Some of the rights that are contained in the Convention on the Rights of the Child include the right to be safe, the right to play, the right to get an education and the right to grow up healthy.
Paula Gerber is a Professor in the Law Faculty at Monash University and an internationally renowned scholar, with expertise in international human rights law. Her focus is children's rights.
She says parents play a key role in a child’s right to grow up healthy.
“Australia benefits from the national healthcare system, Medicare, and all children, as soon as they're born are entitled to that healthcare system. But obviously the primary responsibility for keeping children well and getting them to the doctor and getting their vaccinations falls on the parents as the first port of call.”
Children also have the right to be safe no matter where they are.
Mandatory reporting laws, which vary between Australian jurisdictions, require that suspected abuse is reported to government child protection services.
This applies to instances of physical, sexual and emotional abuse, neglect and exposure to family violence, explains Professor Gerber.
“The law imposes what's called ‘mandatory reporting obligations’ on a number of professionals, so that if they have reason to believe that a child is being subjected to violence or abuse or even neglect, then they must report that to child protection services, which falls within the government’s Department of Human Services. The sort of people who have that mandatory reporting obligation are doctors, nurses, teachers, police, people who work in religious organisations.”
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