection of children, parents or other persons responsible
for a
child’s upbringing will be able to request access to a file, which the
District Office shall grant, if it is not in conflict
with the interests of the
child.
- Violation
of the right to privacy is provided in the Criminal Code in the form of elements
of the crimes of unauthorized use of personal
data (sect. 178), slander (sect.
206), violation of domestic freedom (sect. 238) and violating the privacy of
transmitted messages
(sect. 239).
G. Access to appropriate information
- The
right to access to information is guaranteed by article 17, paragraph 1, of the
Charter:
(a) Freedom of expression and the right to
information are guaranteed;
(b) Everyone has the right to express
his/her opinions in words, letters, print, pictures, or another method, as well
as to freely
seek, receive and spread ideas and information regardless of State
boundaries;
(c) Censorship is not allowed;
(d) Freedom of
expression and the right to seek and spread information can be restricted by
law, if it is a measure necessary in
a democratic society for the protection of
the rights and freedoms of others, national security, public safety, public
health or
morals;
(e) State bodies and bodies of local administration
are required to provide information on their activities in an appropriate
manner;
conditions and methods are set by law.
- In
May 1999 Parliament approved the Act on freedom of access to information, which
governs the provision of information related to
the jurisdiction of State bodies
and local administration bodies. In particular, it governs free access to
information and provides
conditions under which information is provided. The
Act was published in the Collection of Laws under No. 106/1999. (See ibid.,
para. 17.)
- At
the present time section 205 of the Criminal Code (endangering public
morals) is in effect, which protects children against pornography. Paragraph
2
of this section states that anyone who
(a) Offers,
lends or makes accessible to a person under the age of 18, pornographic written
works, sound or visual recordings or
pictures, or
(b) Exhibits
them or otherwise makes them accessible at a place which is accessible to
persons under the age of 18, shall receive
a prison sentence of up to one year,
a fine, or forfeiture of a thing.
(See ibid.)
- Article
17 (c) of the Convention concerns the creation and dissemination of books for
children. After a certain decline in the publication
of children’s
literature after 1989 there has been gradual mild growth. State support for the
publication of illustrated creative
works for children and youth is given
through a grant which has been announced by the Minister of Culture regularly
since 1997.
- Support
for the relationship of children and youth to libraries and books as a source of
information is declared in the outline of
the culture policy in the Czech
Republic. The departments for children and youth in public libraries
regularly organize round tables and competitions, and issue publications
and
bibliographies intended for children and youth. As part of the grant
from the Ministry of Culture, public libraries received a total of CK 730,000
for these activities.
- Access
to appropriate information is also ensured by Act No. 273/1993 Coll. on
certain conditions for the creation, dissemination and storage of audio-visual
works, and on the amending and supplementing of certain laws and certain
other regulations, section 4 of which states that audio-visual works whose
content could
endanger the moral development of minors shall have an
accessibility limit set at the age of 15 or 18. Other measures are also partly
provided by Act No. 468/1991 Coll. on operating radio and television
broadcasting; section 6 provides that operators are required
to see to it that
broadcasting of commercials does not include either commercials which support
behaviour which endangers morals,
consumer interests or the interests of
protection of health, safety or the environment, or commercials directed at
children or in
which children appear, if they support behaviour which endangers
their health or psychological or moral development. (See
ibid.)
- On
5 January 2000, the Government approved the draft of a new act on operating
radio and television broadcasting which devotes more
attention to the protection
of children and youth. In addition to restrictions in commercials, it bans
programmes which can seriously
interfere with the physical or moral development
of children and youth, because of their depiction of violence or their
pornographic
character; programmes capable of endangering the physical,
spiritual or moral development of children and youth may not be broadcast
in the
period from 6.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m.; radio and television broadcasting operators
are required to ensure that the broadcast
of a programme which can seriously
interfere with the physical, spiritual or moral development of children and
youth is immediately
preceded by a verbal or visual warning that it is
unsuitable for children and youth. (See ibid.)
H. The right not to be subjected to torture or other
cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment or punishment
- On
1 January 1993 the Czech Republic, as one of the successor States to the Czech
and Slovak Federative Republic, became a party to
the Convention against Torture
and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, which is an
international treaty on
human rights and fundamental freedoms under article 10
of the Constitution of the Czech Republic; thus it is directly binding on
everyone and has priority over domestic law.
- The
prohibition of torture and other inhuman or cruel treatment and sanctions for it
are contained in section 259a of the Criminal
Code. Section 242 of the Criminal
Code protects children from sexual abuse.
- Section
215 of the Criminal Code, which expressly protects children from cruelty, states
that anyone who mistreats a person who is
in his/her care for upbringing shall
be punished by a prison sentence of six months to three years. The perpetrator
shall be punished
by a prison sentence of two years to eight years if he/she
commits the crime stated in paragraph 1 in an especially brutal manner
or
against more than one person, or continues to commit the crime for a prolonged
period.
- Protection
is provided not only to minor children, but also to adult persons who are for
any reason (illness, age, invalidity, mental
retardation, etc.) entrusted to the
care of other persons, regardless of the basis - legal regulation, court
decision, agreement,
etc. - for the care or upbringing. Torture means not only
causing physical suffering, but also psychological torture.
- At
the present time children learn about their rights not only in school, but
particularly from campaigns, organized mainly by NGOs
concerned with the torture
of children (e.g. the Fund for Endangered Children, the Our Child Foundation,
etc.).
- The
situation of children living in social care institutions, children’s
homes, diagnostic institutions and institutions for
upbringing is unique. Some
institutions employ staff whose quality is not quite appropriate for the
children’s needs. The
main inadequacy is that not only the support staff,
but even the caretakers and attendants do not have to undergo psychological
testing
to determine whether they have a good relationship with children and the
ability to provide proper care, including the handling of
stressful situations.
The staff do not even have to present a copy or an extract from the criminal
register. Thus, cases occur
where children are exposed to degradation, threats
and insults. Romani children also encounter racism on the part of staff. In
1999 the Commissioner for Human Rights handled a case where two caretakers in a
children’s home publicly insulted and attacked
Romani children with racist
insults and rough treatment. The director of the children’s home filed a
criminal report against
both employees for defamation of ethnicity, race and
faith and both employees left the institution.
- The
European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading
Treatment or Punishment in its report of 15 July 1997
recommended to the Czech
Republic that staff of facilities for children and youth be selected carefully.
The management of such
facilities should be entrusted to persons who are capable
managers and are able to actively react to the complicated demands of staff
and
wards. From 16 to 26 February 1997 the Committee visited certain police
facilities, prisons and facilities for youth in the
Czech Republic. The
Government of the Czech Republic responded to the Committee’s report and
recommendations with a preliminary
and subsequent report. In these reports the
Government provided explanations and its position on individual recommendations
and
provided information about measures taken.
V. FAMILY ENVIRONMENT AND ALTERNATIVE CARE
A. Parental guidance
- As
stated in the initial report, article 32 of the Charter provides that parenthood
and the family are protected by law and guarantees
special protection of
children and youth. It states that parents have a right to care for and bring
up their children and that children
have a right to be brought up and cared for
by their parents. Parents’ rights may be restricted and minor children
may be
separated from their parents against their will only by a court decision
based on law. Parents who care for children have a right
to State assistance.
Family relationships are governed by the Act on the Family.
B. Parental responsibilities
- Parental
responsibility is newly regulated by the Act on the Family in sections 31-34.
Section 31, paragraph 1, defines parental
responsibility as the aggregate of
rights and obligations:
(a) When caring for a minor child,
including in particular care for the child’s health and physical,
emotional, intellectual
and moral development;
(b) When representing a
minor child;
(c) When managing the child’s property.
- Paragraph
3 states that a child who is able, in view of the degree of his/her development,
to form his/her own opinion and evaluate
the effect of measures concerning
him/her has the right to obtain necessary information and express
himself/herself freely about
all the parents’ decisions concerning
important matters affecting the child and to be heard in all proceedings in
which such
matters are decided. This provision corresponds to article 12 of the
Convention.
- Under
section 34, paragraph 1, parental responsibility belongs to both
parents.
- Under
section 41, paragraph 2, each of the parents is entitled to obtain help from
bodies for the social and legal protection of children,
other State bodies,
schools, and educational, health care or consulting facilities and municipal
authorities if there are obstacles
which hinder parents in the performance of
their parental responsibility for a child. The child himself/herself is also
entitled
to obtain the help of these authorities and
facilities.
- In
order to protect children, but also to address a family crisis, the 1998
amendment to the Act on the Family brought a new institution
into the legal
order, “suspension of parental responsibility”, which makes it
possible to address a situation where parents
cannot take care of their children
for a certain time. In such a case the court appoints a guardian for the child
or children for
that period. Another new provision also aims to increase
protection of children; it charges a court to always determine whether
grounds
exist to initiate proceedings to remove parental responsibility if a parent
commits an intentional crime against his/her
child or uses his/her child under
the age of 15 to commit a crime, or commits a crime as an accomplice, instigator
or assistant in
a crime committed by his/her child.
- Municipalities
and District Offices provide counselling services to parents through their
divisions or departments for social affairs
and also special departments for
family and childcare. Parents can also make use of the services of counselling
facilities - counselling
offices for marriage, family and human relationships,
which provide counselling for married and engaged couples, single parents,
dysfunctional families, families with medically disabled members and others.
These services are both governmental and non-governmental
facilities.
- In
1998 there were 62 government counselling services in the Czech Republic, which
provided some 130,000 consultations. These services
are established by District
Offices or city halls, and their management falls under the Ministry of Labour
and Social Affairs. In
addition there are some 10 non-governmental counselling
services.
C. Separation from parents
- Under
section 44 of the Act on the Family, a court may, in justified cases, suspend or
restrict a parent’s exercise of parental
responsibility or remove his/her
parental responsibility. If the reasons for this measure cease to exist, the
suspension, restriction
or removal of parental responsibility can be
repealed.
- Under
section 26, paragraph 2, of the Act on the Family the court can entrust a child
to the joint or alternating care of both parents
if both parents are able to
raise the child, have an interest in doing so, it is in the interests of the
child, and the child’s
needs will thus be better ensured.
- Under
section 27, paragraph 2, of the Act on the Family, the court shall regulate the
parents’ contact with a child if the interests
of the child’s
upbringing and the situation in the family require it. Preventing an authorized
parent’s contacts with
his/her child, if it is repeatedly unjustified, is
considered a change in situation requiring a new decision on the environment in
which the child is brought up. However, in practice it often happens that after
lengthy court proceedings the child is automatically
entrusted to the care of
the mother, who, however, does not permit the child to have regular contact with
the father, and thus violates
the child’s rights. Court proceedings often
involve disproportionate delays and this lengthens the time that the child does
not have contact with the other parent. The lengthiness of the process is
sometimes caused by the attitude of the parents, for whom
the matter has become
a matter of prestige. Naturally, there are also cases where the father prevents
the mother from having contact
with the child, particularly in cases where he
takes the child even before the court decision.
Divorces in families with minor children
Year
|
Total number of divorces
|
Of those, with minor children
|
1995
|
31 135
|
22 108
|
1996
|
33 113
|
23 438
|
1997
|
32 465
|
22 603
|
1998
|
32 636
|
21 636
|
- See
also chapter VI. G on institutional upbringing.
D. Family reunification
- In
practice, after family reunification, the provisions of the Act on acquiring and
losing State citizenship are applied, under which
the condition of uninterrupted
residence can be waived for an applicant with permanent residence on the
territory of the Czech Republic
if the spouse is a citizen of the Czech
Republic.
- Under
section 65 of Act No. 326/1999 Coll. on the residence of foreigners on the
territory of the Czech Republic, a foreigner is entitled
to reside permanently
on the territory of the Czech Republic on the basis of a permanent residence
permit. This residence permit
can be issued particularly for purposes of family
reunification if a spouse, relative in a direct line of descent, or a sibling of
the foreigner has permanent residence on the territory of the
Czech Republic.
- There
is no provision in the legal order of the Czech Republic under which an
application for entry or departure from the country
for purposes of family
reunification can have negative consequences for an applicant or his/her family.
E. Illicit transfer and non-return
- In
1997 the Czech Republic ratified the Hague Convention on Civil Aspects of
International Child Abduction, which entered into force
on 1 March 1998. The
main aim of the Convention is to ensure the immediate return of children
wrongfully removed to a contracting
State or retained in it, and to ensure that
the rights concerning care for the child and contact with him/her under the
legal order
of one contracting State will be effectively observed in the other
contracting States. This specifically means ensuring the exercise
of the right
to care for a child to the parent to whom the child was entrusted by court
decision, and ensuring the exercise of the
right to contact with the child to
the parent who does not have the child in his/her care.
- Cases
where a person transports another person across borders against his/her will are
addressed by section 233 of the Criminal Code
(abduction abroad), which
stipulates the following:
(a) Anyone who abducts another abroad
will be punished by a prison sentence of three to eight years.
(b) The
perpetrator will be punished by a prison sentence of 5 to 12 years:
(i) If he commits the crime stated in (a) as a member of an organized
group;
(ii) If he commits the crime against a person under the age of 15 or against a
person suffering from a mental disorder or who is
insufficiently developed
mentally; or
(iii) If, through the crime he causes serious injury to health, death, or
another especially serious consequence.
F. Recovery of maintenance for the child
- Sections
85 and 86 of the Act on the Family define the parents’ duty to provide for
the child. The duty continues until the
children are able to provide for
themselves. Both parents contribute to providing for their children according
to their abilities,
opportunities, and property.
A child has a right to share in the standard of living of his/her parents.
If the parents of a minor child do not live together,
the court shall regulate
the extent of their support duty or approve their agreement on the amount of
support payment.
- Neglect
of required support is punished by section 213 of the Criminal Code. Anyone who
does not fulfil the support duty, even if
from neglect, shall be punished by a
prison sentence of up to one year. Anyone who intentionally avoids the support
duty will be
punished by a prison sentence of up to two years.
G. Children deprived of their family environment
- Children
who require special protection and care, who were temporarily or permanently
deprived of their family environment, or whom
it was not possible to leave in
their current environment in their best interests are recorded and monitored by
childcare authorities
at the appropriate District Offices and Municipal Offices.
If all attempts at family therapy fail (material assistance, financial
assistance, counselling), the childcare authority files an application with the
court to issue a preliminary injunction or an application
to order institutional
care. In the experience of the NGOs, however, family therapy is often
inadequate owing, on the one hand,
to a lack of social workers and, on the other
hand, to a lack of financial resources for the necessary material and financial
assistance.
- The
substantive law regulation in ordering institutional care and other measures
related to care is the Act on the Family No. 94/1963
Coll. in the wording of law
No. 91/1998 Coll.
- At
the beginning of 1995 the Constitutional Court struck down as unconstitutional,
effective 1 October 1995, the provision of the
Act on the Family under which a
preliminary injunction concerning an abandoned child or separation from parents
and delivery to the
care of another person, e.g. a legal entity, usually a
diagnostic institution, could be issued by a District Office. Under an old,
now
repealed regulation the authority informed the court without delay, and the
court then issued a supplemental decision. Since
October 1995, an amendment to
the Civil Procedure Code went into effect, replacing the provision of section 46
of the Act on the
Family annulled by the Constitutional Court. According to the
Civil Procedure Code, only a court is now authorized to issue a preliminary
injunction concerning, e.g. delivery of a child to the care of another person
(including a legal entity), and the measure is issued
by a judge. The court is
then required, based on an application from the District Office, to decide on
the measure within 24 hours.
This applies to situations in addition to
abandonment where, according to the law, the life or positive development of the
child
is seriously endangered or interfered with.
- Under
section 46, paragraph 2, of the Act on the Family the court can order placement
in an institution if the child’s development
is seriously endangered or
seriously interfered with and other measures did not correct the situation, or
if, for other serious reasons,
the parents are unable to provide for the
child’s upbringing. If it is necessary in the interests of a minor, the
court may
also order institutional care if no other prior measures were taken in
this regard. Paragraph 3 of the section state that before
ordering placement in
an institution, the court is
required to investigate whether the child can be raised in alternative family
care, which takes precedence over institutionalization.
If the reasons for
placement in an institution cease to exist after it has been ordered, or if
alternative family care can be arranged
for the child, the court shall cancel
the institutional placement order.
- A
decision which takes the child out of the parents’ care and places him/her
in an institutional setting deeply affects both
the rights of the parents and
the rights of the child. By an order for institutional placement the child is
subjected to an institutional
regime, which the parents cannot affect. The
court does not regulate the parents’ contact with the child. Those
situations
are handled solely according to the institution’s regulations.
In certain cases a child remains in the institution setting
even after the order
has been cancelled by a final decision, until the court prepares and delivers
the verdict.
- Apart
from placement in an institution, the court in criminal proceedings can order a
minor placed in a reformatory under section
84 of the Criminal Code. Under
section 86 of the Criminal Code, in civil law proceedings the court can order a
person under 15 placed
in a reformatory if that person committed an act which
would otherwise be a crime. Reformatories and institutions share the same
facilities with the same regime, as special facilities for reformatories do not
exist.
- At
present there are no legal regulations governing institutional care and
reformatories in the Czech Republic. In September 1999
the Government
passed an outline of an act on institutional care and reformatories. For
children’s homes, the MEYS issued
decree No. 64/1981 Coll. on
education facilities for institutional care and reformatories upbringing, which
generally provides the
rights and obligations of those who are involved in
institutional care. However, a similar regulation for institutional care in
facilities under the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Labour and Social
Affairs does not exist.
