Audience – healthcare professionals and commissioners

Children and young people are growing and developing individuals, not simply adults who lack capacity to make their own decisions. Their rights do not pass from their parents to them at their 16th or 18th birthday, rather there is a continual process of supporting children and young people to be as involved in their own health and care as possible.

Talking About Rights has been produced to help healthcare staff to increase their understanding of specific sections (articles) within the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) through the eyes of children and young people.

The report and short films are based on the views, experience and expertise of children and young people with long-term health conditions (LTHC) and has given them the space to define how rights should be practiced by the services that are an important role in their everyday lives.

The relevant UNCRC articles are listed; each will be addressed in detail in the body of the report.