Children of a Lesser God

The situation for disadvantaged children can become much more difficult during a recession, prompting calls for increased attention to their needs. (Photo by Huang Chung-hsin)

Publication Date：06/01/2009
Byline：OSCAR CHUNG

The social safety net for disadvantaged children is being spread wider as the economy worsens.

Housed in a seven-story building, the classroom attached to the chapel of Guo Kuang Taiwan Christianity Friends Church in Banqiao, Taipei County is already full of 20-odd grade school pupils by 5 p.m. These children, mostly busy doing homework with the assistance of several adults, do not seem so different from their peers--until one learns about their family backgrounds. "They are all from poor families. Most are from broken homes and perform poorly in school," says Tai Kun-yi, pastor of the Banqiao chapel and the person in charge of these students after school.

Such a child is "Xiao Tze," the nickname of a sixth grader from a neighboring elementary school. "In the past I often cried when I did math questions because they were too difficult for me, but not now," says the long-haired girl. Although she appears carefree on the outside, the child rarely makes eye contact with strangers talking to her. "And the dinner is better than what my aunt prepares for me," she says.

Like all the other children, Xiao Tze has free dinners at the chapel before going home at about 7 p.m. Her mother, from Indonesia, married the girl's deaf-mute Taiwanese father years ago, but walked out on the family and returned to her homeland for good when Xiao Tze was only five. The girl's father is now living in central Taiwan, leaving his daughter in the care of his brother and sister-in-law in Taipei out of the belief that they are better able to care for the child.

The Banqiao chapel started to offer help to these children about three years ago, at first using church donations, but began to receive financial support from the Ministry of Education (MOE) in the spring of this year under a project called "Nighttime Angels." Pastor Tai, who had been worried about how to sustain his program financially, therefore feels greatly encouraged about the prospects of continuing to offer the after-school classes and go on helping disadvantaged children, at least for the time being. "Plus, we can give better dinners to these children now," he says gratefully.

The MOE launched the Nighttime Angels project last September, with the aim of taking care of Xiao Tze and other children in her situation. Those from poor or dysfunctional families that are failing to offer proper support and care are placed with selected grade schools or private charity organizations, typically religious groups, in the evenings in order to receive tutoring and after-school care. "Most of these children are unwilling to go home after school because no one is at home. They need 'angels' shining a light for them at night," says Yang Li-hua, an advisor who supervises the project for the Taipei County Government, explaining the name of the program.

The MOE has earmarked NT$120 million (US$3.5 million) for the project this year to help 7,631 children around Taiwan. The government initiative has already gained support from seven private foundations. "Take action to guide these children and Taiwan will need fewer prisons," says Chen Kuo-shi, chairman of the board of Chinatrust Charity Foundation. Sponsorship from the foundation accounts for two-thirds of the NT$48 million (US$1.4 million) received from the private sector for the Nighttime Angels program. Thanks to the financial support from the non-governmental sector, the project is expected to reach an additional 1,600 pupils this year, perhaps preventing them, as Chen suggests, from becoming school dropouts or even criminals.

Focus On Children

Tai, who has shifted the focus of his charity work from homeless adults to disadvantaged children in recent years, echoes Chen's observation. "We changed direction because we found it's more important to offer assistance to the young," he says. "They're not far from the fate of living on the streets if we don't care about them now."

The MOE project certainly has come at an important time in view of the current global economic downturn, which has highlighted the need to support children from families experiencing financial difficulties.

Seen as being at particular risk are children from low to lower-middle income families, categories that are based on comparing income to the minimum cost of living. The minimum cost of living varies in different parts of Taiwan, but currently the highest cost is in Taipei at NT$14,558 (US$428) per person per month.

A low-income family is one in which the total household income is less than the minimum cost of living per number of family members. In Taipei, a lower-middle income family is determined as having an income of 1.3 times the minimum cost of living per family member, although in other parts of Taiwan this factor can be up to 1.5 times the minimum. Bank deposits, stock investments and real estate are also taken into consideration when the government evaluates a family's financial status. According to these standards, some 210,000 Taiwanese live in low-income families, less than one percent of Taiwan's population of 23 million.

Taiwanese children adopted by Dutch parents more than 10 years earlier pay a visit to their place of birth in 2005. Taiwanese can be quite particular when adopting a child and tend to keep the adoption a secret. (Courtesy of Child Welfare League Foundation)

Support for low-income families has long been enshrined in the Public Assistance Act promulgated in 1980 and the scope of related assistance services already has become quite broad. For example, every member of such a family is exempt from paying National Health Insurance premiums as well as eligible for free education in public schools.

