“Portugal cannot feed a single child”
“PPortugal cannot feed a single child. As a society, we have this collective commitment. The Guarantee for Childhood is a way for us to achieve, with concrete actions, the transformation of lives and personalized follow-up on the part of society as well”said Ana Mendes Godinho, on the sidelines of the signature of the protocol of constitution of the local Nucleus of the Guarantee for the Childhood of Leiria.
The Minister of Labour, Solidarity and Social Security highlighted that Portugal is the “only country in Europe to create a model for implementing the Child Guarantee, which considered the existence of centers at local level”.
“Here, with full community involvement, we want to ensure that all children in Portugal have a society committed to themin order to ensure that they have conditions for their development”, he added.
As explained, this program is committed to ensuring that “all children have access to housing, food, education and day care, and, of course, to health”.
“The so-called basic services, essential for anyone to develop and be able to develop all their skills and competences”, he said, noting that “positive discrimination” is important, so that everyone can have the same opportunities.
That is why, underlined the minister, the free day care centers were created. “It’s turning who is in transparency into advantage, through public policy measures,” she said.
“Create control so that children, regardless of their parents’ socioeconomic conditions or where they are, have access to a free day care center, which includes everyone, rich and poor, to guarantee that integration takes place”, he guaranteed.
Ana Mendes Godinho considered that breaking the cycle of poverty will be “a win for everyone”. “This is our commitment, a strong focus on investing in children. It is the best applied investment that we can make at the level of our society”, he added.
“We cannot lose even one child in Portugal. It is really critical for all of us to bet on the children and young people who are in Portugal”, insisted the minister.
The minister also explained that this program emerged when Portugal was at the helm of the presidency of the European Union and “placed children at the center of the construction of the European project”.
“We launched this concept of creating a movement to create conditions for any child to have access to so-called essential services. It was a recommendation approved in the shortest amount of time in Europe and unanimously”, revealed Ana Mendes Godinho, when stating that Portugal was more beyond, by moving forward with the Child Guarantee.
“The huge difference is to guarantee personalized follow-up”, he advanced, referring that this is a “realized hope” with the objective of reaching all municipalities, after Gaia and Leiria.
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