Toespraak minister Donner bij het slot van het Global Child Labour Conference in Den Haag op 11 mei 2010
Majesty, Your Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,
So we have come to the end of two days of conference. Much has been said. Every president has the urge to deliver a final rousing speech that will stimulate and sustain the audience in the time ahead. But I think everything has been said much more eloquently by the different speakers in the last two days; by people that are directly involved in combating child labour. Moreover we have a roadmap now that says it much more thoroughly.
We have all worked on this document in which we detail the steps and strategies to achieve our firm commitment to eliminate the worst forms of child labour by 2016. I am very gratified that we have been able to adopt the roadmap. It is a further commitment to achieve our goal. I will present this document to the International Labour Conference next June in Geneva and to the Review Conference on the implementation of the UN Millennium Development Goals next September in New York. I count on your support.
It is a substantial step in the right direction. I hope that it will also be a symbolic step into a 21th century in which we are taking leave of previous centuries in which child labour was allowed to exist. Thanks to your efforts during these past two days there is a very great chance that we can look forward to a future in which children will remain free of coercion and repression. In which children will have the opportunity to develop their talents. In which they are free to shape their own future, aided by good schooling and freedom of choice. A world that centres around possibilities and not constraints.
By adopting the roadmap you have given expression on the one hand to justice and on the other to social standards by which the societies are judged. These same standards conflict with the reality, in which the right to education is denied. Forcing children to work is inherently at odds with fundamental labour principles. The roadmap is symbolic of the conviction that child labour must be ended. We are striving and working hard to reach the point where children must be given an opportunity. An opportunity to lead a life in which they can shape their own future thanks to good schooling and good basic provisions. A future which, thanks to hard and fast commitments, is and will remain free of child labour.
I should like to thank you all very cordially for your efforts, contributions and perseverance. When you return home shortly, it will be in the knowledge that you have contributed to the beginning of an end. The end of child labour. A moment that will centre around the most important people of the future: our children.
Thank you