Government urged to provide child-minding support to migrant families

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has urged the government to provide migrant families, with no access to childcare services, with child-minding support.

“This is important so as to prevent the need to resort to abusive and irregular child-minding systems, especially in the case of refugees and other migrants with no family or social network in Malta,” the UNHCR said.

The UNHCR submitted its recommendations to the Ministry for the Family as part of the public consultation on the National Children’s Policy which was launched for consultation in September.

In particular, the UNHCR expressed concern that children were still being detained in the initial reception facility, even if for shorter periods of time.

UNHCR said that such a facility was still a place of detention.

“While UNHCR appreciates that the national reception system for asylum seekers does not fall within the remit of the Family Ministry, it considers that non-detention of children is a key priority for the protection of children in Malta,” it said.

The UNHCR urged the relevant authorities to jointly explore solutions in order to address this issue: “In principle, children should not be detained at all.”

In other proposals, the UNHCR recommended that community-based units or information centres should provide interpretation and translation services for foreign mothers and families, in particular refugees. “In this way, access to pre-natal, post-natal and maternal support can be facilitated.”

It recommended that age appropriate sexual health and identity education be culturally sensitive, whilst sexual education courses or classes be held in open reception centres.

On education, the UNHCR urged the government to consider the introduction of induction or bridging programmes for children who are not familiar with Maltese or English and who have gaps in their formal education.

“While the use of peripatetic teachers is useful in this regard, more needs to be done to reduce the initial gap for asylum-seeking and refugee children entering the Maltese education system,” the UNHCR said.