Now, attention is turning to lower-middle income families as well, with the government taking measures to help underprivileged children from families of both income groups. One such move was lifting the age limit for exemption from paying National Health Insurance premiums from age 3 to age 18 for children from lower-middle income families, an expansion that came into effect on January 1 this year. The policy is expected to benefit an additional 110,000 children and adolescents, or some 2 percent of the approximately 5 million Taiwanese minors under the age of 18.

Year by year the MOE has also been loosening the restrictions on free lunches prepared by public grade schools and junior high schools for students from first grade to ninth grade. Currently, the MOE subsidizes these meals not only for students from low and lower-middle income families, but for any student whose teacher thinks is unable to afford the meals.

In the current semester, which started in February this year, 240,000 students are receiving subsidized school lunches, up from 170,000 in the previous semester. This means nearly one in 10 of Taiwan's 2.6 million students in the 7-15 age group might have attended class in the afternoon on an empty stomach but for the subsidy policy. The MOE is considering providing free meals to all students in public grade schools and junior high schools, with eight local governments already doing so.

Kun Yun-jun, a nutritionist with the Miaoli County Government, is responsible for preparing lunch menus for children in local public schools from the first to ninth grades. Kun says that the policy has been welcomed by the vast majority of parents, which she attributes to the current economic downturn. She notes, however, that there has been criticism from some parents, who argue that the budget for this policy might take away from that required for other necessities, such as repairing school facilities. On the other hand, some parents, who have children in a public kindergarten or senior high school, complain that the policy should also be made available to them.

Tackling Abuse

Children from poor families deserve special care also because they represent a relatively high percentage of child abuse victims, says Chen Kun-huang, chief secretary of the Child Welfare Bureau (CWB) under the Ministry of the Interior. The official notes that 57 percent of cases of violence against children occur in families experiencing economic problems. It is thought likely that the number of children at risk will increase as the unemployment rate continues to grow. Figures from the CWB show that 13,703 cases of child abuse were reported islandwide last year, up from 6,059 in 2000. The sharp increase is quite alarming, although it is believed to be due at least partly to society's growing consciousness of child welfare and thus better reporting. A hotline was established by the central government in 1995 to report cases of child abuse and later all forms of family violence. It was given the easy-to-remember number "113" in 2001.

In response to the growing reports of child abuse and even child murders at the hands of suicidal parents, since 2006 the CWB has tried to identify "high-risk families" that are considered likely to do harm to their children. Such families include those with members who are drug addicts, suicidal or who have been laid off, with the bureau using channels like the 113 hotline in its work.

The CWB also provides an emergency subsidy of NT$3,000 (US$88) per child per month for up to one year to families with financial problems. "But are you sure the money remitted to the parents won't be squandered or wrongly used?" asks Harold Li, chief coordinator of the Office of Research and Development for the non-governmental Child Welfare League Foundation (CWLF). Li says the government should pay home visits to these families, just as the foundation has been doing, to make sure the money is used for the children's welfare. "This way you can win the trust of the families, too. Next time they face difficulties, they will think of you first instead of taking some kind of desperate action," he adds.

The CWB recognizes the importance of such face-to-face counseling for family members when offering help to children. Therefore, it partially subsidizes the salaries of an additional 320 social workers it recruited last year, who now work for local governments around Taiwan. In addition to assessing the situation of high-risk families, they play the role of referring parents to assistance organizations such as employment centers.

Premier Liu Chao-shiuan attends a party for disadvantaged children at the Taipei Zoo at the end of March. (Photo by Huang Chung-hsin)

Range of Options

If child abuse actually occurs within a family, social workers have several options including resettling a child. First, they usually try to communicate with the parents and keep children within their biological families. If the situation turns out to be really bad, however, they can turn to other options such as removing the children to the care of foster families.

Harold Li is afraid that, if the economic situation continues to worsen, another issue will become more serious: abandoned children. According to Li, Taiwan saw an annual average of approximately 500 abandoned children and adolescents in the past six years. At the start of this year, the CWLF was receiving around one call per day from parents willing to give up their children and asking for information about their adoption. Li says that since the Lunar New Year celebrations at the end of January, the foundation has been receiving around two such calls per day. Preserving the welfare of abandoned children has been one of the organization's major jobs since 1992, and involves screening prospective adoptive parents as well as checking on the child after the adoption.

