ABSTRACT
This is but one example of legislation which creates a framework for the civil rights of children (see101 for a wider discussion). The aim is to bring together private law, which is concerned with disputes between individuals, and public law, which requires or enables the state to be responsible for the care and protection of children, to identify the rights of children in law, to encourage greater partnership between statutory authorities and parents, and to balance on the one hand the duties of adults to protect children and, on the other, parents’ ability when need be to challenge state intervention in the upbringing of their children.
