Session 03.2 Child Protection
Tracks
Track 2: Room LG18
| Monday, July 28, 2025 |
| 2:00 PM - 3:30 PM |
| LG18 - The David Li Kwok Po Lecture Theatre |
Overview
Individual papers
Chair: TBC
Children’s relationships with caregiving and birth families Pathways of Care: A longitudinal study of children in care in Australia
Professor Judy Cashmore, University of Sydney, Australia
Right to Play: A Forgotten Right in a Forgotten World
Professor Lilla Garayova, Pan-European University, Slovakia
Regulating Elective Home Education: The Limits of Rights
Professor Daniel Monk, Birkbeck, University of London, UK
Speaker
Professor Judy Cashmore
Professor of Socio-legal Research & Policy
University of Sydney
Children’s relationships with caregiving and birth families Pathways of Care: A longitudinal study of children in care in Australia
Abstract
Children in out-of-home care need to understand and navigate a complex set of relationships with the people they are living with, people who may be relatives or kin or unrelated foster carers, as well as their relationships with their parents, siblings and other members of their birth family. Based on data from the Pathways of Care Longitudinal Study (POCLS), this presentation will focus on children’s socio-emotional well-being and the extent to which their relationships with their carers, and with their family, including family contact, change over time, and how these relationships predict children’s socio-emotional well-being. How does this differ for children who are removed as infants or very young children and those who are older with established relationships with parents and siblings at the time of removal, and for those with different cultural backgrounds, as well as those in different types of placements, and with different lengths of time in care?
The Pathways of Care Longitudinal Study (POCLS) is the first large-scale prospective longitudinal study of children and young people in out-of-home care in Australia. It includes a cohort of all 4,126 children and young people (age 0 to 17 years) who entered out-of-home care for the first time over an 18-month period from May 2010 to October 2011 in New South Wales – with a focus on 2,828 of these children with final court orders. It has included interviews over six waves with participating caregivers for children on final orders and standardised assessments for the children in their care as well as interviews for 7–17 year-olds; it also includes linked administrative data from a range of agencies for all 4,126 children.
The Pathways of Care Longitudinal Study (POCLS) is the first large-scale prospective longitudinal study of children and young people in out-of-home care in Australia. It includes a cohort of all 4,126 children and young people (age 0 to 17 years) who entered out-of-home care for the first time over an 18-month period from May 2010 to October 2011 in New South Wales – with a focus on 2,828 of these children with final court orders. It has included interviews over six waves with participating caregivers for children on final orders and standardised assessments for the children in their care as well as interviews for 7–17 year-olds; it also includes linked administrative data from a range of agencies for all 4,126 children.
Biography
Judy is Professor of Socio-legal Research and Policy, and Professorial Fellow in the School of Education and Social Work, University of Sydney. Her research has focused on decision-making procedures and children’s involvement with, and perceptions of, criminal and child welfare processes concerning children’s safety, care and adoption, and the prosecution of child sexual offences. She has been a long-term researcher on the Pathways of Care Longitudinal Study of children entering care for the first time in New South Wales, focusing her analysis on children’s relationships with their family and their carers. She is a member of the NSW Children’s Court Advisory Committee.
Prof. Dr. Lilla Garayova
Vice-dean Of The Faculty Of Law, Professor Of International Law
Pan-European University, Slovakia
Right to Play: A Forgotten Right in a Forgotten World
Abstract
The presentation revisits the critical yet often overlooked right to play as enshrined in Article 31 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Although the CRC marks its 35th anniversary as the most ratified human rights treaty, the actualization of the right to play remains inconsistently addressed and underemphasized in international legal frameworks and national policies. The legal foundation for the right to play was solidified with the adoption of the CRC in 1989, expanding beyond its historical linkage to education, as outlined in previous declarations. Despite this recognition, subsequent assessments by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child through General Comment No. 17 and numerous concluding observations reveal a persistent neglect of this right, with only a fraction of recommendations explicitly advocating for its enforcement.
Through a comprehensive analysis of Committee outputs and the evolving interpretations of Article 31, the presentation illuminates the disparities in recognizing and implementing the right to play. By highlighting the transformative power of play, the speech calls for renewed commitment among stakeholders to prioritize and advocate for play as a dynamic and indispensable component of child development. The ultimate goal is to ensure that the right to play is elevated from a marginal to a central position in global child rights discourse, ensuring that all children can experience the benefits of play in their growth and development, even those in vulnerable situations.
Through a comprehensive analysis of Committee outputs and the evolving interpretations of Article 31, the presentation illuminates the disparities in recognizing and implementing the right to play. By highlighting the transformative power of play, the speech calls for renewed commitment among stakeholders to prioritize and advocate for play as a dynamic and indispensable component of child development. The ultimate goal is to ensure that the right to play is elevated from a marginal to a central position in global child rights discourse, ensuring that all children can experience the benefits of play in their growth and development, even those in vulnerable situations.
Biography
Lilla Garayová is the Vice Dean for Bachelor and Master Studies and International Relations at the Faculty of Law of the Pan-European University. She works as a professor of international law at the Institute of International and European Law ofthe Pan-European University as well as at the Comenius University in Bratislava and also practices law as a children’s right advocate. Her professional and publishing practice focuses on international family law and the protection of children’s rights. She is fluent in 9 foreign languages and regularly publishes and lectures in them. She is a member of the Scientific Council of the Faculty of Law of the Pan-European University, the Slovak Association of European Law, and the International Society of Family Law. She is the representative of Slovakia in FL-EUR, Family Law Europe, an academic society integrating 36 European countries. She is a member of the editorial boards of several scientific journals.
Professor Daniel Monk
Professor Of Law
Birkbeck, University of London
Regulating Elective Home Education: The Limits of Rights
Abstract
The legal regulation of elective home education in England and Wales has been subject to intense debate by policy makers over the last few decades. Three attempts to enact specific legislation and introduce a compulsory system of registration have all failed (most recently in 2022). But revised government guidance to local authorities in 2019 and a key test case (Goodred v Portsmouth City Council [2021] EWHC 3057 (Admin)) have required and legitimised local authorities adopting a more proactive approach to monitoring the education provided by parents.
This paper seeks to ask why this growing practice has proven so resistance to statutory reform and how children and parents and their rights are conceptualised in both calls for and against enhanced regulation; and, in particular, how contrasting parental motives and raced and classed identities are distinguished in the debates.
Locating the debate in a wider European context it also asks why the UK is an outlier adopting the most resolutely ‘liberal’ approach to the issue and how balancing the social and economic and civil and political aspects of education rights provides a site for thinking about the political and cultural history of childhood.
This paper seeks to ask why this growing practice has proven so resistance to statutory reform and how children and parents and their rights are conceptualised in both calls for and against enhanced regulation; and, in particular, how contrasting parental motives and raced and classed identities are distinguished in the debates.
Locating the debate in a wider European context it also asks why the UK is an outlier adopting the most resolutely ‘liberal’ approach to the issue and how balancing the social and economic and civil and political aspects of education rights provides a site for thinking about the political and cultural history of childhood.
Biography
An inter-interdisciplinary scholar, Monk’s extensive publications explore a wide range of issues about children, family, sexuality and education and adopt a variety of methods: doctrinal, empirical, literary, theoretical. Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences and an Editor of Child and Family Law Quarterly.