- Children
living in institutional settings are, to a certain extent, excluded from the
normal way of life, and their further development
is therefore potentially
endangered. During the period under review, no legal regulation contained a
duty to review at regular intervals
whether the conditions for the institutional
placement still exist. The rights and obligations of all persons who were
involved
in ordering and providing institutional care were not sufficiently
regulated, either in the amended Act on the Family or in regulations
with lower
legal force. Regular inspection of these facilities is not regulated, and the
duties of their employees and the corresponding
rights of the children are not
adequately specified. The Czech Schools Inspection or the School Office reviews
the procedures of
employees in institutions based on complaints.
- This
area is appropriately handled by the Act on social and legal protection of
children, which imposes on District Office employees
a duty to monitor the
observance of the rights of children placed in institutions. They are required
to visit the child once every
six months and monitor his/her development and the
conditions for these children’s continuing residence. The employees of
State administration bodies who will conduct the inspections can be bound to
confidentiality about personal data which they will
learn during the inspection
or in connection with it, and they can also be given other obligations when
assessing consequences and
taking
measures related to their findings. At the present time, this cannot be
arranged for inspections which would be conducted by NGOs.
Non-profit
organizations can conduct inspections in the context of a civil society, where
they can take their complaints and grounds
to a higher body than that governing
the facility in which they found defects, or to the courts.
- The
procedures for the establishment and the characteristics of facilities under the
jurisdiction of the Ministry of Health are regulated
by Act No. 20/1966 on care
for public health, as amended. The procedures for the establishment and the
characteristics of facilities
under the jurisdiction of the MEYS are regulated
by Act No. 76/1978 Coll. on educational facilities, as amended. The procedures
for the establishment and the characteristics of facilities under the
jurisdiction of the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs are
regulated by Act
No. 100/1988 Coll. on social security, as amended.
- Children
are placed in the facilities described in the following paragraphs on the basis
of court decisions.
Facilities under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of
Health
- Children
up to the age of 3 are placed in infants’ institutions and
children’s homes for children from 0 to 3 years old
(in 1998 there were 13
infants’ institutions, 10 children’s homes for children from 0 to 3
years old and 16 children’s
homes for children from 1 to 3 years old in
the Czech Republic, with a total capacity of 2,136 places). In these facilities
children
are provided health, educational and social care. The main task of
these facilities is to find as soon as possible, in cooperation
with parents,
the childcare authority and the courts, a solution to the child’s
situation so that his/her stay will be as short
as possible. In 1998 a total of
2,171 children were admitted into these facilities and 2,034 were released, 50.8
per cent of them
to the biological family, 21.3 per cent to adoption, 6.6 per
cent to other forms of alternative family care, 14.9 per cent to another
institutional facility and 6.0 per cent elsewhere. Despite all efforts of all
involved institutions, children’s stays in institutions
are lengthening.
The most difficult to place in alternative family care are severely medically
disabled children, children with
behavioural and developmental problems and
Romani children.
- Nursery
schools also fall under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Health; these are
facilities which provide health education activities
for children from 1 to 3
years of age (see the initial report, para. 160).
Number of nursery schools and number of places in
these
facilities in the period under review
|
1995
|
1996
|
1997
|
1998
|
First half of 1999
|
Total number of facilities
|
207
|
151
|
101
|
79
|
77
|
Total number of places in nursery schools
|
7 574
|
5 551
|
2 965
|
2 191
|
2 167
|
- In
most cases nursery schools are established by municipalities or District
Offices; there are also a minimal number of private nursery
schools (in 1999
there were 4 private nursery school facilities out of a total of 77). The sharp
decline in the number of nursery
school facilities is caused by the fact that
parents (primarily mothers) make more use of the opportunity to stay at home
with the
child on maternity leave and draw State social support payments until
the child reaches the age of four. The low birth rate in the
Czech Republic
also has an influence on the decline of nursery
schools.
Facilities for institutional care, reformatories and
for preventive care under the jurisdiction of the MEYS
- These
educational facilities form a set of institutions of several
types[*] which provide protection for children
and youth aged 3-18 against the negative influences of a dysfunctional family or
other socially
negative environment. They provide the full support and
upbringing which a family should provide under normal circumstances. Children
can be placed in these facilities both based on a court decision and at the
request of parents or their legal representatives. Under
section 46, paragraph
2, of the Act on the Family, the court can, for serious reasons, extend
institutional care up to one year after
a child reaches the age of majority.
- The
institutional care of adolescents who do not have the opportunity to grow up in
a normal family environment is arranged by children’s
homes and special
residential schools. Young people of both sexes are placed in
children’s homes from the age of 3 and remain until the age of 18,
or until completing occupational training; these are young people for whom a
court
ordered institutional placement or who need to be immediately placed in
alternative family care until a court decision is made, or,
sometimes, based on
an agreement between the parents or other legal representatives and the
diagnostic institution which manages
the children’s home.
Children’s homes and special residential schools thus do not work with an
antisocial population,
but with children who do not have the opportunity to grow
up in a normal family environment. Children’s homes are divided
into
residential-type and family-type homes. The basic organizational unit for the
group of children and adolescents in a dormitory-type
children’s home is
the educational group; in a family-type children’s home it is the family
unit.
- Special
residential schools were originally established for children completing
compulsory education in special schools with a dormitory. Their role later
shifted
to providing institutional care. At present they are an alternative to
children’s homes or to reformatories. They have gradually
been
transformed into these institutions because of the predominating clientele and
according to the needs of the network of care
facilities.
- Institutional
care or reformatories for young people with behavioural disorders are arranged
by special care facilities (reformatories). Educational institutions for
children and youth are divided according to age into children’s
reformatories,
reformatories for youth and reformatories for children and youth.
Children who have been ordered placed in an institution or reformatory
and who
have not completed compulsory education and exhibit a level of disturbance such
that they cannot be placed in a children’s
home are placed in a
children’s reformatory. Those who have completed compulsory education are
placed in a reformatory for
youth. Reformatories for children and youth are
established as joint facilities, which fulfil the tasks of a children’s
reformatory
and a reformatory for youth.
- The
basic and dominant facility in this system is the diagnostic institution.
It is here that the first, and therefore very important, contact between the
child and institutional care takes place, and often
the child’s later
development is predetermined here. Diagnostic institutions are residential care
facilities, where comprehensive
psychological and special education examinations
are conducted for children and youth who have been placed in a care facility.
The
comprehensive examination generally lasts eight weeks and consists of
psychological, special education and health examinations.
The diagnostic
institutions place children and adolescents in educational facilities based on
the comprehensive examination.
- The
children’s diagnostic institution performs diagnostic tasks for children
of pre-school age and children attending elementary
school or special school.
The diagnostic institution for youth performs diagnostic tasks for youth. The
length of a child’s
stay in a diagnostic institution is limited by section
11, paragraph 5, of MEYS Decree No. 64/1981 to eight weeks. Diagnostic
institutions
are divided internally into diagnostic, social service, care and
intake locations. The intake locations accept for temporary residence
children
and youth caught running away from legal representatives or a children’s
home or educational institution. The diagnostic
institution keeps records of
children and youth located in individual educational institutions and of
available places in individual
educational facilities in the regional district
assigned to it by the MEYS. The diagnostic institution develops proposals for
changes
in the network of care facilities and dormitory schools in the given
regional district for the MEYS and notifies the Ministry and
its facilities
about knowledge gained by its expert employees.
- Centres
for the care of children and youth are institutions which arrange to work
with the school population directly threatened by sociologically pathological
elements; they
work primarily as a second level of prevention. A condition for
acceptance into the centre is the voluntary decision of the client
and his
parents. The centres have both outpatient and inpatient facilities. Children
come to the latter only if outpatient intervention
is not sufficient. They stay
about two months. The centres work intensively with them using an individual
programme of behavioural
education. Those who fail even here and continue
antisocial behaviour are placed in a care facility or
reformatory.
- The
total number of these facilities increased from 158 in 1989/90 to 190 in
1997/98, i.e. by 20 per cent. The largest part of
this growth came in the last two school years, 1996/97 and 1997/98, when 21
new facilities were added.
The majority of these facilities
(63 per cent) are of children’s homes, of which there were 120
in the 1997/98 school year.
- The
number of children placed in all these facilities increased from 5,700 in
1989/90 to 6,900 in 1997/98, i.e. by 21 per cent. The
largest number
of children and youth are placed in children’s homes and comprise
60 per cent of the charges of these facilities.
In
the 1997/98 school year there were 4,134 children in
children’s homes. Another large group are children in
children’s
reformatories, reformatories for children and reformatories for
children and youth, of whom there were 2,178 in the 1997/98 school
year,
30 per cent of the total number.
Change in the number of educational facilities for
institutional care, reformatories
and preventive care and their charges,
school years 1991/92-1997/98
|
Total charges
|
Total care facilities
|
1991/92
|
5 105
|
164
|
1992/93
|
5 176
|
162
|
1993/94
|
5 839
|
161
|
1994/95
|
6 418
|
169
|
1995/96
|
6 512
|
176
|
1996/97
|
6 875
|
189
|
1997/98
|
6 891
|
190
|
Source: Institute for Information on
Education.
Institutions for social care of children and youth under
the jurisdiction
of the Ministry of Labour and Social
Affairs
- The
institutions for social care provide health, social and developmental assistance
for children and youth with severe mental and
(or) physical disabilities. At
present these institutions are going through significant changes in this area:
expert care is improving,
the institutions are being equipped with necessary
materials (one-time aids, equipment which permits easier movement of heavy,
immobile
patients, and the internal structure of the institutions is changing -
the number of beds per room is decreasing and in some institutions
expert care,
in which the staff treats each client individually, has improved. In practice,
however, a great deal depends on the
attitudes of the directors of the
individual institutions. The main failing has been the lack of possibilities to
fully respect
the individual needs of each
individual.
Alternative care for children deprived of a
family environment
- Foster
care and other forms of alternative care are contained in the Act on Foster
Care, No. 50/1973 Coll., as amended by later regulations,
and in the Act on the
Family. Once the Act comes into effect (1 January 2000), foster care will be
evaluated under the Act. All
forms of alternative family care are decided by a
court.
- Foster
care is part of the system of alternative family care. Children who are not
legally available or who are difficult to put up for adoption
because of a
health or mental disability are placed in foster care. A foster parent is
required to care for the child personally,
and has the rights and obligations of
parents in raising the child. He/she has the right to represent the child and
manage his/her
affairs only in routine matters. There are presently about 5,000
children in foster families. Foster care is decided by a court.
It terminates
when the child reaches the age of majority, by the child’s death, or by
the death of the foster parent. Joint
foster care of spouses terminates with
the divorce of the foster parents or the death of one of the spouses. Foster
care can also
be cancelled for serious reasons, but only by court decisions.
Foster care can be provided in special facilities for foster care,
of which
there were about 90 in the Czech Republic as of 1 January 1999. Married couples
care for the children in these facilities.
A special form of special facilities
for foster care are SOS Children’s Villages (Chvalčov, Doubí u
Karlových
Varů) where only women care for groups of
children.
- The
new Act on social and legal protection of children contains detailed provisions
concerning the arrangement of foster care and
adoption. Under the draft, a
register will be created of children suitable for adoption or foster care as
well as records/a register
of applicants. The draft precisely defines criteria
by which the child and the applicant will be filed in the records/register or
removed. If adoption or foster care is not found for a child within six months
after entry in the register, the Ministry of Labour
and Social Affairs will send
a copy of the data from the register to the officer for international legal
protection of children in
Brno, who will try to arrange adoption
abroad.
Entrusting a child to the care of someone other than
his/her parents
- This
possibility should be used to resolve short-term situations (illness,
imprisonment, parents’ lack of majority, etc.).
However, it is also used
for long-term solutions for the child’s fate instead of foster care,
particularly if a child is entrusted
to the care of grandparents. However, the
result of this practice is that the child’s support is not properly
ensured, because
the parents often do not pay support, or fulfil their support
duty inadequately. If the interests of a child so require, the court
may
entrust the child to be brought up by a natural person other than the parents,
if that person provides a guarantee of proper
upbringing and agrees to be
entrusted with the child. When choosing a suitable person the court generally
gives priority to a child’s
relatives. The child and the appointed person
are under regular supervision by authorities responsible for social and legal
protection
of children.
Guardianship
- A
court appoints a guardian for a minor child if both of the parents have died,
have had their parental responsibility removed, exercise
of their parental
responsibility has been suspended or they do not have full legal capacity. The
guardian brings up the minor, represents
him/her and manages his/her property
instead of the parents. If a natural person cannot be appointed as a guardian,
the court shall
appoint a body for social and legal protection of children as
guardian. The guardian is responsible to the court for proper exercise
of
his/her role and is subject to its regular review.
- A
social worker from the appropriate childcare authority is present at each court
session in which decisions are made about the fate
of a minor child. In its
decision-making the court must primarily take into account the interests of the
child and, if the minor’s
age and intellectual abilities permit, the court
must also hear the minor (Act on the Family, sect. 31).
- Annex
3 contains statistical data on alternative family care.
H. Adoption
- Adoption
is the optimum form of alternative family care. It is governed by the Act on
the Family. Section 67 provides that the consent
of the child’s legal
representative is required for adoption. If the child is able to evaluate the
effect of adoption, his/her
consent is also required. Section 68 of the Act on
the Family also provides that the consent of the legal representatives is not
required if:
(a) For a period of at least six months they
consistently failed to show real interest in the child, particularly
demonstrated by
the fact that they did not visit the child regularly, did not
regularly and voluntarily fulfil their duty of support to the child,
and they do
not show efforts to arrange their family and social opportunities, within their
range of possibilities, so that they
can personally take up caring for the
child; or
(b) For a period of at least two months after the
child’s birth they did not show any interest in the child, even though
there
was no obstacle to prevent them from showing an interest.
The court
determines whether these conditions have been met as of the day the social and
legal protection authority files an application.
- A
parent can give consent to adoption no earlier than six weeks after the
child’s birth.
- Parties
to the court proceedings about the parents’ lack of interest are the
authority for social and legal protection of children
(as the applicant)
and the parents. The court shall summon the parents to the proceedings if their
residence is known. If their
residence is unknown, after reports from the
citizens’ registers, prisoners’ registers, or other evidence fails
to reveal
the residence of the parents, a guardian can be named, under section
29, paragraph 2 of the Civil Procedure Code, and the proceedings
continued with
the guardian.
- In
the court’s evaluation of the lack of interest of the parents in a child,
at least six months pass from the filing of the
application with the court until
the verdict. This delay has negative consequences for the child’s
psychological, emotional
and physical health.
- There
are two forms of adoption in the Czech Republic, reversible and non-reversible
adoption. A court can decide on non-reversible
adoption only for a child over
the age of one year (sect. 75 of the Act on the Family). In non-reversible
adoption the adoptive
parent is registered in the birth register instead of the
parent. Only a husband and wife can adopt a child in this way, or the
spouse of
one of the child’s parents, or a surviving spouse of the child’s
parent or adoptive parent. In exceptional
cases a single person can adopt in
this way, if expectations exist that such adoption will fulfil its social
purpose. In that case
the court will also decide to strike the entry about the
child’s other parent from the birth register.
- The
court can reverse reversible adoption only on serious grounds, at the
application of the adoptee or adoptive parent. When adoption
is reversed mutual
rights and obligations are created again between the adoptee and the original
family. The adoptee will again
have his/her previous surname. Reversible
adoption is governed by section 73 of the Act on the Family.
- An
authority responsible for social and legal protection participates in the
selection of suitable parents and decides about entrusting
a child into
pre-adoptive care. District Offices accept the applications of persons
(spouses) for the adoption of a child or for
entrusting him/her to foster care.
After accepting an application they summarize information about the suitability
of these persons
from a health, psychological, personality and social-economic
viewpoint, and in terms of having a clean civic record. The District
Offices
notify the regional office of the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs about
suitable children and applicants for adoption
or foster care; the regional
office registers them and, in cooperation with experts among employees in
counselling for alternative
family care and from facilities for institutional
care, evaluates which applicants could be suitable alternative parents for a
certain
child. For this the regional office requests expert evaluations of the
motives, upbringing, marital stability, psychological profile
and personality of
the applicants with respect to the child being considered. The decisionmaking
takes into account the child’s
special needs, health, and possible
physical and psychological disabilities, and care is taken to observe the
prescribed procedures
during the arrangements. After recommending a suitable
child to alternative parents who best meet the requirements, the procedures
provided by the Act on the Family take place in the respective District Office.
- Adoption
creates the same relationship between the adoptive parent and the adoptee as
exists between parents and children, and a family
relationship is created
between the adoptee and the adoptive parent’s relatives. Adoptive parents
have parental responsibility
for bringing up children. The adoptee is given the
adoptive parent’s surname.
- Through
adoption the mutual rights and obligations between the adoptee and the original
family terminate. The adoptive parents themselves
decide whether they will give
the adoptee information about his/her biological parents. This principle is in
accordance with the
declaration of the Czech Republic concerning article 7,
paragraph 1, of the Convention. The Czech Republic believes that the problem
of
the relationships between the adopted child and the biological parents is
complicated and sensitive, and therefore it is not considering
revoking the
declaration at the present time. This question is discussed in the course of
pre-adoption proceedings and it is recommended
to the adoptive parents that they
inform the child about these facts in a suitable way and at a suitable time
(pre-school age).
(See ibid., paras. 8 and 26.)
Adoption abroad
- On
14 April 1999 the Government approved (in accordance with the Committee’s
recommendation) in resolution No. 338 accession
to the Hague Convention on the
Protection of Children and Cooperation in Respect of International Adoption
of 29 May 1993. The parties
to this convention undertake to
ensure that, in the adoption of children from one State to another, all the
requirements provided
by the Convention will be observed - in particular that
children will be adopted abroad only if they cannot be adopted, placed in
foster
care or otherwise suitably placed in their country of origin and that they will
be adopted abroad only if it is in the best
interests of the child and in order
to prevent abductions of children and trade in them. The draft passed the first
reading in the
Chamber of Deputies, and was also discussed in parliamentary
committees in September 1999. (See ibid., para. 36.)
