Norwegian Child Welfare Services

The Child Welfare Service of Norway (Norwegian: Barnevernet) established by the Child Welfare Act of 1992 was created "to ensure that children and young people who live in conditions that can harm their health and development are given the necessary help and care at the right time" and "to help children and young people have a safe childhood"

The underlying principle governing all child welfare efforts is devotion to the child's best interests. As a general rule, it is assumed that children will grow up with their biological parents. This biological criterion forms the foundation for Norwegian legislation regulating the relationship between children and parents. A child's affiliation with its parents is considered to be a resource in and of itself.

The Child Welfare Service works to ensure that families have the best possible conditions for taking care of their children. Activities are preventative. Efforts are aimed at ensuring that children and young people are not excluded from community life within their neighborhood environments.

In April 2015, the Lithuanian television reported that Norway removes children from foreign families in order to combat the consequences of "a history of incest". However, it later emerged that these claims were false and in discrepancy with available statistical data depicting the rates of occurrence of incest-related symptomes in various countries.

Support and assistance

The Child Welfare Service is responsible for implementing measures for children and their families in situations where there are special needs in relation to the home environment. Assistance may be provided as counseling, advisory services, and aid measures, including external support contacts, relief measures in the home, and access to day care.

Children are entitled to participate in decisions involving their personal welfare, and have the right to state their views in accordance with their age and level of maturity. This applies especially in cases where there are administrative and legal proceedings that will strongly affect the children's day-to-day lives.

Duties

The child welfare services are required to take action if measures implemented in the home environment are not sufficient to safeguard the child's needs. In such cases, the Child Welfare Service in consultation with the parents may place children under foster care, in a child welfare institution, or introduce specific parent-child measures. Removing a child from the home without parental consent requires a decision from the County Committee for Social Affairs on the basis of a recommendation submitted by the municipal authorities. The county committee is a government body with an autonomous position in relation to the ministry and the Office of the County Governor. Decisions taken by the county committee may only be overturned by the courts. The county committees are administered under the auspices of the Ministry of Children and Equality.

The municipal child welfare services are charged with monitoring the development of children who have been placed in care outside their homes as well as their parents.

Child welfare service employees are privy to a large amount of personal client information, and must comply with strict rules of confidentiality. However, information may be provided to other administrative agencies when this is necessary to carrying out child welfare service tasks.

The responsibilities and tasks of the child welfare authorities are stipulated in the Act relating to child welfare services. The overall responsibility for child welfare lies with the state through the Ministry of Children and Equality, while the administration of child welfare services is primarily carried out at the municipal level and through the Norwegian Directorate for Children, Youth and Family Affairs.

Criticism, and diplomatic incidents

Ca 4000 former children in care have sought compensation for the suffering and abuse while living in orphanages or child protection between 1945 and 1980. 2637 of them have received compensation, in total 220 million dollars (2010).

Bhattacharya children

The Service has been severely criticized by the Government of India for taking away two children of an Indian couple who were working in Norway. Berit Aarset, who heads Human Rights Alert, Norway, has called the incident "state kidnapping." She said, "This is not the first time such a thing is happening in Norway ...the legal system favours the Child Welfare Services and they do what they want all the time....quite often when a Norwegian is married to a non-Norwegian they also do the same thing; they also do this to asylum seekers and in almost every case they say one of the parents have a mental problem just to make their case strong ...that is what has happened in the Bhattacharya case too." The case of the Bhattacharya children, involved Norway's foreign minister (Jonas Gahr Støre) meeting with a special envoy from India in 2012.

Rutkowski kidnappings

In two widely publicized cases, the Polish private investigator Krzysztof Rutkowski has helped children (a Russian-born boy and a Polish girl) escape Norwegian foster care and reunite with their parents. Later Norwegian authorities claim for return of the kids has been declined by Polish court as unjustified.

Michalák case

In May 2011, the two sons of Eva Michaláková and husband who originate from the Czech republic were removed by the Child Welfare Services due to suspicion of child sexual abuse by the father; allegations denied by the couple. Michaláková has since divorced her husband and continues to reside in Norway.

Michaláková continues to pursue custody of her children through various channels, including the European Court of Human Rights where her complaint was rejected without prejudice for non-exhaustion of domestic remedies. The case has been discussed by Miloš Zeman president of the Czech republic, in the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic, and the foreign minister Lubomír Zaorálek has sent a diplomatic note to Oslo regarding the matter. On January 20, 2015 the Norwegian Embassy in Prague published press release explaining the Norwegian official diplomatic position on the Michalák case. Several other politicians also get involved in effort to get the children of Eva Michaláková back to their mother. The first Czech politican to do so was deputy Jitka Chalánková (TOP 09). Since November 2014 also two Czech MEPs Tomáš Zdechovský and Petr Mach have got involved in this case. Norway is currently not a party to the 1996 Hague Convention on Parental Responsibility and Protection of Children, however the government is in the process of its ratification.

Maxine case

In late March and April 2015 Barnevernet took away 2.5 months old Maxine girl whose mother is deaf Norwegian and father is Slovak. As the main reason given was "lack of eye contact between girl and her parents."