What are my rights?

Everyone has rights no matter their age. But children need extra protection because they are young. For example, children have the right to go to school and to be protected from dangerous work. 

Who is a child?

A child is any person under the age of 18.

What are rights?

Rights represent things that every child in the world, including you, should be able to do or to have.

For example, all children should be able to go to school, all children should be able to visit a doctor when they are sick, and all children should be treated well and not with violence.

Five rights you should know!

  • You have the right to live and grow up healthily.
  • All children should be treated the same way no matter who they are and what their parents do. Some children, however, might need some extra support: children who are poor, for example, might need help to buy school books.
  • When adults make decisions about you, they should decide what is in your best interest.
  • You have the right to be heard in decisions that affect you and adults must take your views seriously.
  • You have the right to be protected from violence and harm.

What does it mean?

  • Violence: There are many forms of violence:
    • physical violence such as beatings, slapping, pushing, etc.
    • mental or psychological violence such as insults, neglect, threats, name-calling, bullying, etc
    • sexual violence: any unwanted form of sexual behaviour
  • What does best interest of the child mean?  When adults make decisions about you, they should think if this decision is best for you. When parents are divorcing, for example, the decision where and who the child should live with, should be taken thinking about what is best for the child, not what is best for the mother or the father.
  • What is the right to be heard?  It is about people listening to you. Your opinion must be taken into account. The decision taken by adults may, however, be different from what you want. When this happens, they should explain to you why they decided otherwise.
  • What is protection? Protection helps you to feel unafraid of being harmed by someone or something. Children should be protected from harm. For this reason, they should ask for help from those people who know what to do to protect them such as teachers, a mother or a father or a person they trust.

Drawings used on this web page have been kindly designed for FRA by Elton Chen.