- According
to the new Act on social and legal protection of children, an Office for
International Legal Protection of Children, located
in Brno, is to be
established. This office will be the main coordinator of adoptions of children
from the Czech Republic abroad
and vice versa. Only those children will be
offered for adoption abroad who are legally available and for whom adoptive
parents
were not found in the Czech Republic, or for whom other forms of
alternative family care are not appropriate. Under section 22,
paragraph 8, of
the draft act, if the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs does not arrange
adoption or foster care within six calendar
months after a child is entered in
the register of children suitable for adoption, or within 12 calendar months
after a decision
entering an applicant in the register of applicants goes into
legal effect, it will forward a copy of the data from these registers
to the
Office to be entered in the register for arranging adoption abroad. (See ibid.,
para. 36.)
- Acceptance
of the European Social Charter of the Council of Europe, which contains several
provisions concerning protection of children
in the work environment (art. 7,
paras. 1-9) and outside it (art. 7, paras. 10, 16 and 17) should contribute to
the protection of
the rights of children. The ratification documents of
the European Social Charter were filed with the Secretary-General of the Council
of Europe in November
1999, so far, the Charter has not been issued in the
Collection of Laws.
I. Periodic review of placement
- To
strengthen the protection of children living in institutions, the Act on social
and legal protection of children provides more
details on monitoring these
children’s development. Social and legal protection authorities are
required to visit the children
in institutions at least once every six months
and to monitor in particular the development of their mental and physical
abilities,
evaluate whether the reasons for their stay in the institution
continue to exist and determine how their relationship with their
parents is
developing.
J. Abuse and neglect, including physical and psychological
recovery,
including social reintegration
- In
the Czech Republic cruelty to children is a crime under section 215, which is
subject to a duty to report under sections 167 and
168 of the Criminal Code.
Not preventing or not reporting the crime of cruelty to a person entrusted to
another for care is a crime.
- Protection
of a child from corporal punishment or other disproportionate behaviour by
parents towards children is included in the
Act on the Family, under which
parents have the right to use appropriate measures that do not affect the
child’s dignity or
in any way endanger the child’s health or
physical, emotional, intellectual and moral development.
- The
Act on Misdemeanours No. 200/1990 Coll. was amended in order to cover treatment
of a child which endangers his/her development
but does not meet the elements of
certain crimes such as cruelty or endangering health (the amendment to the Act
on Misdemeanours
was passed
together with the Act on social and legal protection of children by law No.
360/1999 Coll.). The amendment introduces elements of
six new misdemeanours,
which should increase the protection of the child from various forms of abuse
and neglect. For example, the
following will be considered a
misdemeanour:
− Leaving a child without proper supervision appropriate to his/her age,
intellectual development or state of health, which
results in exposing the child
to the danger of injury to health;
− Use of punishment or other behaviour towards the child which will expose
the child to the danger of physical or psychological
injury;
− Misusing children for physical work disproportionate to their age and
level of physical and intellectual development.
- District
Offices monitor instances of cruelty, abuse and neglect, and record them in
statistical records, which are processed on a
nationwide basis. At the present
time expanding the monitoring to include other indicators, with the aim of
discovering other connections
with this negative phenomenon, is being
considered.
- Section
167, paragraph 1, of the Criminal Code provides that anyone who obtains reliable
information that someone else is preparing
or committing, among other things,
the crimes of cruelty to a person entrusted to him/her and sexual abuse, and
does not prevent
the commission or completion of the crime, shall be punished by
a prison sentence of up to three years. Under section 168 of the
Criminal Code
anyone who does not report such a crime to the State prosecutor or the police
shall be similarly punished.
- NGOs
operating hotlines, crisis centres, and other similar institutions have great
significance in protecting children from cruelty,
abuse and neglect. Children
turn most to the Safety Hotline. The Safety Hotline began operations 1
September 1994. It operates
nationwide and 24 hours a day, uninterrupted.
Thanks to SPT Telecom, a.s., children and young people can call it for free from
the
entire territory of the Czech Republic. The Safety Hotline works
on 10 terminals, which means that 10 children can call it
simultaneously.
From September 1994 to September 1999, the hotline took a
total of 2,449,587 phone calls from children and adolescents. Approximately
one
third of all calls are resolved. The Safety Hotline’s services are most
often used by children and adolescents aged 10-17
(86 per cent of the
clientele).
Number of cases of suspicion of cruelty and abuse of children
reported
to social and legal protection authorities
|
|
1998
|
Physical cruelty
|
600
|
641
|
Psychological cruelty
|
169
|
192
|
Sexual abuse
|
520
|
593
|
Number of persons investigated, charged and convicted of the
crime of cruelty
to a person entrusted to them for care from 1995 to the
first half of 1999
|
Investigated
|
Charged
|
Convicted
|
1995
|
127
|
98
|
91
|
1996
|
191
|
159
|
93
|
1997
|
175
|
148
|
81
|
1998
|
162
|
136
|
95
|
First half of 1999
|
215
|
66
|
44
|
- At
the present time community centres are being established to work with
children threatened or already affected by socially pathological development.
An undoubtedly
positive development in recent times in the Czech Republic is the
creation of halfway houses. They offer assistance to young adults
without a family base (in practice this includes cases where returning to the
family would
be to the young person’s detriment - in each case, however,
the client participates voluntarily). These houses differ from
mere
accommodation by providing ongoing therapy which leads to the ability to lead an
independent life. These facilities are intended
primarily for children who come
from children’s homes and care institutions. Community centres and
halfway houses in the Czech
Republic are both Government-run and privately-run.
The Government supports the activities of non-governmental entities with
subsidies
from the State budget, provision of which is subject to binding rules.
In the review period these facilities were not monitored as
an independent
category of the subsidy policy of the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs.
According to the latest information,
a total of 12 halfway houses were in
operation at the end of 1998; another three facilities began operations in
1999.
- No
less important is the existence of an information system between the Ministry of
Education (educational facilities for institutional
care or reformatories) and
the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs (social care). This has operated
since the fourth quarter of
1998 and ensures that a young person will not remain
without an opportunity for assistance after being released from a
children’s
home or educational institution upon reaching the age of
majority.
- Other
new institutions whose creation the State supports through the Ministry of
Labour and Social Affairs are early care (an offer
of expert assistance -
“accompanying” families with a disabled child) and other new forms
of work with the family (again,
they take the form of “accompanying”
in handling difficult life situations).
- A
developing theme for social services is assistance for victims of domestic
violence, who are, virtually without exception, women
and children. The aim is
to move from a mere offer of refuge in crisis situations to offering various
forms of expert assistance
both to the women themselves (preventing a repeat of
the situation) and, in certain indicated cases, to the entire family; eventually
- so far this is in the embryonic stages - the NGOs want to implement
fundamental changes in the approach to the problem, inspired
by experience in
Austria and Germany.
- New
forms of assistance to families are in the jurisdiction of NGOs, which the State
supports financially under certain conditions.
The Ministry of Labour and
Social Affairs conducts its subsidy policy according to publicly announced
priorities.
- In
accordance with principles for providing subsidies from the State budget of the
Czech Republic to civic associations, the MEYS
announces programmes for the
support and protection of children and youth. These include the subprogramme
“Understanding”
which can support the activities of civic
associations whose activities are prevention and subsequent measures against
torture and
other cruel and inhuman or degrading treatment. Among the most
significant civic associations which submit specific projects within
the
programme are the Fund for Endangered Children and DCI. For data on the subsidy
levels for individual civic associations see
annex 4.
- The
MEYS monitors implementation of the conclusions of the World Congress against
Commercial Sexual Expoitation of Children (Stockholm,
1996) and two regional
conferences (Council of Europe, 1996; Strasbourg, 1998). In view of the
significant social danger of this
phenomenon, the European States passed
measures particularly in the areas of law and coordination. The Czech Republic
accepted several
international obligations in this area, including the
development of a national action plan against commercial sexual exploitation
of
children. The draft national plan states that the MEYS will perform the
following tasks in the area of upbringing and
education:
(a) Provide basic information about the
danger of commercial sexual abuse of children, to children in the context of sex
education
and to parents in parent associations;
(b) Expand
postgraduate education of teachers on the problem of commercial sexual abuse of
children. (See ibid., paras. 22 and 39.)
VI. BASIC HEALTH AND WELFARE
A. Disabled children
- The
problem of disabled and handicapped children is monitored by the Government
Committee for Disabled Citizens, which was established
by government resolution
No. 151 of 8 May 1991. The Chairman is the Prime Minister of the Government of
the Czech Republic, the
Executive Vice-Chairman is the Minister without
Portfolio, and members are the Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, the
Minister
of Health, the Minister of Education, Youth and Sports, deputy
ministers from other ministries representatives of the disabled and
employers of
the disabled. The Committee has already developed three basic policy papers on
State policy toward citizens with disabilities.
- The
1993 national plan of measures to reduce the negative results of
disability was replaced by a national plan to equalize opportunities for
citizens with disabilities,
approved by government resolution No. 256 of 14
April 1998. This plan takes the form of the
Standardized Rules for the Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with
Disabilities approved by the United Nations in October 1993.
Although basically
the entire plan applies to children with disabilities, chapters 3, 4.6, 6, 9, 15
and 19 (see annex 1) are particularly
important for families with disabled
children.
Legislation from the years 1995 to 1999 concerning the
rights of children
with disabilities
- For
better comprehension of the following text we consider it necessary to
provide introductory information about the minimum subsistence
level in
relation to average gross family income. The minimum subsistence level in the
Czech Republic in 1998 for an average (i.e.
four person - two adults
and two children) household was CK 9,490-10,870/month, depending on the age
of the children. The average monthly gross salary in the
first half of 1999 reached CK 12,063. The ratio of family minimum subsistence
level to average
gross salary in the first half of 1999 was 78.7-90.1 per
cent where one adult was employed, and 39.3-45.1 per cent where two
adults
were employed. The ratio of family minimum subsistence level to net
financial income from employment was 52.3-59.9 per cent in a
family with one economically active member and 39.645.4 per cent
in a family with two economically active members.
Figures, according to statistics on family accounts from the
Czech Statistics Office
for 1998, for a four-person family with children and
at least one person employed
CK/mo.
|
Household with 1 economically active
member
|
Household with 2 economically active
members
|
Gross financial income
|
21 364
|
29 522
|
of that, gross employment income
|
15 937
|
25 896
|
Total net income (incl. in kind)
|
19 731
|
25 081
|
of that, net financial income
|
18 147
|
23 967
|
- In
1995 Act No. 117/1995 Coll. on State social support was passed (it went into
effect on 1 October 1995). Its provisions are described
in the
following paragraphs.
Social contribution
- Provision
of section 20 - Conditions for the right to a social contribution from the
State:
(1) A person caring for at least one dependent
child, with the exception of a child entrusted into foster care or a dependent
child
which is in the full direct care of an institution (facility) for care for
children or youth, has a right to a social contribution
if the decisive income
in the family (i.e. that taken as the basis for calculating the amount) does not
exceed the multiple of the
family’s minimum subsistence
level,[1] possibly increased under
section 22, paragraphs 1 and 2, and a coefficient of 1.60.
(2) If several persons meet the conditions for a right to a
social contribution, the social contribution applies only once, to the
person
determined by agreement among these persons. If these persons do not agree, the
District Office which decides the payment
shall determine to which of these
persons it will allocate the social contribution.
- Provision
of section 21 - Amount of social contribution:
(1) The
social benefit per calendar month is calculated as the difference between the
amount required for the personal needs of a
child who is not provided for, or
the sum of the requirements for the needs of such children in the family,
multiplied by the decisive
income of the family, divided by the family’s
minimum subsistence level multiplied by a coefficient of
1.6.
(2) If the decisive income of the family falls under the
minimum subsistence level, then the social benefit is calculated using the
minimum subsistence level as the decisive income. When this is the case, the
increase of the amounts according to section 22, pararagraphs
1 and 2, is
not taken into account.
- Provision
of section 22:
(1) When setting the amount of the social
contribution, the amount for the personal needs of a dependent child provided in
section
21, paragraph 1, is multiplied in the case of:
(a) A
child with long-term severe disability, by a coefficient of
2.70;
(b) A child with long-term disability, by a coefficient of
2.40;
(c) A child with long-term illness by a coefficient of
1.20.
(2) When setting the amount of the social contribution, the
amount for the personal needs of a dependent child and the sum of the
amounts
for personal needs decisive for determining the family’s minimum
subsistence level provided in section 21, paragraph
1, is multiplied
if:
(a) Both parents have long-term severe disabilities, by a
coefficient of 1.40;
(b) A single parent has a long-term
severe disability, by a coefficient of 1.40;
(c) One of the
parents has a long-term severe disability, by a coefficient
of 1.10;
(d) There is a single parent and the situation in
letter (b) does not apply, by a coefficient of 1.05.
(3) If a
dependent child draws a partial disability pension from pension insurance,
paragraph 1 (a)-(c) shall not be used for setting
the amount of the social
contribution.
Parental contribution
- Provision
of section 30 - Conditions for the right to a parental contribution from the
State:
(1) A parent has a right to a parental
contribution who, personally, all day, cares for at least one child:
(a) Up to four years old; or
(b) Up to seven years old, if the child has a long-term
disability.
(2) A parent loses his right to a parental contribution for a
calendar month if in the calendar month:
(a) His income under
section 10, paragraph 1 (a) and b) is higher than under paragraph 3 or comes
from work defined under section
10, paragraph 1 (c);
(b) The
parent has a right to health security contributions, unless these health
security contributions are reimbursement for income
defined under paragraphs 3
and 4, i.e. payments to the unemployed or the handicapped during their
rehabilitation for employment;
(c) The child who forms the basis
of the contribution attends a nursery school, kindergarten or another similar
facility for a pre-school-age
child to a greater extent than the one listed
under paragraph 6 (i.e. three days per month), or an elementary
school.
- In
1997 Act No. 100/1988 on social security was amended (the amendment went into
effect on 1 July 1977). The relevant provisions
are described
below.
Contribution for care for a close relative or other
person
- Provision
of section 80:
A contribution for care for a related or
other person is allocated to a citizen caring personally, all day and properly,
for a related
person who is:
(a) Primarily or completely incapacitated;
(b) Older than 80 years of age and partly
incapacitated;
(c) Older than 80 years of age and the physician
states that he/she needs the care of another person if his income paid in the
calendar
month does not equal to a multiple of 1.6 of the amount for
personal needs, if he cares for one such person, or a multiple of 2.75
of
the amount for personal needs if he cares for two or more such persons; the
contribution is also allocated to a citizen who cares
for a person other than a
relative, if they live together in a household.
- Provision
of section 81:
The contribution under section 80 is also
allocated to a parent or grandparent, or other citizen, who took a child into
care replacing
parental care based on a decision by the appropriate authority,
who cares personally, all day and properly, for a minor child older
than one
year, who, under a special regulation, has a long-term serious disability
requiring extraordinary care.
- In
1998 Act No. 155/1998 Coll. on sign language and amending other laws was
passed (it went into effect on 13 July 1998). The relevant provisions
are described below:
- Provision
of section 7:
The non-hearing have a right
to:
(a) Use sign language;
(b) Education using sign language;
(c) Be taught sign language.
- Provision
of section 8:
Non-hearing students in secondary schools
and universities who were, with level II and level III, due to complete
disability, shall
have interpreting services provided without cost under
conditions provided by a special regulation of the Ministry of
Education.
- Provision
of section 9:
Parents of children who were diagnosed
with partial or complete deafness have the right to cost free education in sign
language courses.
Diagnosis is based on Decree No. 207/1995 Coll.
which lists degrees of handicap and their further impact in terms of the
State social
contribution, as amended by Decree No. 156/1997 Coll.
- The
Act on State social support authorizes the MEYS to issue an implementing
regulation for section 9 and section 10; a working group
was established which
is working to create the regulation. The working group has prepared a proposal
of a decree on the conditions
and extent of (free of charge) interpretation for
deaf students of secondary schools and universities, and on the extent and
content
of the training and ways of testing of teachers working with deaf
students and teachers of sign language. The proposal was distributed
for
comments to the ministries as of 31 December 1999.
- Chapter
VI, Section A, “Handicapped children” - responds to the
Committee’s concluding observations (paras. 20 and
37).
B. Health and health services
- The
health of the child population in the Czech Republic is not improving
significantly, despite the good level of health care for
this population group.
There is no evident decline in the illness of children and youth, the number of
treated patients is not declining
(the number of congenital developmental
defects and allergic illnesses, including bronchial asthma, is increasing, while
the growth
in nervous system disorders, mental retardation and serious
behavioural disorders is continuing). We consider the most serious causes
of
this situation to be the polluted environment, primarily in industrial
agglomerations and unhealthy lifestyles; the number of
serious injuries to
children is also rising fairly significantly. Since 1990 the percentage of
adolescents, as well as children,
who have experiences with drugs or are already
addicted to them has been increasing. Nicotine addiction and alcoholism are
also
increasing among the youth.
- Data
on hospitalization and outpatient care also reveal serious illness among
children and youth. The ratio of child patients to
total hospitalization cases
in 1997 was 16.5 per cent; 345,000 hospitalizations were recorded (including
newborns of children) from
0-14 years old, which is 19 cases per 100 children.
In the age group 15-19, there were 90,000 hospitalizations in 1997 (11
adolescents
per 100 people).
- The
most frequent cause of hospitalization among children from 0-1 year is
conditions which arose during the prenatal period (15 per
cent of
hospitalizations in this age group), followed by respiratory tract illnesses (8
per cent). In the 1-4 and 5-9 age groups,
the most frequent cause of
hospitalization is illness of the respiratory system (roughly 40 per cent, then
injuries and poisonings
(12 per cent). For children aged 10-14, the main cause
is injuries and poisonings (almost 20 per cent). Illnesses of the digestive
tract are in third place for all children. In adolescence the most frequent
cause is, again, injuries.
