Gov’t to Outline Plans for the Welfare of Children in State Care

The Government will highlight its plans to further improve the welfare of the nation’s children in State care, at a press conference to be held on Monday (May 27), at Jamaica House, beginning at 10:00 a.m.

This follows Cabinet’s approval on Monday, May 20, of the recommendations of a joint submission by the Ministries of Youth and Culture, Justice, Education and National Security on this matter.

Further details on Cabinet’s approvals and decisions regarding the submission, will be provided at the conference by Minister of Youth and Culture, Hon. Lisa Hanna and the other portfolio Ministers.

Making the disclosure on May 22, Minister Hanna informed that the submission will provide “the platform for an acceleration of steps to achieve further and rapid improvement in the wellbeing of our children, particularly those in public institutions and juvenile facilities.”

The Minister was speaking at a scholarship awards function for wards of the State, hosted by the Children of Jamaica Outreach Inc. (COJO), at the Spanish Court Hotel in Kingston.

The submission is as a result of the work of the Inter-Ministerial Working Group, which Minister Hanna convened last year to examine the recommendations of the 2010 Task Force report on the fire which occurred at the Armadale Correctional Centre in St Ann, in 2009.

The group is also tasked with charting the way forward in relation to children who come in contact with the justice system.

Contact: Alecia Smith-Edwards