February 15, 2007	Thursday	Muharram 26, 1428

LONDON, Feb 14: The United Nations children's fund damned Britain and the United States as the worst places for children to live among wealthy nations, in a report which caused widespread soul-searching on Wednesday.

The Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Finland topped the 21 industrial powers assessed for the child well-being report.

Britain's youngsters had the worst relationships with their family and peers, suffered more from poverty and indulged in more “binge drinking” and hazardous sex than children in other wealthy nations, said the report.

The United States placed 20 and Britain 21 on the list.

Stung by the ranking, which featured on the front page of newspapers, the British government said much of the data used by Unicef was outdated and did not take recent successes into account.“We are working hard to improve all children’s life chances,” a government spokesman said.

But a children's policy watchdog warned of “a crisis at the heart of our society.” Professor Sir Albert Aynsley-Green, Children's Commissioner for England, whose office was set up in 2004, said the British “must not continue to ignore the impact of our attitudes towards children...”Bob Reitemeier, chief executive of The Children's Society, said that “despite being a rich country, the UK is failing children and young people in a number of crucial ways.” Britain came last in two of the main six areas studied by Unicef: relationships, especially with their peers; and risky behaviour such as sex, drink and drugs.The United States ranked second to last in both categories.

Britain ranked 20 for children's own assessment of their happiness, finished at 18 for poverty and inequality, landed at 17 for education over the long-term and scored 12th for health and safety.

The United States ranked 17 for material well-being, 12 for educational well-being, and 21 for health and safety. American youngster's assessment of their well-being was not rated.

More broadly, Britain joined the United States and Sweden in having the highest proportion of children living in single-parent families, while Italy, Greece and Spain had the lowest.

Unicef said child poverty -- defined as the percentage of children living in homes with equivalent incomes below 50 per cent of the national median -- remains above the 15 per cent mark in Britain, the United States and Ireland, as well as Spain, Portugal and Italy.

Almost a third of British youngsters aged 11, 13 and 15 reported being drunk on two or more occasions, against just an average of under 15 per cent in the majority of OECD countries.

Britain did make progress however in the field of child safety, having cut the incidence of deaths from accidents and injuries to the “remarkably low level” of fewer than 10 per 10,000.

Sweden, the Netherlands and Italy also achieved the same rate of progress.

Britain's opposition Conservative party accused Gordon Brown, the finance minister who is expected to succeed Tony Blair as prime minister this year, of “failing” a generation of children.

The British government spokeswoman hit back at the charges, saying improving children's well-being is a “real priority.”—AFP