- Another
source of information about illness rates is outpatient treatment. Children are
treated most often for illnesses of the nervous
system and the sensory organs,
primarily for visual disorders up to blindness, then illnesses of the
respiratory system (primarily
bronchial asthma), then illnesses of the skin and
subcutaneous tissues (primarily eczema). For adolescents, illnesses of the
musculo-skeletal
system are in third place.
- Health
care for children and adolescents is paid from public health insurance to the
extent provided by Act No. 48/1997 Coll. on public
health insurance. The State
pays public health insurance for children and adolescents. In special
children’s facilities (infants’
institutions and children’s
homes for children up to age three) health care is paid from the budget of the
institution.
- In
exceptional cases operations which cannot be performed domestically are partly
paid from the budget of the Ministry of Health.
These are primarily organ and
bone marrow transplants for children and adolescents. In 1998 and 1999 some CK
19,020,000 were paid
for these purposes from the budget of the Ministry of
Health. Certain inoculations are also paid from the budget.
- The
primary health indicator for children is infant mortality, where the Czech
Republic has already achieved a reduction from 9.9
per 1,000 in 1992 to 5.9 per
1,000 in 1997 and is on the level of European Union States.
- Infant
mortality is affected by low birth weight of newborns. The ratio of newborns
with weight up to 2,500 g to the total number
of live births is about 6 per
cent, but the ratio of such infants to total number of infant deaths hovers
around 60 per cent. The
most frequent cause of infant mortality is certain
conditions which arise in the perinatal period; these cause over one half of
infant
deaths. The second most frequent cause of infant mortality is congenital
defects, deformation and genetic abnormalities. In 1997
2,680 children with
congenital defects discovered in the child’s first year were reported, a
growth of 18 per cent over 1996.
In comparing the number of defects in girls
and boys, it can be said that more defects appear in boys. The most frequent
defects
are congenital defects of the heart. Thanks to the improving level of
prenatal diagnostics, the incidence of certain congenital
defects in the newborn
population is decreasing. These are fissures of the nervous system, defects of
the stomach wall, certain
serious heart defects, defects of the urogenital
system and genetically determined defects (primarily Down’s Syndrome).
Despite
the successes achieved, congenital defects are responsible for a 25 per
cent share of infant deaths.
- Mortality
in the 0-14 age group has been steadily declining since the middle of the 1970s.
In comparison with 1970 the number of deaths
in this group declined by one
fourth. This significant decline is due to an unusual decline in mortality in
infanthood. In other
childhood age groups we have also recorded a steady
decline in mortality, but not as dramatic. The mortality in the 0-14 group in
the last two years is 52 deaths per 100,000 people in the age group, which is
0.052 per 1,000. For children aged 1-14, injuries
and poisonings are the
primary cause of death. The specific mortality rate in the 5-19 age group is
characterized by frequent swings.
Compared with 1980, mortality in this group
declined by 11 per cent. The most frequent cause of death is injuries and
poisonings.
- The
number of child suicides has declined steadily since 1995. The number of deaths
from intentional self-injury aged from 5 to 19
in the Czech Republic during the
review period as shown in the following table:
Year
|
Number of deaths
|
Absolute
|
Per 100,000 people
|
Age group
|
Total 5-19
|
Age group
|
Total 5–19
|
5-9
|
10-14
|
15-19
|
5-9
|
10-14
|
15-19
|
1995
|
1
|
10
|
91
|
102
|
0.2
|
1.4
|
10.5
|
4.6
|
1996
|
2
|
7
|
71
|
80
|
0.3
|
1.0
|
8.5
|
3.7
|
1997
|
-
|
6
|
66
|
72
|
-
|
0.9
|
8.3
|
3.4
|
1998
|
-
|
8
|
52
|
60
|
-
|
1.2
|
6.9
|
2.9
|
- For
the number of child deaths in the Czech Republic by cause, see annex
5.
- The
scope and principles of mandatory inoculation are provided by Decree
No. 48/1991 Coll. on inoculation against contagious diseases.
Payment
for inoculation is made under Act No. 48/1997 Coll. on health insurance. This
decree includes mandatory regular inoculation
of children with a triple vaccine
against diphtheria, tetanus and whooping cough; a triple vaccine against
measles, rubella and mumps;
and a vaccine against contagious childhood polio and
tuberculosis. The decree also distinguishes special inoculation which is
performed
for people who are exposed to higher risks of infection in their
professions. This includes inoculation of health workers against
tuberculosis
and viral hepatitis type B. The decree also distinguishes extraordinary
inoculation (e.g. against flu for medically
at risk persons), inoculation after
injuries (against tetanus), inoculation against rabies and inoculation when
travelling abroad
(against malaria).
- The
safety of inoculation materials used is provided by Act No. 79/1997 Coll. on
medications.
- Development
of examination methods continues in the Czech Republic (e.g. magnetic resonance
imaging was brought into operation for
paediatric patients). Highly specialized
centres are being created to treat children in cardiology, neurology,
traumatology, perinatology
and oncology. Significant progress was achieved in
children’s transplantology; transplants of kidneys, the heart - even in
small children - lungs and the liver are being performed. The introduction of
new treatment procedures in oncology has led in recent
years to a gradual
decline in mortality due to malignant tumors. Whereas 12 boys and 6 girls (per
100,000 boys and girls) died in
1991, in 1996 the figures were 6 boys and 4
girls.
- In
the prenatal period a woman in a normal pregnancy is examined 10 times and in
risky or pathological pregnancies, more often, according
to need. An ultrasound
examination is done twice in a normal pregnancy (in the twentieth and
thirty-second week), and in risky or
pathological pregnancies, more often. The
frequency and content of examinations in the prenatal period is provided by
Decree No.
60/1997 Coll. on dispensary care. This care is paid out of public
health insurance.
Total numbers of births, miscarriages and abortions
for
girls aged up to 19
|
Pregnancies resulting in birth
|
Miscarriages
|
Abortions
|
1995
|
17 094
|
1 189
|
5 251
|
1996
|
14 203
|
996
|
5 037
|
1997
|
12 208
|
936
|
4 302
|
1998
|
11 159
|
891
|
4 207
|
- Sex
and planned parenthood education is gradually becoming part of the curricula in
the education process in elementary and secondary
schools. The Ministry of
Health works with the Association for Family Planning and Sex Education. This
Association arranged the
Czech translation and distribution of the Charter of
Sexual and Reproductive Rights (International
Planned Parenthood Federation). The Charter defines sexual and reproductive
rights which are often neglected or denied to people.
Gynaecological
examinations include a conversation about contraceptive options, sexual health,
and possibilities for planned parenthood.
Support of NGOs by subsidies from the Ministry of
Health
- The
target groups in subsidized projects are:
(a) Associations of
the medically disabled (e.g. Union of Diabetics, Czech Union of the
Non-Hearing);
(b) Associations of parents and friends of disabled
children (e.g. Federation of Parents and Friends of Hearing-Impaired Children,
Association for Assistance to Chronically Ill
Children);
(c) Associations of parents and friends of those groups of
the disabled who cannot organize themselves (e.g. Association for Assistance
to
the Mentally Disabled);
(d) Humanitarian organizations (e.g. diocese
charities, diaconates, certain religious orders).
- The
Ministry of Health subsidizes NGOs as part of the National Health Programme.
Subsidies are given to general preventive programmes,
a number of which also
apply to children and adolescents, e.g. fundamentals of healthy nutrition,
breastfeeding, programmes against
smoking, alcohol and drugs, AIDS prevention,
the programme “Healthy school, movement and sports” and programmes
aimed
at preventing injuries and poisoning among children. For the number of
supported projects and the total amounts of subsidies from
the Ministry of
Health to NGOs, see annex 6.
- The
Ministry of Health also subsidizes NGOs which work with people with physical or
psychological disabilities, including children
and youth. The precise amount of
funds allocated directly to children and youth through this route cannot be
calculated because
a number of the NGOs work with the entire population. A
qualified guess is that 35 per cent of the total amount goes to programmes
for
children and youth. For the total amount of subsidies for disabled people, see
annex 7.
- The
Ministry of Health also subsidizes projects as part of its anti-drug policy.
The subsidy is intended to develop a minimal network
of offices involved with
care for drug addicts and anti-drug activities. The total amount of subsidies
for 1999 was CK 2,090,000.
HIV and AIDS
- As
of 30 June 1999 a total of 411 cases of HIV infection were registered in the
Czech Republic. In 124 cases full-blown AIDS had
been diagnosed as of that
date, with 77 deaths. On the same date, there were a total of 35
cases registered in the Czech Republic
of HIV-positive pregnant women, who gave
birth to 25 children (in one case twins, in nine cases the pregnancy was aborted
at the
mother’s request, in one case there was a miscarriage); 19 of the
children have been diagnosed HIV negative, 5 had not at that
date reached
the age of two, when it is possible to make a definitive diagnosis about a
child’s HIV status, and the other child
tested HIV positive.
- In
1991 the Government approved a national programme of AIDS prevention, which was
also the basis for a short-term plan to address
the problem of HIV/AIDS in the
Czech Republic that was developed for the period 1993-1997. The plan hoped to
achieve, among other
things, anonymous, cost-free, easily available HIV testing
in a wide network of sampling and testing locations, the creation of many
local
and one national AIDS help line, and several AIDS counselling centres. The
participation of NGOs in the programme also increased
and peer health education
programmes were started, particularly for young people. The problem of
preventing sexually transmitted
diseases and AIDS was included in the teaching
guidelines in force. Programmes for undergraduate and postgraduate teacher
training
in HIV/AIDS issues and sex education were also started in cooperation
with the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education and
civic associations.
- At
the present time there is a national programme for HIV/AIDS issues in the
Czech Republic for the period 1998-2002. Among its main
tasks are:
Support for safer sex;
Providing information about
perinatal transmission of HIV;
Arranging counselling for HIV-positive
women;
Providing counselling about HIV prevention to all pregnant
women.
Continuing national and regional mass media campaigns aimed at
the general public with the aim of increasing knowledge about the
importance of
safer sexual contact in preventing HIV/AIDS and changing sexual behaviour, using
articles by experts, round tables,
educational events, television and radio
spots, etc.
C. Social security and childcare services and facilities
- Significant
changes have occurred in the provision of social support payments for families
with children. In 1995 Act No. 117/1995
Coll. on State social support was
passed, which transformed and introduced new State social support payments.
Among the payments
dependent on a family’s income level are the child
contribution, the social contribution, the housing contribution and the
transportation contribution. State social support is aimed at increasing income
in predefined situations in which a family’s
income decreases relatively
or its expenses increase.
- The
current version of the Act conditions the right to social support payments, if
other specified conditions are met, on registration
for permanent residence by
the entitled person and persons evaluated together with him/her. Section 3,
paragraph 1, of the Act (“Circle
of entitled persons”) states:
State social support payments are allocated, if further specified conditions are
met, only to
a natural person (the “person”), if that person is
registered for permanent residence on the territory of the Czech Republic
under
special regulations [section 4 of Act No. 135/1982 Coll. on registration and
records of the residence of citizens; section
7 and section 19,
paragraph 3, of Act No. 123/1992 Coll. on the residence of foreigners on
the territory of the Czech and Slovak
Federative Republic]. Permanent residence
under this Act also means longterm residence permitted to foreigners under a
special law
[No. 123/1992].
- The
valid provisions of section 3 of the Act can also be seen as a violation of the
obligation arising from article 2, paragraph 1,
and article 3, paragraphs 1 and
2, of the Convention. The contents of this provision do not correspond to its
title, where paragraph
1 defines the conditions for the entitlement not only
with regard to the entitled person, but the provision also requires persons
evaluated jointly to fulfil the conditions. This condition is, under the cited
section, registration for permanent residence of
the persons evaluated jointly.
Whereas this is a legitimate requirement for the entitled person, the purpose of
imposing this condition
on persons evaluated jointly with him/her is not clear.
It is a paradox for entitled persons to be penalized because of the person
with
whom they share a household, or with whom they pay expenses for common needs.
The conditions for the entitled persons’
claims are made dependent on the
concept “family” without stipulating any further relationship beyond
registration for
permanent residence together with the entitled
person.
- The
stated purpose of the Act is to provide State social support payments in
specified cases, depending on the family’s income
level. It considers a
“family” to be the entitled person and the persons evaluated jointly
with him/her and enumerates
them, with the provision that these persons must
live and pay expenses for their needs together. Setting conditions for persons
evaluated jointly in section 3 thus also appears completely unnecessary from the
point of view of the Act’s purpose. In addition,
as a consequence of the
current wording, disproportionately strict procedures are applied in cases where
the entitled person meets
the condition of registration for permanent residence
under special regulations but a person evaluated jointly with him/her does
not,
even though he/she is a socially needy applicant.
- In
addition to State social support payments, families with children also receive
additional social care payments. Their purpose
is primarily to address a
certain negative life situation. This can be a severe disability, long-term
unemployment of family members
and sharply decreasing standard of living,
natural disasters and other things. One-time financial and in-kind payments are
provided
to cover one-time extraordinary expenses. One-time payments of up to
CK 15,000 may be provided. In-kind payments of up to CK 8,000
may be provided
and in exceptional cases up to CK 15,000. The following payments are also
provided: a contribution to obtain basic
needs for a child, a contribution upon
the marriage of a child who lived in foster care, a financial contribution for
the use of
an apartment of a dependent orphaned child and a contribution for the
recreation of children of a retired person. Families with
children can also use
the opportunity to take out an interest-free loan. However, they do not have an
automatic right to an interest-free
loan; the District Office provides it
depending on its financial possibilities and on whether the family will be able
to repay the
loan. For information on expenses relating to payments to families
with children, see annex 8.
Social care institutions
|
|
1996
|
1997
|
1998
|
Number of social care institutions for children and young people
|
176
|
182
|
181
|
181
|
Number of places in these institutions
|
12 651
|
12 803
|
11 906
|
12 470
|
- The
table lists the total number of institutions and places in these institutions as
reported by all entities: the Ministry of Labour
and Social Affairs, District
Offices, municipalities and non-governmental entities. Institutions for the
mentally disabled are the
predominant proportion of all social care
institutions. One fourth of clients in institutions with year-round residence
require
placement in intensive nursing-type departments.
- In
the Czech Republic there are four institutions for physically disabled young
people, with a capacity of 597 places, 419 places
being for day residents.
These institutions include schools in which the children complete compulsory
education or prepare for a
future occupation.
D. Standard of living
- The
corresponding information is contained in the chapter on expenses for the
support of the child.
VII. EDUCATION, LEISURE AND CULTURAL ACTIVITIES
A. Education, including vocational training and guidance
- The
present structure of the education system is defined primarily by Act No.
29/1984 Coll. the Schools Act, and Act No. 111/1998
Coll.[2] on post-secondary
schools. The education system of the Czech Republic is made up of relatively
independent levels of education,
with corresponding individual types of schools.
The initial report discussed the individual levels of the education system in
detail
in paragraphs 250 to 261. We also attach a diagram of the entire
education system (see annex 9).
- In
the second half of 1998 a new Act on post-secondary schools went into effect
(No. 111/1998 Coll.). This act responds to the changes
which Czech schools
went through and which also reflect worldwide developments. The main change can
be said to be the extensive
development of post-secondary education caused by
increased interest in post-secondary studies. The basic problem is how to meet
the high demand and yet maintain the desired quality of education. This
requirement is met by sufficient diversification in post-secondary
education,
i.e. in addition to five-year curricula, creating a selection of
professionally oriented, generally threeyear curricula.
Diversification of the
post-secondary system is balanced by the institution of accreditation of all
curricula, accreditation of
a post-secondary school’s authorization to
conduct qualification proceedings in a given field and proceedings to award the
title of professor. The institution of accreditation has been reintroduced for
the purpose of ensuring quality postsecondary education.
The curriculum is
taken as the basic unit of post-secondary education.
It can be for a baccalaureate, master’s or doctorate degree. A
standard length of study has been newly introduced. In the
original legal
scheme, baccalaureate studies were conceived as a part of post-secondary studies
with unified content. An organizer
can be the State or other legal entities.
Conditions for the establishment of private post-secondary schools were created.
- In
the 1998/99 school year approximately 46,000 students were accepted into
first-year studies at post-secondary schools (excluding
doctoral programmes),
and about 12,500 students were accepted to post-secondary vocational schools.
In relation to the total number
of 18yearolds (150,644) the respective
percentages are 30.5 per cent and 8.3 per cent. That means that a total of 38.8
per cent
of 18-year-olds were accepted for post-secondary education. As in past
years, roughly one half of applicants were accepted.
- The
number of post-secondary students has been climbing since 1989. In 1998 there
were 170,000 students in post-secondary schools.
One of the main aims of the
Government’s education policy is to ensure, by 2005, that one half of
19-year-olds have the possibility
to enter one of the forms of tertiary
education. This aim is based on the decision to enable two thirds to three
fourths of young
people in that period to obtain a secondary school diploma in
secondary general or vocational education.
- Minority
education may be built up to the level of secondary schools (based on section 3
of the Schools Act). It is provided for
the Polish and Slovak
minorities.
- The
situation in education management after
1989[3] was fundamentally
affected by the passage of the Act on State administration and local
administration in education,[4]
No. 564/1990 Coll. primarily by three steps: the introduction of branch
management of regional education, the creation of prerequisites
for the
development of local administration in regional education, and the introduction
of legal entity status for schools. The
MEYS has all administrative power and
financial powers over schools. Medical, specialized agricultural and military
schools, still
administered by their respective ministries, remain exceptions.