For Li, however, the attitude of many Taiwanese towards adoption is problematic. "Usually adoption is a secret in our society," he says. This explains why the chance for a child to be adopted over the age of 3 is quite slim because it is easier for older children to realize that their adoptive parents are not their biological parents. In addition, the adopted child has to be completely healthy and look acceptable. Some couples refuse to adopt children with a dark complexion or whose parents were laborers in Taiwan from Southeast Asia, Li says. In comparison, the CWLF coordinator says, Western people who adopt a child are more likely to ignore age or other factors unwelcomed by Taiwanese. Then again, he also speaks considerately of the latter. "It's already costly to raise a healthy child today, not to mention a physically handicapped one," he says.

For years the CWLF has been trying to educate Taiwanese about adoption and in 2005, the organization coordinated a visit of nine teenagers originally from Taiwan, who had been adopted by Dutch parents more than 10 years earlier. All of the young people had been abandoned as children and most were born with physical impairments. "These children came back to see their place of birth. On the other hand, we wanted Taiwan's society to learn from those foreign parents. They adopt children of different races and are willing to take care of imperfect babies," Li says.

Change in Attitude

A change of attitude is also required when it comes to helping children with developmental disabilities. "Many parents ignore such a problem, since they think sooner or later their child will naturally become normal when they grow up," says Wu Shu-fen, deputy director-general of the International Development Division of Eden Social Welfare Foundation, which has been addressing this issue since 1994, making it one of the first organizations in Taiwan to do so.

Over the years government agencies such as the Department of Health as well as private organizations like Eden have been trying hard to educate the public about the importance of identifying such children and treating them as early as possible. According to the CWB's Chen Kun-huang, the best time for such children to receive treatment is before they turn 3 years of age, with the treatment becoming much less effective after they reach the age of 6. Their parents apparently are getting the message and are becoming more willing to take their children to assessment centers at large general hospitals around Taiwan. If diagnosed as having a developmental disability, their situation is reported to local governments and they can receive counseling and treatment with the assistance of social workers. In 2008, 15,033 new cases of suspected developmental disability were reported, or 6 percent of all children under the age of 6, up from 3.12 percent in 2000. At present a total of nearly 20,000 confirmed cases are now being tracked by social workers.

To encourage parents to seek treatment for their children at medical institutions, the CWB provides a monthly subsidy that can be used only for this purpose of NT$5,000 (US$147) per child to low-income families and US$3,000 (US$88) to other families. The CWB also encourages these children to attend nurseries and daycare centers since, Chen Kun-huang says, they especially need to receive stimuli by interacting with their peers. To motivate the schools to admit these children and take extra care of them, the government started to subsidize placements in 2004. For example, an organization can apply for a subsidy of NT$10,000 (US$294) per child per year to purchase extra equipment or facilities for their education.

Wider Net

Even as the social safety net for disadvantaged children is becoming more and more complete, however, many non-governmental charity groups are losing financial support because of the economic downturn. Compared with last year, corporate donations to Eden are down by 20 percent, for example, while the number of struggling families the organization is trying to help has grown from 6,000 to 8,000 during the same period. "The more severe the recession is, the busier we are helping the children, but at the same time, it is more difficult to raise funds," Harold Li says.

According to the MOE, of around 100,000 disadvantaged children who qualify to receive aid from the Nighttime Angels program, fewer than 10,000 are able to benefit from the initiative due to funding constraints. Some 16,000 are seen as at immediate risk of dropping out of school or becoming delinquents.

The good news is that the government is committed to giving hope to children on the margins of society. There are plans to increase funding to NT$400 million (US$11.76 million) by 2011 for the Nighttime Angels project alone.

At the same time, private charity groups are trying to complement government efforts, such as the CWLF, which started assisting children in remote areas through financial support and educational services in March this year. "The MOE gives financial aid to grade schools in government-designated remote areas. We offer help to children who are not in those areas, but are still quite needy," Li says.

The safety net certainly is still not big enough, but it is spreading. People often say that children are the future of a society. There is also a saying in Chinese that in hard times, children should be spared the worst of the adversity. Bearing this in mind, Taiwan should be able to continue helping the most vulnerable of the younger generations to weather society's hardships.

Write to Oscar Chung at oscar@mail.gio.gov.tw