Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the Written Ministerial Statement of 6 December 2010, Official Report, column 7WS, what consideration his Department has given to the articles of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child when making new policy and legislation since May 2015.

Analysis of the impact of policies in relation to particular groups is carried out in a range of ways, particularly through engagement with civil society and professionals.
Assessments are regularly undertaken where the child may be directly or indirectly affected by proposed changes.

Rights, freedoms and protections for children are considered throughout policy-making, but we have also put in place extra checkpoints – across government – where we think these are useful and important. These include the Equalities Analysis, which enables decision-makers to understand the impact on protected groups, one of which is age.

In the Department for Work and Pensions (“DWP”) we consider the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child as part of our Equality Analysis when the Department is considering changing, developing or delivering policies or programmes or services that may affect children either directly or indirectly. An example of this is the impact assessment carried out in respect of the welfare reforms set out in the Welfare Reform and Work Bill. In undertaking its analysis, where applicable, DWP took into account the UNCRC.

A Family Test for the development of policy was introduced by the UK Government in 2014, led by DWP. The objective of the test is to introduce a family perspective to the policy making process, and to ensure that the potential impacts on family relationships and functioning, both positive and negative, are made explicit and recognised in the process of developing new policy.