In 1990 School Offices were established at the district level, representing
a
middle link in the ministerial administration of regional education. The MEYS
also has administrative power over vocational and
medical
education.
- Municipalities
are, by law, the organizers of kindergartens and elementary schools (the MEYS
has organizational powers at the level
of secondary and special schools, with
the exception of medical and military schools).
- Passing
the Act on State administration and local administration in education increased
the autonomy of schools and strengthened the
position of the school principal.
The Czech Schools Inspection became an independent body of State administration
in the Ministry
of Education under the Act.
- In
June 1995 an amendment was passed to the Act on State administration and local
administration in education (No. 139/1995 Coll.),
which significantly
strengthened the local administration elements in the Act: it created
prerequisites for the creation of a school
council as
an independent body on the level of the school and also as a sort of
counterbalance to the position of school principal. In the creation
of higher
local administration units under Constitutional Act No. 347/1997 Coll., the
system of State administration and local administration
in education will have
to be redrawn.
- In
an overview of education financing, see annex 10.
Compulsory education
- Most
children attend compulsory education in elementary school. In addition children
can attend part of compulsory education in the
lower classes of multi-year high
schools, in the lower classes of dance conservatories, in special elementary
schools, and in special
and remedial schools. For students whose health does
not permit them to attend school, the School Office can arrange a form of
education
which will enable them to obtain the same education as with compulsory
education. A severely medically disabled child can be released
from compulsory
education for a certain time by the Director of the School
Office.
- Usually,
children enter school at the age of six, although in recent years there have
been frequent cases where school entry is postponed
by the school principal at
the parents’ request and at the recommendation of a
pedagogic-psychological counselling officer
or doctor, generally for one year.
Compulsory education lasts nine years (under the amendment to the Schools Act
No. 138/1995 Coll.).
- Beginning
on 1 September 1998, the MEYS, under section 58a of Act No. 29/1984 Coll., the
Schools Act, as amended, established, for
a period of five school years,
experimental testing of a new organizational form of elementary education: home
education. In the
1998/99 school year, two elementary schools carried out the
experiment, and three schools did so this year. Approximately 120 students
use
this opportunity for education at the present time. The MEYS sets conditions
for experimental testing in approval proceedings.
- Talented
students can go from the lower classes of elementary schools to multi-year
academic secondary schools[5]
and dance conservatories. The fact that the more talented students leave to
attend high school before completing compulsory education
creates a situation
where less talented children remain in the upper classes of elementary schools,
and this also lowers the quality
of teaching.
- Students
who are not able to attend compulsory education in elementary school for various
reasons can, with the consent of their legal
representatives, be transferred to
special schools. At the level of compulsory education these are primarily
special elementary
schools (established for medically and physically disabled
students and for difficult-to-teach students), special schools (established
for
students with intellectual inadequacies) and remedial schools (established for
students with inadequacies in intellectual development
such that they cannot be
educated in a special school).
Number of special schools, 1991/92-1997/98
|
|
1992/93
|
1993/94
|
1994/95
|
1995/96
|
1996/97
|
1997/98
|
Number of institutions
|
779
|
964
|
979
|
975
|
1 027
|
1 002
|
986
|
Kindergartens
|
198
|
225
|
235
|
240
|
253
|
263
|
259
|
Total elementary and special schools
|
612
|
677
|
700
|
679
|
693
|
678
|
667
|
Special elementary schools
|
*
|
*
|
*
|
215
|
218
|
216
|
210
|
Special schools
|
*
|
*
|
*
|
464
|
475
|
462
|
457
|
Remedial schools
|
61
|
72
|
118
|
127
|
93
|
151
|
153
|
Academic secondary schools and secondary vocational
schools
|
23
|
48
|
70
|
89
|
106
|
122
|
139
|
Secondary vocational schools and vocational schools
|
95
|
113
|
127
|
111
|
148
|
156
|
158
|
Source: Institute for Information on
Education.
Notes: The number of institutions does not correspond
to the sum of schools at individual levels because special schools with several
different levels can operate within one institution. Until the 1993/94 school
year special elementary schools and special schools
were not monitored
separately.
Number of elementary schools, 1989/90-1997/98
|
|
1990/91
|
1991/92
|
1992/93
|
1993/94
|
1994/95
|
1995/96
|
1996/97
|
1997/98
|
Total elementary schools
|
3 904
|
3 958
|
4 064
|
4 142
|
4 199
|
4 216
|
4 212
|
4 166
|
4 132
|
Elementary schools: With only the first level
|
1 455
|
1 496
|
1 560
|
1 647
|
1 677
|
1 710
|
1 712
|
1 672
|
1 638
|
With only the second level
|
3
|
5
|
7
|
5
|
9
|
8
|
9
|
4
|
5
|
With both levels
|
2 446
|
2 497
|
2 497
|
2 490
|
2 513
|
2 498
|
2 491
|
2 490
|
2 489
|
With a reduced number of classes
|
1 118
|
1 118
|
1 242
|
1 378
|
1 300
|
1 349
|
1 399
|
1 463
|
1 482
|
Source: Institute for Information on Education.
- The
number of elementary schools increased after 1989 until 1993/94 (during that
time 295 new schools were opened) then stagnated
for two years, and in the
last two years the number of schools has declined. The increase in the number
of schools was caused by
rapid expansion of incomplete schools and schools with
few grades[6] (over 80 per cent
of new schools are schools of this kind). At present, 40 per cent of all
elementary schools are incomplete schools,
and their students are 8.5 per cent
of all elementary school students. These schools facilitate children’s
attendance in school
in small and remote municipalities and help to renew the
tradition of the school as one of the natural centres of municipal life.
Opinions about the quality of teaching at incomplete schools vary; more than
elsewhere, it depends on the abilities of the teacher.
- The
percentage of non-government schools, i.e. private and parochial schools, is
relatively low at the elementary school level. In
the 1997/98 school year there
were only 32 private and 19 parochial schools in the elementary school
network, which is 1.2 per cent
of all elementary schools; this ratio has been
stable for several years. The percentage of students in non-government
schools among
all elementary school students is also stable - under 0.5 per
cent. The dense network of government elementary schools and their
tradition is
the most significant limiting factor for the development of non-government
elementary schools. In addition, the decline
in the population and the drain of
students to multi-year high schools also narrows the space for non-government
organizers of schools.
They devote themselves primarily to areas which are
unique in a certain way: for example, children disabled by slight brain
dysfunction,
children from an environment different from the standard family
type, or children who, for psychological or social reasons, are not
able to
adapt to conditions in standard elementary schools. An example is the Premysl
Pitter Parochial Elementary School in Ostrava,
which focuses on Romani children.
Number of students in elementary schools, 1989/90-1997/98 (in
thousands)
|
|
1990/91
|
1991/92
|
1992/93
|
1993/94
|
1994/95
|
1995/96
|
1996/97
|
1997/98
|
Total elementary school
|
1 235.7
|
1 193.1
|
1 166.5
|
1 115.0
|
1 061.4
|
1 027.7
|
1 004.6
|
1 100.1
|
1 092.4
|
First level
|
566.8
|
545.8
|
537.8
|
528.7
|
521.3
|
522.7
|
522.8
|
637.0
|
635.6
|
Second level
|
688.9
|
647.3
|
628.7
|
586.3
|
540.1
|
505.0
|
481.7
|
463.1
|
456.8
|
Source: Institute for Information on Education.
- The
relatively rapid decline in the number of students in elementary schools is a
reflection of demographic trends. A significant
factor in the decline at the
second level of elementary education is also the increasing interest in studies
at multi-year high schools.
- A
significant element which affects not only the number of children in elementary
schools but the entire process of upbringing and
education is the integration of
disabled children into education in standard elementary schools, which began in
the 1990/91 school
year[7].
Including disabled children among healthy children has great significance for
socialization. Including disabled children is financially
and technically
demanding and it requires an individual approach from the teacher, so
integration of children is supported through
amendments to financing rules. The
number of children integrated into standard classes is increasing, and the
number of children
in special and specialized classes established in elementary
schools is stagnating. Teachers and parents have accepted the integration
of
disabled children into education in elementary schools and it has had a positive
effect on the work of special schools, which
thus have more room to care for
children with more severe disabilities and more complicated defects. (See
ibid., paras. 20 and 37.)
Number of disabled children integrated into standard,
special
and specialized classes 1993/94-1997/98 (in thousands)
|
1993/94
|
1994/95
|
1995/96
|
1996/97
|
1997/98
|
Total integrated children
|
40.1
|
16.6
|
41.3
|
51.2
|
54.4
|
Integrated children in standard classes
|
30.4
|
5.5
|
30.4
|
38.8
|
42.2
|
Children in special and specialized classes
|
9.7
|
11.1
|
10.9
|
12.4
|
12.1
|
Source: Institute for Information on Education.
- The
number of elementary school graduates has gradually declined since
the 1992/93 year in connection with demographic trends and
with the
departures of talented pupils to multiyear high schools.
Number of students attending compulsory education in
multi-year high schools
(in thousands) and their proportion of the total number of students
attending
compulsory education (in %), 1991/92-1997/98
|
1991/92
|
1992/93
|
1993/94
|
1994/95
|
1995/96
|
1996/97
|
1997/98
|
Academic secondary school pupils completing compulsory
education
|
14.8
|
23.4
|
34.9
|
41.5
|
45.3
|
50.3
|
51.7
|
As a percentage of all pupils completing compulsory
education
|
2.3
|
3.8
|
6.1
|
7.6
|
8.6
|
9.8
|
10.2
|
Source: Institute for Information on Education.
- Most
of those who complete compulsory education continue their education at a
secondary school; going directly into the labour force
tends to be an
exception. Groups of young people with a low educational level are
exposed to the greatest risks in the labour market. Those who leave
school without properly completing all nine grades can acquire other, primarily
manual, skills in non-demanding vocations
at vocational schools, which last one
to three years. Supplementing/completing elementary education (including
special education) is theoretically possible through courses which one school
in
a district is always authorized to offer. The opportunity to attend
these courses is, however, subject to successfully completing an application
process, which many graduates
of special schools are not able to do.
Without completing elementary education they continue to be disadvantaged
both in the opportunity to complete requalification courses
and in the labour
market generally. In the 1997/98 school year a total of 2,761
persons attended courses for supplementing elementary
education.
- Kindergartens
are a separate chapter; they are defined not as school, but pre-school
facilities. Kindergartens are generally attended
by children aged 3-6. In
justified cases younger children can be accepted to kindergartens. Also, older
children who have had compulsory
education postponed remain in them, and
postponement of compulsory education is a more and more frequent occurrence; in
recent years
around 20 per cent of children enter elementary school at age 7.
Kindergarten is not compulsory, although from time to time the
idea is
considered of requiring children to attend pre-school education the year before
compulsory education begins; this is becoming
the rule in a number of countries.
Nonetheless, attendance in kindergartens is high, particularly among children
aged 5 and older.
Kindergarten attendance is considered beneficial for them,
primarily to ease their shift to elementary school.
Number of kindergartens and children (in
thousands)
attending kindergarten
|
1989/90
|
1990/91
|
1991/92
|
1992/93
|
1993/94
|
1994/95
|
1995/96
|
1996/97
|
1997/98
|
Schools
|
7 328
|
7 335
|
6 972
|
6 827
|
6 599
|
6 526
|
6 474
|
6 344
|
6 152
|
Children
|
395.2
|
352.1
|
323.3
|
325.7
|
331.5
|
338.1
|
333.4
|
317.2
|
307.5
|
Source: Institute for Information on Education.
- The
decline in the number of children in kindergarten is significant, primarily in
the period until 1991 when the attitude towards
kindergarten changed; this was
related to extended maternity leave or the gradually changing family model,
where the mother stays
at home even after maternity leave ends and continues to
raise her children herself. The population decline also played a role;
it is
the main cause of the decline in the number of children in kindergarten in the
present period. Altogether, since 1989 the
number of children in kindergarten
has declined by 22 per cent. However, 88 per cent of children of
pre-school age still attend
kindergarden and their role in children’s
upbringing is irreplaceable. The number of kindergartens has declined
by 1,176,
i.e. 16 per cent since 1989/90.
- Since
1990/91 children with medical disabilities are also accepted in kindergarten.
These children can be integrated with healthy
children, or they can be placed in
special and specialized classes.[8]
In the 1997/98 school year the number of integrated children
exceeded 7,200, of whom 3,000 were integrated directly in standard
classes.
The most frequent disabilities were speech defects and a combination of several
disabilities. (See ibid.)
B. Aims of education
- The
aims of education have not changed since the initial report was prepared. At
present there are three educational curricula for
elementary schools (all under
the Elementary Education Standard): grade school (since 1997, created by
combining the curricula of
grade school and civic school), elementary school and
national school. All lead to comparable results after completing the first
level, which lets students continue with a different curriculum at the second
level. Several elementary schools use alternative
educational systems, e.g.
Waldorf pedagogy is used experimentally in five elementary schools and elements
of it in other schools;
elements of the Dalton
plan[9] or Montessori
education tend to be used in isolated instances.
C. Leisure, recreation and cultural activities
School facilities for care outside class
teaching and care for children
and young people
- In
addition to schools, the education system also includes facilities and
institutions which form a system of supplemental care directly
or indirectly
related to children’s education and development (see the Schools Act,
section 45 and section 18 of Act No. 76/1978
Coll., on school facilities).
These facilities form the social base for schools (housing and meals for pupils
and students) and
support extracurricular educational activities (school groups,
elementary arts schools, children’s and young people’s
centres). In
addition, the education system also includes facilities for institutional,
reformative and preventive care. All these
facilities fill four basic
functions:
(a) Care for children and young people outside
classroom hours and special interest education in leisure time (school groups
and
clubs, centres for leisure time for children and young people, elementary
arts schools, State foreign language
schools);[1]
(b) Housing
and meals (school cafeterias, young people’s homes, in post-secondary
education dining halls and residence halls);
(c) Alternative family
care, reformative care and preventive-reformative care (special facilities and
diagnostic institutions);
(d) Pre-school (kindergartens and special
kindergartens), which were described in a separate chapter.
- Between
13 and 15 per cent of the total funds of the Ministry of Education are spent
annually on these
facilities.[1] Some of the
funds are paid by parents of pupils who attend these facilities. The amount of
parental contributions differs widely,
depending on the type of facility, the
child’s age and the organizer of the facility.
Care for children outside classroom time (leisure
time)
- The
aim of facilities which provide care for children outside classroom time is to
orient children and young people towards worthwhile
interests and to develop
their knowledge and skills; they also provide a not insignificant amount of
assistance in upbringing and
socialization to employed parents. They are
primarily school groups for pupils in the first level of elementary schools and
special
schools, and school clubs for pupils in the second level of elementary
schools and special schools which are established at these
schools. Others are
centres for where children and young people can spend their free time; they are
further divided into children’s
and young people’s centres and
centres for special interest activities. The activities offered by these
facilities are intended
for all categories of children and pupils, including
parents and other interested people. Relatively new elements in the activities
of such centres are activities aimed at unemployed young people and anti-drug
activities. A separate type of facility consists of
elementary arts schools and
State foreign language schools.
- Non-school
facilities have great importance in aesthetic education and art for children and
with children. Since the beginning of
the 1990s, primarily in the Ministry of
Culture, a system of nationwide exhibits in individual artistic education fields
has been
developed, as well as a related network of educational events for
teachers and directors of non-school organizations.
- A
total of 262,000 children attended school groups (233,000) and school clubs
(29,000) in the 1997/98 school year. The number of
pupils attending school
groups declined significantly until the 1993/94 school year, when it gradually
increased to 233,000 in 1997/98,
the same level as in 1992/93. The number of
school groups increased, from 3,740 in 1989/90 to 4,250 in 1997/98. The
percentage
of pupils attending school groups among the total number of pupils in
the first level has declined in the review period, from 49.5
per cent in the
1989/90 school year to 36.7 per cent in the 1997/98 school
year.
- The
number of school clubs increased in 1990/91 to double their original number,
as 293 clubs were added. Their number then gradually
decreased, and
in the last three years it has been slightly above 350. The number of pupils
attending school clubs also grew markedly
in the first post-revolution year up
to 30,400. After a decline lasting until 1993/94 the numbers have been
increasing again recently
(to 28,900 in the 1997/98 school year). At the same
time the percentage of pupils attending school clubs among the total number
of
pupils in the second level of elementary and lower grades of multi-year high
schools is growing (5.7 per cent).
Number of leisure-time centres for children and young
people
and their members (in thousands), 1991/92-1997/98
|
1991/92
|
1992/93
|
1993/94
|
1994/95
|
1995/96
|
1996/97
|
1997/98
|
Number of centres
|
327
|
325
|
317
|
317
|
301
|
305
|
302
|
Youth under 15
|
154.5
|
152.5
|
154.7
|
168.9
|
170.9
|
177.9
|
173.3
|
Youth 15 and over
|
46.6
|
42.5
|
43.2
|
41.1
|
39.5
|
50.8
|
43.7
|
Source: Institute for Information on
Education.
Note: Data for these centres are for children’s
and young people’s centres, including independent centres, for the 1991/92
school year, and for leisure-time centres for children and young people,
including independent centres, for the 1992/93 to 1997/98
school years. The
data do not include other institutions which do provide leisure time activities
for young people but do not fall
under the Ministry of Education.
- The
total number of members in the centres declined absolutely for the
period 1989/901997/98 from 226,000 to 217,000, i.e. roughly
by 9,000
members (about 4 per cent). Interest in the centres comes mainly
from young people up to age 15. At present they constitute
roughly
four fifths of all members (this ratio is stable).
