Ombudswoman finds rights violations at Latgale children’s home

Latvia’s Ombudswoman Karina Palkova has found serious violations of children’s rights at a children’s home in the Latgale region, including inadequate nutrition, insufficient funding for children’s needs and staff failing to communicate sufficiently in the state language, LSM reported.

Palkova disclosed the findings in an interview with Latvian Radio’s Labrīt programme.

In earlier discussions with the Ombudsman’s Office, employees of the social support and care centre acknowledged potential risks and described various difficulties in their daily work, including a lack of funding.

Palkova said cooperation with the municipal child protection authority had been insufficient, and that its knowledge of the children’s living conditions proved inadequate.

The inspection also found that the children’s home staff almost never spoke Latvian, even though Latvian is the children’s native language.

Palkova has not identified the children’s home or the municipality. She was travelling on Tuesday morning to meet the municipality’s leadership.

In a Facebook post, Palkova wrote that the care centre allocates less than 200 euros per child for all needs throughout the year. The money must cover clothing and shoes for all seasons, as well as other everyday necessities.

She said this was the lowest amount allocated in the budgets of out-of-family care institutions inspected by the Ombudsman’s Office.

The institution’s menu showed that breakfast costs approximately 0.55 to 0.69 euros, lunch 1.25 to 1.61 euros, an afternoon snack 1.28 to 1.64 euros, and dinner 0.72 to 1.28 euros.