Coining Children\u27s Blood into Capital: Can Precepts of International Law End Economic Exploitation of Children

Article 32 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child ( UN Convention ) states that parties to the convention must recognize the right of the child to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child\u27s education, or to be harmful to the child\u27s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development. Despite this well-intentioned document and several other treaties, conventions and protocols, millions of children around the world are subjected to varying degrees of economic exploitation, some in conditions that are akin to slavery. Section I will examine the problem, scope and causes of child labor. Section II will survey international law, both generally and specifically; what laws govern, and whether these laws are being enforced; and additionally, whether the problem countries are parties to the UN Convention or other protocols, such as the International Labor Organization Conventions 138 or 182. Section II will also examine domestic legislation relating to child labor overseas. Section III will describe current efforts to end child exploitation, what the international community can do to ensure the enforcement of domestic laws protecting children, and delineate promising strategies for ending end child exploitation

Coining Children\u27s Blood into Capital: Can Precepts of International Law End Economic Exploitation of Children

Article 32 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child ( UN Convention ) states that parties to the convention must recognize the right of the child to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child\u27s education, or to be harmful to the child\u27s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development. Despite this well-intentioned document and several other treaties, conventions and protocols, millions of children around the world are subjected to varying degrees of economic exploitation, some in conditions that are akin to slavery. Section I will examine the problem, scope and causes of child labor. Section II will survey international law, both generally and specifically; what laws govern, and whether these laws are being enforced; and additionally, whether the problem countries are parties to the UN Convention or other protocols, such as the International Labor Organization Conventions 138 or 182. Section II will also examine domestic legislation relating to child labor overseas. Section III will describe current efforts to end child exploitation, what the international community can do to ensure the enforcement of domestic laws protecting children, and delineate promising strategies for ending end child exploitation

Aging Out: 2018 Legislation Seeking to Address Virginia’s Permanency Problem for Children in Foster Care

Virginia has one of the highest rates of youth who “age out” of the foster care system and one of the lowest family reunification rates in the country. This is due to several factors, including that the termination of parental rights has an accelerated timeline in Virginia compared to the federal timeline. Children who age out of the system lack a sense of permanency that is critical to healthy psychological development. As a result, many such children tend to experience lower levels of educational attainment and income, and higher levels of substance use, criminal justice system involvement, and homelessness than average. During its 2018 session, the Virginia General Assembly sought to address some aspects of this problem through their enactment of House Bills 1219, 1333, and 106 and Senate Bills 44 and 646. House Bill 1219 allows the court, at an annual foster care review of a child who is eligible, to initiate the restoration of a parent’s rights if the child so wishes and if restoration is deemed appropriate after an investigation of the parents’ circumstances. Further, House Bills 1333 and 106 and Senate Bills 44 and 646, collectively, provide for the creation of the Kinship Guardian Assistance Program, which provides support to relatives of a child who take that child into their care and custody from foster care, after a determination that their biological parent is not fit to care for the child. These bills allow children to either return to their parents or to remain with extended family, creating the permanency and stability they so desperately need

Family Time: A Selection of Bills from the Virginia 2023 Legislative Session Relating to Family, Intimate Partner Violence, and Child Welfare

In 2023, the Commonwealth of Virginia was forced to operate without a finalized state budget following the adjournment of the regular session of its legislative body. The Commonwealth waited (luckily without bated breath) for its “caboose” budget for the 2023–2024 budget cycle for nearly six months after the General Assembly adjourned sine die, which it did on its normal date for a “short” (odd-numbered) year on February 25, 2023. However, most other actions taken by the Virginia General Assembly during its 2023 session did go into effect on July 1, 2023, as usual. These include a number of bills that primarily impact the family-related matters heard in Virginia’s juvenile and domestic relations (“JDR”) district courts, as well as circuit courts with jurisdiction over divorces, concurrent jurisdiction over some family law matters, and appeals from the JDR courts. Most of these bills were without controversy. The legislature amended a few that were more contentious in order to be acceptable to both sides of the aisle and these passed, often unanimously

Unallot a Lot: Virginia\u27s Human Services Budgeting in the Time of Coronavirus

Virginia’s 2020 General Assembly budgeting process for fiscal year (“FY”) 2021-2022 was upended by the global pandemic which, after a rosy economic forecast for the Commonwealth, sent revenue expectations tumbling, and necessitated a nearly complete rewrite of the budget immediately upon its enactment by the legislature. Social services, an important aspect in the economic health of the Commonwealth, seemed poised to have greater support from the new Democratic majority in both houses of the state legislature as well as the governor’s mansion. But this may or may not have been true, even before the impact of COVID-19