Number of elementary arts schools and their pupils (in
thousands),
1991/92-1997/98
|
1991/92
|
1992/93
|
1993/94
|
1994/95
|
1995/96
|
1996/97
|
1997/98
|
Number of elementary arts schools (including branches)
|
645
|
674
|
770
|
745
|
761
|
804
|
810
|
Students in musical fields
|
109.3
|
112.1
|
124.8
|
138.4
|
144.3
|
144.5
|
145.6
|
Students in other fields
|
67.2
|
68.7
|
75.0
|
80.3
|
85.1
|
83.8
|
83.5
|
Source: Institute for Information on Education.
- Elementary
arts schools[1] provide
fundamentals of education in music, fine arts, dance and literature-drama. The
role of elementary arts schools includes
preparing children to study at
conservatories and young people to study at post-secondary arts schools.
However, their activity
is not conceived of as elite, because children who do
not intend to become arts professionals also attend. Education in elementary
arts schools is unusually significant as a means for developing creativity,
cultivating taste, etc. In many places in the country
elementary arts schools
are also significant centres for cultural activities. The number of
elementary arts schools has gradually
increased since 1989 (with the exception
of fluctuation in the 1994/95 school year). Overall there was a growth of 268
schools (i.e.
one half more than in 1989), up to 810 in
the 1997/98 school year. Elementary arts schools are the only
organizations for leisure
time where the number of pupils is increasing - up to
229,000 pupils in the 1997/98 school year. The total number of pupils has
increased since 1989 by virtually 53,000, i.e. 23 per cent. Of greatest
interest in the entire period is musical studies, attended
by 63 per cent of the
total number of pupils.
- The
State language schools arrange foreign language studies for children, young
people and adults at all levels of ability. Studies
at a State language school
can be completed with a State final exam. The number of State language schools
has varied from 26 in
1991/92 to 32 in 1990/91, and is basically stable in
the review period. The number of students has declined steadily, from 64,000
in
the 1989/90 school year to 30,000 in the 1997/98 school year. However, these
data do not provide a relevant picture of language
teaching. Apart from
significant changes in language teaching in standard schools, there has been
significant development of private
language schools and other institutions which
offer language courses. The number of participants in these courses (children
and
adults) is not statistically monitored.
Participation of children and young people in civic
associations
- The
Act on association of citizens No. 83/1990 Coll. enabled many newly created
civic associations to fulfil their expectations about
leisure time activities.
In subsequent years several hundred civic associations with an interest in the
leisure time of children
and young people registered with the Ministry of the
Interior. In 1999 there are about 400 civic associations in the Czech Republic,
and roughly 250,000-300,000 children participate in their
activities.
- In
view of the fact that civic associations are not financially self-sufficient,
they make use of opportunities for State subsidies
under the Programmes for
Support and Protection of Children and Young People which the MEYS announces
every year (under Government
resolution No. 289/1990) and through which it
provides subsidies of over CK 160 million annually. The Department for Young
People
in the Ministry of Education thus acquires an objective overview of the
activities of civic associations of children and young people.
The
Ministry’s other sources of information about the activities of civic
associations and cooperation with them include meetings
of the Chamber of Young
People and the Mobility Commission (consulting bodies to the
MEYS).
- The
Institute for Children and Youth (an organization established by the Ministry)
issues a directory of selected civic associations.
- In
the years 1995-1999 the Ministry of Culture announced annual competitions for
support of leisure time cultural activities. They
were aimed at various age
groups, including children. Supported projects involved the development of
non-professional art, cultural
activities of disabled citizens, support and
preservation of the culture of ethnic minorities living in the Czech Republic,
children’s
aesthetic activities and special interest cultural, non-arts
activities, aimed primarily at prevention of negative phenomena (primarily
for
high-risk groups of children and young people).
- Since
1993 the Ministry of Culture has annually announced a programme for support of
cultural activities of disabled citizens. Those
who submit projects are all
civic associations whose activities mostly concern health and social issues, and
for whom culture is
only a part of their activities. Only a small number of
them are devoted exclusively or primarily to artistic activities. Approximately
80 projects from 60 applicants go through the competition each year, and about
CK 4.5 to 6.5 million are divided between them.
- Civic
associations are not the only providers of cultural activities for disabled
citizens. They are also organized by social care
institutions and special
schools, which receive financial resources from their organizers, i.e. local
governments, District Offices,
and private legal entities. The Ministry of
Culture also provides subsidies to these institutions, but in isolated
cases.
- Each
year the Ministry of the Environment announces a tender for civic associations
with a number of themes aimed at work with children
and young people. Of the
funds allocated to civic associations in this tender in 1999 CK 6,450,000 were
provided and under the budget
chapter “Ecological education” three
international projects for elementary and secondary schools were supported - the
programme Blue from the Sky (Modré z nebe) received CK
500,000, the programme GLOBE CK 600,000 and the programme Tulip
(Tulipán), CK 98,000.
VIII. SPECIAL PROTECTION MEASURES
A. Children in situations of emergency
1. Refugee children
- We
refer to the chapter on the non-discrimination principle about children without
Czech citizenship in the present report and paragraphs
273 to 279 of the initial
report. We add to the initial report current data on the number of applicants
for refugee status who passed
through
the refugee camps organized by the Ministry of the Interior: in 1995 it was
1,417 people, including 374 children under 15; in 1996
- 2,211 people, including
616 children under 15; in 1997 - 2,09 (sic) people, including 428 children
under 15; in 1998 - 4,086 people,
including 963 children under 15.
- In
connection with the international crisis in Kosovo, seven humanitarian flights
were organized in cooperation with the International
Organization for Migration
(IOM) and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR), and 822 refugees were
brought to the Czech Republic. Kosovo Albanians
who were evacuated to the Czech Republic from Macedonia had an opportunity to
apply
for refugee status or to stay in the Czech Republic on grounds of
temporary asylum. Those who had already applied for refugee status
at the time
when the Government’s decision to establish temporary asylum went into
effect were able to recall the application
and go under the protection of
temporary asylum.
- At
the present time, the refugee problems in the Czech Republic can be divided into
two areas, based on the legal status of the persons
concerned:
(a) Refugees and applicants for refugee status
(persons to whom the provisions of the Convention relating to the Status of
Refugees
and its Protocol and the Act on Refugees apply);
(b) Persons
granted temporary asylum.
- In
camps for applicants for refugee status managed by the Ministry of the Interior
of the Czech Republic classes in the Czech language
are provided for children
and adults, children attend elementary school cost free, and the refugee camp
provides them with school
equipment and needs. In the summer months, in
cooperation with non-governmental organizations, summer camps are organized for
refugee
children. Thematic trips, on which the children have an opportunity to
see the historic and cultural monuments of the Czech Republic,
are organized as
part of the programme. We also refer to chapter III, section A on children
without Czech citizenship.
- Increased
attention is given to socially weak and large families, and children who arrive
without their parents. Unaccompanied children
under 18 are given legal
protection, and applications to appoint guardians are filed. The Act on social
and legal protection of
children governs providing assistance and ensuring
protection of these children; it imposes an obligation on the municipality to
take provisions to protect their life and health and ensure that their basic
living needs are met at the most essential level, including
health care. The
municipality informs the District Office without delay about the measures taken,
and the District Office contacts
the embassy of the country of which the child
is a citizen and discusses with it the possibility of the child’s return
to his/her
homeland. The District Office takes the necessary measures such as
filing an application for a preliminary injunction, filing an
application to
appoint a guardian or custodian for the child, filing an application for the
child’s placement in care, and
handling the child’s placement in a
refugee camp.
- The
Act No. 498/1990 Coll. on refugees, as amended, sets the age limit of 15 at
which people are able to act independently in proceedings
to grant refugee
status. In practice, guardians are also appointed for people who have passed
this age limit. For foreigners, there
are two guardianship institutions for
children up to 15 and for youth:
(a) Guardianship for the
asylum procedure. In this case an NGO employee is appointed guardian (e.g. the
Czech Helsinki Committee).
The employee represents the applicant for refugee
status in all matters concerning the asylum procedure;
(b) Guardianship
for residence. This guardian is appointed by the court of territorial
jurisdiction based on an application to appoint
a guardian filed by the Director
of the Department for Refugees and Integration of Foreigners. A record of the
interview with the
youth (minor) unaccompanied by a legal representative is
attached to the application as evidence. If the child is on the territory
of
the Czech Republic with relatives, they are proposed as guardians. Otherwise a
different adult, whom the applicant knows and
who is reliable, is appointed. If
there is no other possibility, an employee from the Department for Care for
Children in the appropriate
local District Office performs this
function.
- The
problem of minor unaccompanied applicants has been systematically recorded
only since 1 October 1998. Before that date records
were not kept about
that applicant group. From 1 October 1998 to 31 August 1999, 23 unaccompanied
minors applied for refugee status.
- On
17 November 1993, the Government approved a project for integrating people who
have been granted refugee status (resolution No.
643), which is intended to ease
the integration of these people in municipalities in the Czech Republic through
the use of restricted-purpose
State funds. It can also be expected that it will
ease the integration of larger families or families with small
children.
- People
granted temporary asylum are provided housing and other services in humanitarian
centres. Children generally attend local
schools, and to make teaching easier
classes in the Czech language are arranged in the humanitarian centres.
Elementary education
is provided to the children cost free, and the humanitarian
centre provides the children with school aids. Those interested in studies
at
secondary and post-secondary schools have the opportunity to study under the
same conditions as citizens of the Czech Republic.
Social and psychological
assistance to children is provided in humanitarian centres primarily through
clubs, programmes for children
of different ages and developing contacts and
cooperation with the school.
2. Children in armed conflicts, including physical
and
psychological recovery and social reintegration
- In
the law of armed conflicts the Czech Republic is bound by the Geneva Conventions
of 12 August 1949 for the protection of war victims
and the Additional
Protocols thereto of 8 June 1977. The protection of the civilian
population (including protection of children)
is covered by the Convention
relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (the Fourth
Convention) and both Additional
Protocols, which cover both international armed
conflicts (Protocol I) and non-international armed conflicts (Protocol II).
Article
77 of Protocol I provides the duty of States to prevent the
participation of children under 15 in hostilities and forbids their recruitment,
as well as a duty to house them separately from adults (except families), and
forbids executing a death sentence on them. Protocol
I contains similar
provisions for the protection of children for purposes of domestic armed
conflicts.
- In
view of article 10 of the Constitution of the Czech Republic the above-mentioned
legal rules are directly binding and take precedence over domestic
law.
- Under
the new provisions of legislation on military service valid as of
1 December 1999, military service duty does not apply to a
child, who
therefore does not become a soldier and cannot participate in armed conflict. A
child also cannot accept military service
voluntarily.
B. Children involved with the system of
administration
of juvenile justice
- We
refer to chapter II on criminal responsibility, and court proceedings concerning
children.
- In
the category of minors under 15 years of age who commit an act which would be a
crime if committed by an adult, a court does not
decide in criminal proceedings
about their responsibility for a crime, but, depending on the seriousness of the
act, the court conducts
the proceedings under the Civil Procedure Code and takes
a decision to place the minor - either mandatory or at its discretion -
in a
reformatory or other institution. The status of the minor in these proceedings
is the same as that of any other minor in a
custody or civil law proceeding. In
these proceedings, the minor is always represented by his/her legal
representative and his/her
rights are also secured by the youth care
authorities. In these proceedings, the minor is questioned under conditions
stated in
section 48, paragraph 2, and section 31, paragraph 3, of the Act on
the Family which only limits this right in cases when the child
is not able to
form his/her own opinion on the matter because of his/her degree of development.
As soon as the child reaches the
age of 15, the minor can be held criminally
responsible and criminal proceedings are conducted against him/her in which
he/she must
be represented by a defence attorney.
- In
case of a minor who is younger than 15 and who is suspected of committing an act
which has the character of either a crime or a
misdemeanour, the police conducts
the questioning in a way analogous to the Criminal Procedure Code provision on
questioning a witness.
A thorough guarantee of the rights of such a person is
to be introduced by the government proposal of the amendment to the Police
Act
which would adjust in detail the conditions for compulsory summons or detention
of such a person and the interview procedure,
including informing the legal
representative and the childcare authority.
- The
childcare authorities are informed of all offences where the police discover the
perpetrator to be a child under 15. The entity
which decides on any measures to
be taken against the perpetrator of an offence is usually an administrative
commission, which has
the character of an independent body in this matter.
Measures are then taken under sections 43 and 45 of the Act on the Family.
The
non-existence of an independent criminal justice system for children and youth
is being discussed by the commission for the
recodification of the Criminal
Code.
- The
question of the criminal responsibility age limit, which is currently set at 15
years of age, is being discussed in the framework
of the recodification of the
Criminal Code. The majority of the experts on the recodification committee
believe that the social
advantage of lowering the age limit for criminal
responsibility would be less than the negative impacts of so doing. The
questions
of the approach towards crimes committed by juveniles and acts which
would be considered criminal if committed by adults is better
addressed in the
framework of a comprehensive modification of the criminal court system for
minors.
- The
following statistics provided by the Ministry of the Interior concerning
juvenile delinquency (15-18) and child delinquency (under
15) must be understood
in the light of the procedural rules for criminal court proceedings (for
juveniles) and the lack of such rules
(for minors). Criminal matters often
continue from one calendar year to another, or even longer, and statistics ad
personam are
not kept.
Development of crimes caused by juveniles and
children
- In
1995 a total of 10,322 offences were committed by children which would
otherwise have been judged as crimes; this was 6.47 per
cent of
total crimes. Juveniles (15-18) committed 22,310 crimes, which was
13 per cent of total crimes. In 1996 the figures for
children were
12,059 offences representing 7.10 per cent of crimes, and for
juveniles 22,719 crimes, representing 13.37 per cent
of the total. In
1997 children committed 12,086 offences, representing 6.92 per cent of
total crimes and juveniles committed 19,139
crimes,
or 10.96 per cent. In 1998 the number of offences committed by
children declined somewhat to 11,999, or 6.30 per cent of
total crimes. Among juveniles there was a decline to 16,730 crimes, or
8.78 per cent of total crimes. As of 30 April 1999 children
had
committed 3,812 offences and juveniles 4,445. Compared to 1994 we can
observe a constant increase in the criminal activity of
children and juveniles.
This fact gave rise to wide discussion on lowering the age-limit for criminal
responsibility to under 15.
Property crimes committed by
children and juveniles
- In
1995 children committed 8,460 crimes of this kind, which was
10.18 per cent of total property crimes. Juveniles committed 18,520
property crimes, which was 22.29 per cent of total property crimes.
In 1996 children committed 9,207 property offences, or 10.63
per cent
of total crimes of this kind. Juveniles committed 17,703 property offences, or
11.00 per cent of total property crimes.
In 1997 these numbers were,
for children, 9,320 crimes, or 11.00 per cent of total crimes, and for
juveniles, 14,992 crimes, or
17.69 per cent of total crimes. In 1998
there were 9,312 crimes committed by children, or 11.61 per cent of
total crimes, and 13,165
crimes committed by juveniles, or
15.00 per cent of total crimes. Data on property crimes as
of 30 April 1999 are 2,486 committed
by children and 2,883 by
juveniles.
Violent crimes committed by children and juveniles from
1995
to the first quarter of 1999
- In
1995 children committed 939 such acts, which represents 5.4 per cent
of total violent crimes (including 1 murder) and juveniles
1,443 acts, which
represented 8.26 per cent of total violent crime (including 13
murders). In 1996 children committed 1,334 such
acts, which represented
7.17 per cent (no murders) and minors committed 1,640 acts, which
represented 8.82 per cent (including 9
murders). In 1997 these
numbers for children were 1,339 - 7.13 per cent (including 2
murders) and for juveniles 1,497 - 7.97 per
cent (including 7
murders). In 1998 children committed 1,276 acts - 6.57 per cent
(including 2 murders) and juveniles 1,334 - 6.87
per cent
(including 16 murders). In the period from 1 January to 30 April 1999
there were 576 violent criminal acts by children
(including 3 murders)
and 460 violent criminal acts among juveniles (including 2
murders).
Total morally criminal activity by children (including the
crimes of rape, sexual abuse and endangering the moral upbringing of young
people, endangering morality and procuring)
- In
1995 crimes in the cited group were committed by 116 children and 255 juveniles.
In 1996 there was a small decline to 99 children
and 248 juveniles. In
contrast, in 1997 there was an increase in these crimes among children to
120 cases, and a decline among juveniles
to 169 cases. In 1998 crimes of a
moral nature committed by children declined again to 88 cases, and
that of juveniles increased
to 171 cases. In the time period from 1 January
to 30 April 1999, in this area there were 36 cases among children
and 56 cases among
juveniles.
- In
1995, the amendment to the Criminal Code No. 152/1995 Coll. introduced a new
provision of section 81a, under which the court can
decide that a sentenced
juvenile who has reached the age of 18 while serving the sentence will be
transferred to a prison for other
convicts. The court can also decide that the
convicted person will continue to serve the sentence in another type of prison,
which
can differ by one level from the prison in which he/she served the
sentence so far.
- In
1998 the Constitutional Act No. 162/1998 Coll., as amended, and the amendment to
the Criminal Procedure Code No. 166/1998 Coll.
extended the period in which a
detained person, accused or suspected of a crime, must be delivered to the court
from 24 to 48 hours.
C. Children in situations of exploitation, including
physical
and psychological recovery and social reintegration
1. Economic exploitation of children, including child
labour
- In
this section we refer to information provided in the initial report submitted by
the Czech Republic. On specific matters we can
add the information that the
provision of the Labour Code, under which natural persons who complete
compulsory education in a remedial
school before reaching the age of 15 acquire
capacity for labour law purposes on the day they complete compulsory education,
but
no earlier than upon reaching the age of 14, cannot be used in practice at
present. The 1990 amendment to the Schools Act (Act No.
