Question to the Department for Education:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the remarks by Baroness Barran on 17 July 2023 (HL Deb col 2044), what steps they have taken to respond formally to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child's Concluding Observations, published in June 2023.

Following the constructive dialogue in Geneva, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child published their Concluding Observations on 2 June 2023. As the lead department, the Department for Education has actively coordinated follow-up activities relating to the United Nations on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), including sharing the Concluding Observations with relevant policy teams across government departments.

The government has carefully considered all the recommendations listed in the Concluding Observations document and will continue to do so until the next reporting round.

Although the UK is a proud signatory of the UNCRC, it does not always agree with, or implement, the Committee’s recommendations and there is no prerequisite to do so.

The Committee will establish and communicate the due date of the next periodic report in due course, which the department will coordinate.