Cops now better equipped to deal with children – Gordon Harrison

WESTERN BUREAU:

Following last weekend’s child justice guidelines training seminar in Hanover, the Office of the Children’s Advocate believes that police personnel from across the county of Cornwall are now better equipped to treat the needs of the nation’s children who find themselves in conflict with the law.

The attendees, senior police officers from the Counter-Terrorism and Organised Crime Investigation Branch, the Community Safety and Security, along with other police personnel from Area One and Area Three, who were joined by justices of the peace, were labelled as first responders in ensuring the rights of children are protected.

In explaining the stance taken, Children’s Advocate Diahann Gordon Harrison said if the rights of children are going to be protected, police personnel and justices of the peace need to understand and adopt the guidelines.

“This weekend training seminar represents a significant milestone in a journey that has seen the Office of the Children’s Advocate having meaningful and practical discussions with diverse stakeholders in the justice sector,” said Gordon Harrison.

“In my own view, who is better to have the dialogue with than our very own police officers and justices of the peace because we need you as our strategic partners in this process,” said Gordon Harrison.

“It is you who are the first responders at the police stations and in the communities that you serve as JPs, you, therefore, are our eyes, our ears and many times the ones who have the opportunity to shape the view or the perspective of a child who must come in contact with what they called the system,” added Gordon Harrison.

Aware of guidelines

In regard to the justices of peace, the children’s advocate said when they visit children who are held in jail cells, it is important that they are aware of the various guidelines.

“You have a very critical role to play in this particular dispensation because you sometimes do the visits of the cells and see children in difficult circumstances so you need to be fully aware of the guidelines,” noted Gordon Harrison.

“You, therefore, are the architects who will frame that child’s long-lasting impression that can either be a very good thing or a very negative Babylon experience,” noted Gordon Harrison.

She described the child justice guidelines as a resource handbook of measures that first responders should follow when dealing with children, noting that the book is easy to read, and has been packaged and presented to guide the interaction of first responders with children taken into the custody of the police, or those deemed to be in need of care and protection.