522/1990 Coll.)
repealed the provision under which compulsory education in a remedial school
lasted eight years. Under sections
33 and 34 of the Schools Act,
compulsory education lasts a minimum of nine years. The information stated in
paragraph 318 of the
initial report is only theoretical, in view of the fact
that the cited provision of the Labour Code was not repealed.
- In
1997 the Ministry of Health issued decree No. 261/1997 Coll., which specifies
the work and workplaces which are forbidden to all
women, pregnant women,
mothers during the first nine months after giving birth and juveniles, and
conditions under which juveniles
can perform this work on an exceptional basis
for purposes of training.
- The
Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs is currently considering the question of
how to legally regulate protection of children
under 15 against excessive use or
abuse for physical and mental work, e.g. in family businesses or in cultural,
artistic, advertising
and sporting activities. The Ministry is also considering
this question due to the need to bring the laws of the Czech Republic
into line
with European Community Directive No. 94/33 on protection of juveniles in work,
in the interest of preparing the Czech
Republic for ratification of
International Labour Organization Convention No. 138, as well as in the interest
of proper fulfilment
of article 7 of the Council of Europe’s European
Social Charter. (See ibid., para. 40.)
2. Drug abuse
- Illegal
production and possession of narcotic and psychotropic substances and poisons
and spreading drug abuse are crimes under sections
187 and 188 of the Criminal
Code which ensure protection of society against illegal handling of narcotic and
psychotropic substances,
poisons, and preparations containing narcotic
substances, psychotropic substances, a precursor, or poisons. Use of narcotic
and
psychotropic substances remains non-criminal.
- Section
188a reads:
“1. Anyone who induces another to abuse addictive substances other
than alcohol or supports him/her in it or who otherwise incites
or spreads the
abuse of such substances will be punished by imprisonment for up to three years
or prohibition of activity or a fine.
“2. The perpetrator will be punished by imprisonment for one to five
years if he/she commits the crime stated in paragraph 1
against a person under
the age of eighteen.”
- According
to statistics from the Czech Republic Police, crimes related to spreading drug
abuse were committed in 1994 by 33 children
and 27 juveniles, in 1996 by 66
children and 41 juveniles, in 1997 by 60 children and 48 juveniles, in 1998 by
127 children and 76
juveniles and, finally, in the period from 1
January to 30 June 1999, by 26 children
and 19 juveniles.
- In
1995, 54 juveniles and no children committed the crime of illegal production and
possession of narcotic and psychotropic substances.
By the following year,
children committed this act in 14 cases, juveniles in 115; in 1997 the
respective figures were 30 children
and 129 juveniles, in 1998, 43 and
174; in the period from 1 January to 30 April 1999, the
statistics show 18 children and 66 juveniles
involved in the illegal production
and possession of narcotics.
- The
implementation of the anti-drug policy is primarily the responsibility of the
Interministry Anti-Drug Commission (the IAC). It
is headed by the Prime
Minister, the ViceChairman is the Minister without Portfolio, and other members
are the Minister of Health,
the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Labour and
Social Affairs, the Minister of Education, the Minister of Defence, and the
Minister
of the Interior. In February 1998 the IAC presented a basic policy
document to the Government - “the Concept and Programme
of the
Government’s Anti-Drug Policy for the Period 1998-2000”. The
Government approved the document on 23 February
1998 by resolution No. 111 as a
binding starting point for practical measures on drug-related
issues.
- The
IAC is serviced by its working group - the Council of Ministry Representatives.
Its members, employees of the central bodies
of State administration, are
responsible for the ministries’ activities in this area. In addition, on
the local level there
is a network of district anti-drug coordinators and
anti-drug coordinators in incorporated cities. Their mission is to ensure
effective
distribution of information about primary, secondary and tertiary
prevention, or to coordinate the activities of all facilities which
handle these
issues.
- In
recent years anti-drug policy has been financed at the central level in
two ways: through the appropriate ministries and from the budget chapter
General Cash
Administration (GCA) through District Offices in incorporated
cities (based on the abovementioned government resolution No. 111).
The
special-purpose subsidies significantly reinforced the quality of anti-drug
policy at the local level, thereby confirming the
importance of practical
application of anti-drug policy in those areas where such activities take place.
For 1999, CK 75 million
were allocated from GCA for anti-drug policy projects
through local public administration, and another CK 45 million for ministry
subsidies.
- In
March 1999 the IAC approved the report on the situation and development in drug
matters for 1998. The report indicates that juveniles
aged 15 to 19 constitute
the high-risk population which most often experiments with illegal drugs. Among
newly recorded users, 12.7
per cent reported having their first
experience with drugs before the age of 15, while in the group aged up to 19 it
was 74 per cent.
Out of 209 persons charged under section 187,
section 188 and section 188a of the Criminal Code in 1998, 13 were juveniles,
which
represents an annual increase of almost one third.
- Primary
prevention is primarily a matter for the Ministry of Education. However, it is
not restricted only to the field of education.
A wide spectrum of services of
care for children and juveniles outside of school, provided by civic groups and
organizations, also
play a role here.
- The
MEYS approved the following programmes:
An outline for preventing abuse of addictive substances and other socially
pathological phenomena among children and youth in the
jurisdiction of the
Ministry of Education for the period 1998-2000 (programme approved in
December 1997);
Minimum preventive programme for schools and school facilities in the area
of abuse of addictive substances, School without Drugs
(programme approved in
December 1997);
National Educational Outlines (programme approved in December
1997);
Special courses for instructors in primary anti-drug prevention (in
cooperation with teachers from the United States of America and
Great Britain,
26 graduates) (programme approved in May 1999);
Instruction for drawing and accounting for funds from the MEYS budget
intended for implementing the minimum preventive programme and
to support
preventive activities in 1998 (programme approved in December 1997).
- Based
on the outline for preventing abuse of addictive substances and other socially
pathological phenomena among children and youth
in the jurisdiction of the
Ministry of Education for the period 1998-2000, and based on the instruction for
drawing and accounting
for funds from the MEYS budget intended for implementing
the minimum preventive programme and to support preventive activities in
1998,
roughly CK 9.5 million were distributed among School Offices. The Ministry
of Defence and the Ministry of Agriculture, for
their own educational
purposes, also adopted the Ministry of Education’s minimum preventive
programme.
- At
least 92 elementary schools are implementing the programme Healthy School. This
is a project of the World Health Organization
for Europe, the European Union and
the Council of Europe, which was offered to the Czech Republic in 1991. A total
of 94 schools
were accepted through a selection process; they form the
current network of schools in the Healthy School project. In order for
a school
to participate in the selection process, it had to prepare its own project for
supporting health.
- Almost
70 per cent of all districts have peer programmes in elementary and
secondary schools. However, their effectiveness is limited
by the
children’s motivation, as a result of which unmotivated individuals
and more difficult children are often left out of
these
programmes.
- Minimum
preventive programmes, implemented in schools and school facilities in care
institutions and reformatories, become part of
prevention projects implemented
in cities and municipalities. That means that in a number of cases schools and
school facilities
began systematically to cooperate with the police, the State
prosecutors, authorities for social care, assistance and support, health
facilities, and other entities whose activities are aimed particularly at
extracurricular activities of children and juveniles.
- A
study of the activities of pedagogic-psychological counselling facilities in
prevention of abuse of addictive substances indicates
that in the last three
years the number of such facilities involved in preventive activities grew by
almost 60 per cent: in 1996/97
there were 156 such facilities,
in 1997/98 there were 224 and in 1998/99, 230.
- The
MEYS announces annual tenders for programmes to support and protect children and
juveniles. In the programme Understanding, which
is aimed at supporting
activities of civic associations for the disabled, 43 projects were supported in
1997, 150 projects in the
following year and 123 projects were approved out
of the 272 submitted for 1999.
Medical treatment and resocialization
- As
part of creating a system of social services, the Ministry of Labour and Social
Affairs of the Czech Republic has lately been approaching
the problem of drug
users, addicts and their families from the perspective of citizens in social
need, whose rights to adequate assistance
are equal to those of others. The
aims of the Ministry are:
(a) Through specific
strengthening of respect for human rights, to prevent the social disintegration
of drug users, addicts and their
families;
(b) To participate in
improving inter-ministry cooperation and promote conceptually coherent measures
which ensure continuity of
care;
(c) To create a system of social
services for drug users, addicts and their families.
- A
system of social services specially directed at a clientele with drug problems
will be included in the draft act on social assistance.
The act is to contain
these forms of assistance:
(a) Low-threshold contact
centres and work in the field;
(b) Outpatient counselling and
therapeutic services;
(c) Therapeutic
communities;
(d) Protected workplaces and programmes aimed at
assistance with finding work;
(e) Protected housing for those who
complete treatment;
(f) Social programmes for addicts undergoing
substitute treatment;
(g) Social programmes for active drug users
who are not undergoing treatment.
- While
categories (a)-(c) are being developed through inter-ministry cooperation and
the selection of these types of services is generally
satisfactory, services in
categories (d)(g) basically do not exist. Undoubtedly, the most effective
follow-up care is the least
developed part of the system of care for drug users, because it is
the newest and financially relatively expensive. A few existing
programmes of
follow-up care are operated by
nongovernmental entities; their
quality is very good, but their capacity is quite insufficient. For them to
expand further, it is
necessary to create a framework, particularly a State
philosophy for their development and a clear subsidy policy. Building a social
services system for active drug users is greatly complicated by the negative
attitudes towards these people by the majority population
and certain
politicians. Nonetheless, it is necessary to make efforts in this direction.
The undisputed fact that drugs have become
part of our life clearly indicates
the need to find approaches which will minimize negative consequences and social
risks for individuals
and society in connection with drug use.
- Secondary
prevention of drug addiction was a basic priority for the Ministry of Health in
1998. In that year the Ministry aimed its
support at
developing:
(a) Timely intervention programmes
(including field programmes connected with “harm reduction”
activities);
(b) Outpatient facilities with drug replacement
programmes;
(c) Day centres with intensive outpatient
treatment;
(d) Facilities with detoxification
programmes;
(e) Short-term, medium-term and long-term
institutional care (psychiatric treatment
facilities);
(f) Resocialization (therapeutic communities).
- Key
points included support for a methadone replacement therapy programme for
narcotics addicts, which was implemented in the General
Hospital associated with
the Charles University School of Medicine (Všeobecná
fakultní nemocnice). The Ministry supported it in 1998 as a pilot
project, and the capacity of the programme was not increased during the year.
- The
funds spent enabled a special department for infectious hepatitis to be created,
with an ongoing comprehensive addiction syndrome
treatment programme. Subsidies
from the Ministry of Health permitted the number of beds available for drug
addicts to be increased
through the operation of, for example, the therapeutic
communities Karlov and Magdaléna (Mníšek pod Brdy), and
the
Drug Addiction Treatment Station in Jemnice. Of these facilities, only the
therapeutic community Karlov provided the missing
link of care for juvenile drug
addicts.
- As
part of the HIV/AIDS prevention programme, the Government is devoting attention
to preventing the spread of HIV among drug users
on two
levels:
(a) Supporting expansion of peer activities
among juveniles and street work among drug users which attempt to strengthen
health education
among young people. The aims are to reduce the increase of new
drug users and to restrict the spread of HIV/AIDS among drug addicts
as much as
possible by supporting needle exchange programmes;
(b) A study
aimed at determining the prevalence of HIV-positive people among drug users
using saliva testing. So far the results
still show a relatively low rate.
(Chapter VIII, Section C.2, “Drug abuse”, responds to the
Committee’s concluding
observations, para. 24.)
3. Sexual exploitation and sexual abuse
- Child
abuse and cruelty to children is a crime in the Czech Republic under section 215
of the Criminal Code and is subject to reporting
duty under sections 167 and 168
of the Criminal Code.
Cases of cruelty to children and child abuse reported to
authorities
for social and legal protection of children
|
|
Total 1998
|
Physical cruelty
|
Psychological cruelty
|
Sexual abuse
|
1997
|
1998
|
1997
|
1998
|
1997
|
1998
|
Cases reported
|
1 289
|
1 426
|
600
|
641
|
169
|
192
|
520
|
593
|
By
|
Police
|
339
|
342
|
82
|
68
|
12
|
27
|
245
|
247
|
Schools
|
195
|
239
|
128
|
164
|
33
|
31
|
34
|
44
|
Health-care workers
|
210
|
180
|
137
|
113
|
20
|
21
|
53
|
46
|
Citizens
|
199
|
281
|
101
|
147
|
42
|
48
|
56
|
86
|
Child
|
79
|
103
|
28
|
43
|
10
|
11
|
41
|
49
|
Other
|
267
|
281
|
124
|
106
|
52
|
54
|
91
|
121
|
- According
to the Retrospective Epidemiological Study of Child Sexual Abuse in the Czech
Republic,[13] which included
a survey of children aged 14-15 let, every third adolescent girl reported an
experience of sexual abuse in childhood.
In virtually half the cases of sexual
abuse of girls the aggressor is someone in the family, most often a man in the
social role
of father (biological: non-biological - 2.5:1), brother,
grandfather, or uncle. In roughly one third of cases sexual violence against
girls is committed by someone known to the girl, and in only less than a quarter
of cases by a stranger. Also according to the study,
at present there is a
growing trend of commercial sexual abuse of boys, particularly prostitution of
boys. Half of the sexual violence
against boys is committed by a stranger, who
uses accidental contact for forced sexual activity, the other half by someone
from the
circle of acquaintances (those most frequently cited were teachers and
leaders of clubs, sports groups and summer camps). All cases
involved
homosexual activity.
- Article
12 of the Working regulations for school employees requires employees to
“report to the school principal or school facility
director information
which could indicate that a child or minor pupil is exposed to cruelty, abuse,
neglect or other mistreatment
in the family or other environment outside the
school. They shall also report information about specific danger to pupils
using
addictive substances, including alcohol.” At the instigation of the
Czech Republic Police, several meetings were held with
employees of the MEYS
about issues of delinquency among school-age youth and coordination of
procedures, which resulted in the publication
of information for School Offices,
schools and pre-school facilities. (See ibid., paras. 22 and
39.)
- The
Ministry of the Interior prepared a basic policy paper, Analysis of Problems
Related to Prostitution and Outlining Conditions
for their Systematic Solution,
which was approved by the Czech Republic Government in May 1999. This paper
contains an analysis
of the current situation in the provision of sexual
services, a description of related criminal activity and of the health and
social
risks, and an evaluation of the methods for addressing these risks in
Europe. It will also be a basis for comprehensive legal regulation
of
prostitution and limiting its negative accompanying features to a tolerable
level. It is also expected that a set of accompanying
social, preventive and
resocialization programmes will be developed which could enable victims of
prostitution to return to normal
life. (See ibid.)
- In
the first half of 2000 a draft National Plan to Fight Commercial Sexual Abuse of
Children will be submitted to the Government which
will also contain
re-socialization and rehabilitation aspects. The draft will be prepared by the
National Crime Prevention Committee,
which will ensure the participation of the
relevant ministries. The Ministry of the Interior will then submit it to the
Government.
(See ibid.)
- The
following table shows the number of children under 15 (A) and children 15-18 (B)
who were victims of crimes of a violent or moral
nature from
1995-1999:
|
1995
|
1996
|
1997
|
1998
|
1999
|
|
A
|
B
|
A
|
B
|
A
|
B
|
A
|
B
|
A
|
B
|
Sexual murder
|
3
|
2
|
3
|
1
|
4
|
0
|
1
|
0
|
0
|
1
|
Murder in personal relationships
|
5
|
3
|
2
|
2
|
6
|
6
|
9
|
6
|
3
|
0
|
Other murder
|
5
|
3
|
2
|
0
|
7
|
5
|
9
|
2
|
2
|
1
|
Murder of newborns by the mother
|
6
|
0
|
3
|
0
|
3
|
0
|
1
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
Child abandonment
|
36
|
2
|
9
|
0
|
10
|
1
|
15
|
0
|
4
|
0
|
Abduction
|
36
|
2
|
20
|
0
|
14
|
0
|
13
|
1
|
4
|
0
|
Intentional injury to health
|
426
|
604
|
453
|
547
|
432
|
491
|
457
|
460
|
144
|
121
|
Extortion
|
306
|
200
|
508
|
228
|
569
|
233
|
603
|
288
|
236
|
54
|
Restricting personal freedom
|
135
|
6
|
53
|
6
|
267
|
90
|
156
|
101
|
45
|
14
|
Cruelty to a person entrusted for care
|
164
|
|
113
|
7
|
141
|
6
|
122
|
8
|
45
|
1
|
Rape
|
74
|
151
|
80
|
136
|
77
|
112
|
81
|
127
|
20
|
42
|
Sexual abuse
|
1 083
|
33
|
1 181
|
48
|
948
|
42
|
1353
|
38
|
264
|
9
|
Source: Ministry of the Interior.
- In
April 1999 the Czech Republic Police created a special workplace - a computer
crime group - responsible, among other things, for
certain tasks involved in
uncovering child pornography on the Internet.
- Non-governmental
organizations play a significant role in helping sexually abused children and
child victims of cruelty (e.g. the
Our Child Foundation - Safety Hotline, the
Fund for Endangered Children, the Pink Hotline, the Children’s Crisis
Centre Prague,
the Blue Hotline Brno, STŘEP, etc.). For example, the Fund
for Endangered Children conducts the following activities for the
protection of
child victims of cruelty and abused children:
(a) Finding these
children, investigating their situation and attempting to place them in
alternative families, if it is not possible
to treat the family, in cooperation
with childcare authorities;
(b) Arranging sheltered housing for parents
with children threatened by the other parent or another adult member of the
household;
(c) Arranging temporary family care for a child until a case
is resolved;
(d) Psychological examination, provision or arrangements
for psychotherapy or convalescent treatment, activities for children living
in
children’s homes;
(e) Free legal advice for the parent who is not
injuring the child;
(f) Education related to the children and the
public;
(g) Filing crime reports; giving information to the police, the
court and childcare authorities.
