Scotland’s National Action Plan for Human Rights wins SASW backing

Laws and policies in Scotland need to be consistently underpinned by human rights, instead of merely acknowledging this agenda as an afterthought. This was the focus of Scotland’s National Action Plan for Human Rights, launched on World Human Rights Day on 10 December.

Backed by SASW, the Scotland National Action Plan (SNAP) outlined a four year programme aimed at placing human rights to the fore. Including a series of outcomes, priorities and a process for working together between 2013 – 2017, the plan was developed by a range of public bodies, third sector voluntary organisations and people who use services.

SASW Manager Trisha Hall said: “SASW welcomes and strongly supports SNAP. BASW’s Code of Ethics states that ‘respect for human rights and a commitment to promoting social justice are at the core of social work practice throughout the world’. SNAP is an invaluable framework to support social workers in Scotland to make those words come alive.”

Writing in Third Force News, Professor Alan Miller, Chair of the Scottish Human Rights Commission, said: “Evidence shows that laws and policies, often designed with the best of intentions, are not consistently delivering good practice in care homes, schools, and hospitals or in our justice system.

"Human Rights can often be an afterthought, applied inconsistently, or are simply perceived as a complicated legal area that organisations feel frightened of tackling. It is time for meaningful change in the way human rights are perceived, understood and applied in Scotland.”