(Jamma) To combat child-adolescent poverty and early school leaving by recovering the necessary resources also through the increase in taxes on gambling, and in particular on online betting. Some honorable members of the 5 Star Movement asked for it in a motion presented yesterday in the Senate, including Blundo (in the picture), Catalfo, Paglini, Puglia, Bencini, Marton, Simeoni, Donno, Cioffi, Endrizzi, Scibona, Molinari, Orellana, Casaletto, Buccarella, Bertorotta, Gaetti, Bocchino, Nugnes, Bottici, Airola, Serra, Fattori, Moronese, Battista, Vacciano, Cotti, Morra, Crimi, Montevecchi, Lezzi, Castaldi and Tavern.
Below is the full text of the agenda.
the senate,
given that:
according to the data of the report drawn up in 2012 by the international organization "Save the children" (entitled "Atlante dell'Infanzia") and the second annual report of the National Guarantor of childhood and adolescence (presented in parliament on 10 June 2013 ), the condition of minors and adolescents in Italy is characterized by many critical issues, in every area of life;
in our country more than 7 children and/or adolescents out of 100 live in conditions of absolute poverty. There are a total of 720.000 minors who are prevented from accessing a minimally acceptable standard of living: an army located largely in the southern regions and significantly growing in 2011, compared to the previous year, with an increase in the order of 75.000 new little big poor;
the latest Istat survey on Italian household consumption confirms that poverty in our country mainly affects families with minors, to a greater extent than in the vast majority of European countries. More precisely, the national average incidence of families in relative poverty rises from 11,1 to 16,2 per cent when there are children in the family, while absolute poverty rises from 5,2 per cent to 6,6 per cent. In other words, poverty hits the very root of the country's development system: for an increasing number of families, having children is now synonymous with poverty, a real gamble. This condition is also confirmed in a study on household balance sheets, referring to the period 2006-2010, conducted by the Bank of Italy;
the crisis strongly affects educational and growth opportunities. In this regard, Unicef, examining the living conditions of children in the 29 so-called "advanced economy" countries, places Italy in 22nd place. In particular, Italy ranks 25th for education, 22nd for participation in forms of higher education and 24th for school results achieved. On the other hand, our country is positioned in the unenviable second place for the total number of children who do not study;
Italy has the highest levels of school interruption in Europe. The data in this sense differ greatly according to the Italian regions, but the "black shirt" goes to the regions of Southern Italy, where the crisis that began in 2008 has considerably worsened an already highly critical picture: in Sicily the percentage of students who school leaving before graduation is 26 percent, followed by Sardinia with 23,9 school dropouts and Puglia with 23,4 percent;
whereas:
in Italy in recent years there has been a constant reduction in funding for families, childhood and maternity; the national fund for social policies went from one billion euros in 2007 to 45 million in 2013. In addition, funds for educational and school services were drastically reduced and the budgets of local authorities were impoverished, making many inclusive welfare networks unsustainable , even in realities where there is a strong cultural tradition of social and community support;
the ever-increasing poverty of families affects their concrete possibilities of providing minors with the medical care and preventive health care they need;
On 20 February 2013, the European Commission issued the recommendation "Investing in children: breaking the vicious cycle of disadvantage", urging Member States to put children at the center of their agenda and to plan investments aimed at combating child poverty . In the same recommendation, the Commission also recalls that "the reduction of poverty and social exclusion" is one of the objectives of the Europe 2020 strategy, to which all Member States must necessarily contribute;
an even more dramatic figure is the estrangement of minors from their own family nucleus due to the state of poverty of the families of origin, an estrangement which in many cases goes as far as the loss of parental capacity. In Italy the phenomenon has reached numbers that require serious reflection: more than 32.000 children are locked up in communities or placed in foster care, in some cases with justified reasons, in others on the basis of reasons that are vague and inconsistent to say the least. An enormous number, which costs the State half a billion euros a year in daily fees alone. A system that in recent months has been questioned by some associations, books and publications that even tell of "children stolen by justice", of too interventionist social workers, of inattentive psychologists, of an impassive and cold judiciary in issuing these provisions with strong economic interests,
commits the Government:
1) to develop a serious, concrete and effective plan to combat child-adolescent poverty and early school leaving, finding the necessary resources and considering the allocation of the same not as an expense that generates debt but as an investment in human capital aimed at social progress and economy of the country;
2) to monitor the exact number of family homes present throughout the national territory, in order to trace their national mapping;
3) to envisage and activate more effective control and surveillance mechanisms on the activities carried out by the communities or family homes, in order to test the effective necessity, validity and usefulness of the foster care projects envisaged for each minor;
4) to proceed with a reform of social services in order to make their intervention more selective and effective and mostly calibrated to the needs of the minor;
5) to urgently identify regulatory provisions aimed at clarifying that the conditions of poverty of the parents or of the parent exercising parental authority cannot be an obstacle to the exercise of the minor's right to his own family;
6) to take initiatives to introduce the citizen's income, preparing a plan that identifies the audience of eligible families, considering the number of citizens living below the poverty line as an indicator;
7) to find the necessary resources also through the fight against tax evasion and the increase of taxes on gambling, and in particular on online betting;
8) to implement specific social and employment policies for the unemployed and unemployed between the ages of 30 and 54 in general, and for inactive women in particular, as categories at the highest risk of poverty and social exclusion.