- The
basic form of help which the Safety Hotline offers is telephone crisis
intervention. If the seriousness of the child’s
situation requires an
expert or the help of an appropriate authority or institution, the Safety
Hotline can refer the caller to the
appropriate facility or institution. The
Safety Hotline also offers, particularly in serious cases of danger to the
psychological
and physical health and the life of the child, to arrange help
through intervention directly to the competent authorities and institutions.
The Safety Hotline continues to monitor the handling of the crisis situation.
The Safety Hotline’s Crisis Centre is closely
connected to its activities.
This is a non-governmental health facility which provides children, adolescents
and their parents highly
expert psychological and social and legal assistance
through diagnosis, individual and family psychotherapy, group therapy and social
fieldwork.
- Issues
of cruelty, neglect and abuse of children and adolescents represent
approximately 6 per cent of the conversations on the Safety
Hotline.
In 1998 over 3,000 children turned to the Safety Hotline, an average of
approximately 8 people a day. Many cases had to
be handled directly in the
Safety Hotline’s Crisis Centre through therapeutic or diagnostic help or
through the intervention
of social workers. This procedure would be indicated
in a significantly
higher number of cases, the child or adolescent must agree to accept this
form of help. In many cases, however, children and adolescents
refuse to break
their anonymity, particularly due to enormous fear, primarily of the reactions
of the parent causing injury. A total
of 28.7 per cent of the problems brought
to the Safety Hotline Crisis Centre are cases of cruelty, neglect and abuse.
- We
can see the numerous cases of abuse, cruelty and neglect registered by the
Safety Hotline and its Crisis Centre as a sign of the
relatively high incidence
of violence committed against children and juveniles, particularly in the
family. This is because children
primarily identify a related or familiar
person as the originator of the violence. They identify a completely unknown
person as
the perpetrator markedly less often. This also corresponds to the
results of a retrospective study which was aimed at the incidence
of sexual
abuse in childhood among the adult population of the Czech Republic and in
persons with risky sexual behaviour. This was
a research project by the Safety
Hotline Crisis Centre conducted in 1998. The results of this study indicated
that 25.7 per cent
of respondents experienced a form of sexual abuse in
childhood (up to age 15). Of the total number of respondents, 33 per cent of
women and 17 per cent of men reported such an experience.
- The
Pink Hotline also offers help to child victims of cruelty and abused children.
The Hotline conducts not only telephone crisis
intervention, but also in-person
crisis intervention for the child and the entire family. The Hotline works with
schools, childcare
authorities and the police.
4. Sale, trafficking and abduction
- Abduction
is a crime under section 216 of the Criminal Code, which
states:
“1. Anyone who removes a child or a person suffering from a mental
disorder or mental retardation from the care of the person
who has the duty to
care for him/her under the law or according to an administrative decision, shall
be punished with a prison sentence
of up to three years or a fine.
“2. The perpetrator shall be punished by a prison sentence of two to
eight years if he/she,
“(a) commits the crime stated in paragraph 1 with the intent of
acquiring material gain for himself/herself or another, or
“(b) endangers the moral development of the abducted person by
such act.
“3. The perpetrator shall be punished by a prison sentence of three to
ten years if, by the act specified in paragraph 1, he/she
causes serious injury
to health, death, or another especially serious consequence.”
- Trading
in children is a crime under section 216a of the Criminal Code, which
states:
“1. Anyone who, for compensation, entrusts a child to the power of
another for purposes of adoption, making use of child labour
or for another
purpose, shall be punished by a prison sentence of up to three years or a
fine.
“2. The perpetrator shall be punished by a prison sentence of two to
eight years if he/she,
“(a) commits the crime specified in paragraph 1 as the member of an
organized group, or
“(b) acquires significant benefit by such crime.
“3. The perpetrator shall be punished by a prison sentence of three to
ten years if, by the crime specified in paragraph 1,
he/she causes serious
injury to health, death or another especially serious consequence.
5. Other forms of exploitation
- The
Czech Republic has not experienced any other forms of child
exploitation.
D. Children belonging to a minority or an indigenous group
- Education
of minorities in the Czech Republic in their native language is guaranteed by
the Charter (art. 25, para. 2a).
- Act
No. 29/1984 Coll. on the system of elementary and secondary schools (the Schools
Act), as amended by later regulations, and Act
No. 564/1990 Coll., on State
administration and local administration in education, as amended by later
regulations, permit the creation
of schools or classes to teach children of
non-Czech nationality whose parents are citizens of the Czech Republic in their
native
language. However, the creation and activities of these schools or
classes generally depend on the interest of parents, who declare
their interest
in a suitable way, generally through their civic associations. Section 3,
paragraph 2, of the Schools Act states:
“Pupils belonging to ethnic
minorities are guaranteed the right to education in their native language ... .
Members of ethnic
minorities have the right to education in their native
language without cost in the State school system of State schools. In practice,
this right is met in the standard State school system (schools with the language
of the ethnic minority as the language of instruction,
schools with instruction
in the language of the ethnic minority as an elective subject, separate classes
with the language of the
ethnic minority as the language of instruction) or in
bilingual schools.
- At
the present time, a draft law on minorities is being prepared, which is to be
submitted to the Government by the end of the first
half of the year 2000; it is
expected that the law would come into effect in the first half of 2001. The
draft, based on the present
constitutional guarantees of minority rights, will be in accordance with
the European Framework Convention for the Protection of National
Minorities to
which the Czech Republic has already acceded, and with the European Charter
of Minority and Regional Languages, for
which the Czech government authorities
have begun the process of ratification. Establishing minority schools is not
based on a statutory
obligation of the State. The Schools Act only regulates
the opportunity of establishing minority classes and schools. The draft
law is
also to specify the minimum number of pupils, lower than in schools with Czech
as the language of instruction, at which the
State will be required to establish
a minority class, or at which it will be able to dissolve such a class.
Overall, it can be said
that the law should regulate the rights of minority
members, including the children, to the use of their language, development of
their culture and cultural autonomy, through which they will decide, or jointly
decide, on issues of minority culture, language and
education. This will also
apply to minority children.
- In
the Czech Republic only the Polish minority, which is concentrated in the
districts of Karviná and Frýdek-Místek,
has fully developed
education with Polish as the language of instruction. Method management,
publication of textbooks and methodical
aids for Polish schools are arranged by
the Polish pedagogic centre in Český Těšín,
established by the
MEYS. Specifically, in these districts, the following types
of Polish schools exist (in the 1998/99 school
year):
Kindergartens - 38 classes, 590
children;
Elementary schools - 29 schools, 152 classes, 2,642
children;
Secondary schools - Academic High School in
Český Těšín, 11 classes, 271
pupils;
Detached classes in Karviná - 82
pupils;
Business Academy in Český
Těšín - 91 pupils;
Secondary industrial machinery school (Střední
průmyslová škola strojní) in
Karviná 73 pupils;
Secondary health
studies school (Střední škola zdravotní) in
Karviná - 51 pupils;
Secondary agricultural school
(Střední zemědělská škola) in
Český Těšín - 16 pupils.
- In
view of its high degree of assimilation and dispersed population, the Slovak
minority does not have a clearly formulated educational
programme. There is
only one elementary school, in Karviná, with only about 50 pupils. In
Prague the MEYS made preparations
to open a Slovak high school and begin
instruction in the 1997/98 school year; however, the programme failed for lack
of student
interest.
- In
1997 the Government approved decree No. 686 on measures assisting the
integration of the Romani community in society. The decree
charges the Minister
of Education, Youth and Sports to implement significant organizational and
methodological changes in the upbringing
and education of Romani children. The
MEYS supports the education of members of the Romani minority in the following
ways:
(a) It establishes and operates preparatory
classes in elementary schools, kindergartens and special schools for children
from a
socio-culturally disadvantaged environment, which Romani children can
attend before beginning compulsory education. The aim of teaching
in these
“preparatory classes” is, through purposeful and systematic work
with the pupils, to increase their level of
preparation for school in language
and social skills;
(b) It initiates specific educational
programmes for elementary schools whose aim is to provide Romanies with
elementary education
and, subsequently secondary
education;
(c) It prepares pedagogical documentation aimed at
specific educational needs of Romani children which, without exception, respects
the fact that tolerance permeates education as a whole;
(d) It
publishes textbooks which take into account differences between cultures and
nationalities;
(e) It cooperates with civic associations in
offering education for children of Romani origin;
(f) It arranges
the participation of its experts in the Consultative Group for Ethnic Education
Issues.
- Since
1993 the MEYS has systematically applied itself to the education of Romani
children, primarily by establishing preparatory classes
for children from a
socio-culturally disadvantaged environment in the elementary education system.
Eighty preparatory classes were
established in the 1998/99 school year. Romani
assistants are a particularly important aid in overcoming language barriers
among
Romani children. As of 30 March 1999, 110 Romani
assistants were working in elementary schools, special schools and
kindergartens.
Resources for the salaries for Romani teaching assistants are
allocated and released by the Ministry of Education at the request
of the
school. The Ministry of Education arranges the education and preparation of
assistants for these positions. The MEYS monitors
new bases for testing
children when assigning them to special schools.
- For
five years the MEYS has been supporting the “Project for Experimental
Graduated Education of Romani Consultants” in
the Secondary Evangelical
School of Social Work in Prague 4; the school is included in the school network.
The MEYS and the Ministry
of Labour and Social Affairs share the
financing.
- The
Private Romani Secondary Social School in Kolín, aimed at daily four-year
studies for social workers focusing specifically
on the Romani community, has
been included in the school network. The MEYS provides 40 per cent of the
school’s financing.
- Another
measure of support to and education of Romani children is special-purpose
subsidies for specific projects concerning education
of the Romani population.
The Ministry subsidized a total of seven projects within the Programme for
Development of Elementary and
Secondary Education and the ExTra programme. As
part of programmes for the support and protection of children and youth, civic
associations
of children and youth and civic associations working with young
people, programmes aimed at preventing racism and xenophobia receive
long-term
support. One of the tasks of the accepted outline in connection with the decree
of the Government of the Czech Republic
No. 686/1998, is to prepare a policy for
the education, development and socialization of marginal and highrisk groups,
with emphasis
on Romani children and youth, and to prepare a system and methods
for the further education of adults among the Romani population
or other
linguistically handicapped and culturally distinct minorities. Another task is,
in cooperation with centres for leisure
time and civic associations, to develop
specific leisuretime activities for high-risk groups of children and youth
involving education,
events and activities leading to tolerance, and the
elimination of racism and various forms of discrimination and violence in
society.
Programmes of timely intervention are to be developed as part of the
care for high-risk groups.
- In
decree No. 279 of 7 April 1999, the Government approved the policy towards
assisting the integration of members of the Romani community
into society. In
the decree the Government charges the Minister of Education to ensure that
changes are implemented in curricula
at elementary and secondary schools, so
that these curricula will include teaching about the Roma, their history
(including the Nazi
holocaust), their culture and traditions. A significant
task for several ministries is to include such provisions in the legal order
in
order to provide an opportunity to conduct actions to remove possible
disadvantages caused to members of the Romani community,
in order to eliminate
such disadvantages by 31 December 2020. By accepting the outline the Government
committed itself to creating
conditions for changing the school system so that
Romani children can be as successful in it as others. Methods for achieving
this
will be primarily removing language barriers, organizing preparatory
classes, offering Romani as a supplemental language of instruction,
hiring
Romani assistants in schools, and adopting primarily individual approaches to
pupils. The system in which most Romani children
only complete special school,
which qualifies them only for the lowest-paid jobs, will be replaced with a
system of classes with
flexible transfer between educational tracks in
elementary schools and smaller numbers of pupils. The State will provide adult
Roma
an opportunity to complete their elementary or further education. (Chapter
VIII, section D, “Children belonging to a minority
or an indigenous
group”, responds to the Committee’s concluding observations, paras.
15 and 32.)
IX. CONCLUSION: DISTRIBUTION OF THE INITIAL AND
SECOND PERIODIC REPORT ON IMPLEMENTATION
OF THE CONVENTION
- The
Ministry of the Interior sent the initial report to the ministries concerned.
The ministries or non-governmental organizations
distributed the report as they
saw fit to government al and non-governmental institutions. The initial report
is also published
on the Internet at: http://www.unhcr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf under
the search term “Czech Republic” and “Committee on the Rights
of the Child”.
- The
Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs published the initial report and
distributed it in varying numbers of copies to the following
institutions: the
Ministries of Education, Youth and Sports, Health, Justice, the Interior and
Foreign Affairs, the Office of the
President of the Republic, the Parliament of
the Czech Republic, the Union of Health Care and Social Work, the Society of
Social
Workers, the Children’s Crisis Centre, the Czech Society for Social
Paediatrics, the Fund for Endangered Children, the Czech
Society for Protection
of Children, social care institutions, District Offices, city halls of
incorporated cities, infant care institutions,
children’s homes, care
institutions and secondary and post-secondary schools with a focus on social
affairs.
- The
second periodic report will be sent to all ministries and other State
administration authorities (the Supreme State Prosecutor’s
Office, the
Supreme Court, etc.), and to the Czech Press Office, non-governmental non-profit
organizations and branches of international
organizations, and will also be
published on the Internet.
Notes
List of
annexes[*]
1. Method Instruction of the
Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports on education against
expressions of
racism, xenophobia and intolerance.
2. The National Plan for Equalizing
Opportunity for Citizens with Medical
Disabilities
of 14 April 1998.
3. Statistics on
alternative family care.
4. Subsidies of the Ministry of Education, Youth
and Sports to civic associations.
5. Number of deaths of children aged
under 19.
6. Amount of subsidies from the Ministry of Health for projects
aimed at children and
adolescents.
7. Amount of subsidies from the Ministry of Health for medically disabled
persons.
8. Expenses for payments to families with
children.
9. Diagram of the Czech Republic Education System.
10. Financing education.
11. Information on the amount of funds
provided to the benefit of children from the State
budget from 1995 to
1999.
-----
[*] For the initial report submitted by the
Government of the Czech Republic, see CRC/C/11/Add.11, for its consideration by
the Committee,
see documents CRC/C/SR.411413 and for the concluding
observations, see CRC/C/15/Add.81.
GE.0242621 (E)
150702
[*] “Minorities” and
“minority” here and in the following text mean national and ethnic
minorities under part
III of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms,
published under No. 2/1993 Coll., which is part of the constitutional order
of
the Czech Republic and which has the legal force of the Constitution and
constitutional laws, and minorities under the Framework Convention for the
Protection of National Minorities.
[*]
Children’s home, children’s reformatory, reformatory for youth
(reformatory for children and youth), home for under-age
mothers, institution
for reform and medical treatment (or department for reform and medical
treatment), children’s diagnostic
institution, diagnostic institution for
youth, centre for the care of children and
youth.
[1] The minimum
subsistence level is set by the Act on the minimum subsistence level
No. 463/1991 Coll., as amended. The amount of
the minimum standard of
living which is considered necessary under the Act on the minimum standard
of living to ensure food and other
basic personal needs is a monthly
amount of (a) CK 1,560, for a child up to 6 years old; (b) CK
1,730, for a child 6-10 years old;
(c) CK 2,050 for a
child 1015 years old; (d) CK 2,250, for a dependent child 15-26
years old; (e) CK 2,130 for other citizens. The
amount of the minimum standard
of living which is considered necessary under the Act on the minimum standard of
living to secure
necessary household expenses is a monthly amount
of (a) CK 1,300 for an individual; (b) CK 1,700 for a two-person
household; (c)
CK 2,110 for a three- or four-person household; (d) CK 2,370 for
a household of five or more people.
[2] The legal framework of
the education system is also formed by Act No. 76/1978 Coll. on school
facilities, as amended, and Act No.
564/1990 Coll. on State administration and
local administration in education, as amended by later
regulations.
3 The development of the system of
administration of regional education after 1990 is described in detail in the
Annual Report on the Status and Development of the Education System
in 19951996 (Education in Movement), MŠMT, ÚIV
1996.
4 Passage of Act No. 367/1990 Coll. on
municipalities and Act No. 425/1990 Coll. on district offices, and the amendment
to the Schools
Act No. 171/1991 Coll. also played an important role.
[5] After grade five of
elementary school to an eight-year high school and after grade seven to a
six-year high school.
6 Schools with few grades are
schools where the teaching of several grades is organized in one classroom.
Incompletely organized
schools do not have all grades, but each of them has its
own classroom. Generally, schools are created with only the first level;
schools with only the second level are rare.
7 It was
not statistically monitored until the 1993/94 school
year.
8 Special classes are for hearing, visually,
physically or mentally disabled children, for children with speech defects and
with combined
defects. Specialized classes are for children with specific
developmental behavioural and learning disorders.
9 A
teaching philosophy whose main feature is emphasizing individual work and the
pupil’s self-reliance. It is named after
an experimental school in Dalton
(United States of America).
10 The Act also regulates
the possibilities for educational institutions for artistic production and the
National Shorthand Institute.
11 In the 1997/98 school
year it was CK 11.4 billion, i.e. 14.9 per cent of all public
expenditure for education (including municipal
expenditures). Almost two
thirds of these funds (CK 7.2 billion) were spent for housing and
meals.
12 Elementary arts schools are included among
schools under the Act, but in view of their activities, which serve the leisure
time
of children and young people, they are classified among school facilities,
for clarity.
[13] E.
Vaníčková, Retrospective Epidemiological Study of Child
Sexual Abuse in the Czech Republic. The Concluding
Report on the Grant
provided by the Internal Grant Agency of the Ministry of Health, Czech
Republic, Prague, 1998.
[*] Available for consultation in the files
of the secretariat.
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