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STORY: UN / EDUCATION GORDON BROWN
TRT: 02:39
SOURCE: UNIFEED
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 19 APRIL 2017, NEW YORK CITY
FILE - NEW YORK CITY
1. Wide shot, UNHQ exterior
19 APRIL 2017, NEW YORK CITY
2. Wide shot, press room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Gordon Brown, Special Envoy for Global Education, United Nations:
“And if we do not act now, we will not meet the sustainable development goal on education in 2030 or 2050 or even 2100. If we cannot devise a proper system of financing for education that matches and compliments the reforms and modernizations that are necessary to deliver education for children, then millions of children will remain on the streets rather than in schools, then girls in particular will be the majority of those who lose out on education.”
4. Med shot, journalist asking question
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Gordon Brown, Special Envoy for Global Education, United Nations:
“At the moment on $8 per head per year is spent on aid in lower and middle income countries per child. That is not enough to pay for one text book, far less to pay for a teacher or to pay for school buildings or to pay for the necessary elements of a school curriculum. If we do not change that system and reform it then we will be far from our ability to reach these goals.”
6. Med shot, journalist asking question
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Gordon Brown, Special Envoy for Global Education, United Nations:
“Now it’s time to end the neglect of education, and so we are proposing an international finance facility for education where countries who are donor countries would give guarantees. On the basis of that development banks would borrow money for education purposes. We would then encourage countries to buy down the loans that were available into credits or into grants to enable countries that are lower and middle income countries at the moment, who can only borrow money at three or four percent, to pay for education at terms they can afford.”
8. Med shot, journalist asking question
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Gordon Brown, Special Envoy for Global Education, United Nations:
“Our goal is nothing less than to be the first generation in history where every single child has a chance to go to school, and we believe that the proposals that we are putting forward, first of all to protect children and particularly girls, and secondly to finance education, are two of the most important changes that can be made and need to be made now.”
10. Med shot, journalist asking question
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Gordon Brown, Special Envoy for Global Education, United Nations:
“I respect the great work that has been done by the special representatives of children in armed conflict, but it is time to look at whether the law is good enough to protect the rights of children in particular of course I’m concerned about the rights of children free of child marriage, free of child labour, free of child exploitation, to be in schools and not to be forced into these exploitative conditions. We want opportunity and not oppression for children.”
12. Wide shot, press room
UN Special Envoy for education Gordon Brown said now is the time to “end the neglect of education” by creating an international finance facility which would make it possible for lower and middle income countries “to pay for education at terms they can afford.”
Speaking to reporters in New York today (19 Apr), Brown said the proposed facility would ask donor countries to voluntarily act as guarantors and require developing countries to increase investment in education as a percentage of national income from four percent to an average of 5.8 percent. He said countries would then be encouraged to “buy down the loans that were available into credits or into grants to enable countries that are lower and middle income countries at the moment, who can only borrow money at three or four percent, to pay for education at terms they can afford.”
Brown noted that the proposal for the finance facility was put forth by the International Commission on Financing Global Education Opportunity and was on the table this week during the World Bank annual meeting in Washington. He said the goal of the Commission was “nothing less than to be the first generation in history where every single child has a chance to go to school” adding that the proposals being put forward to protect children and to finance education were “two of the most important changes that can be made and need to be made now.”
On the protection of children, Brown said Save the Children and Theirworld would announce a new inquiry on protecting children in conflict this week. One of the proposals would be for the creation of a special international court dealing exclusively with violations of children’s rights. He said the court would cover more violations of children’s rights than the International Criminal Court (ICC), as countries that are accused of perpetrating these crimes were not members of the ICC, and the only way around this would be through a Security Council agreement to refer the cases to the Court. He said the proposed court would have more public support in different countries for recognition, however he stressed that many answers lay in improved domestic laws to protect children even in countries experiencing conflicts.
