Prime minister appoints committee to examine children’s placements

Prime Minister Kristrún Frostadóttir has appointed a committee to investigate the conditions of children placed in private homes at the initiative of state and municipal authorities, mbl.is reports.

District Court judge Sigríður Hjaltested will chair the committee. The other members are social worker Arna Ír Gunnarsdóttir and psychiatrist Sigurður Örn Hektorsson.

The appointment is based on legislation passed by Alþingi, Iceland’s parliament, in June. The investigation will cover the period from 27 March 1947 to 1 June 2002, although the committee may examine more recent cases in certain circumstances, according to a government announcement.

The committee is expected to work for at least three years and submit a written report with reasoned conclusions to the minister.

Members bring varied experience

Sigríður is a lawyer and has served as a district court judge at Reykjavík District Court since 2013. Her judicial work has covered a wide range of cases, including child protection matters, although she has mainly worked on criminal cases.

She previously worked for the Prison and Probation Administration, as a judge’s assistant at Reykjavík District Court and as an assistant prosecutor in the sexual offences department of the Capital Region Police. She has also worked temporarily at the Ministry of Justice’s legal affairs office and taught part-time at the University of Iceland and Reykjavík University.

Alongside her judicial work, Sigríður has studied alternatives to criminal sentencing in Iceland and abroad, with an emphasis on preventive measures and young people, according to the announcement.

Arna Ír is a social worker who has worked since 1996 on a range of welfare-service projects for the state and municipalities. Her previous roles include social worker in Oslo, division manager at the Regional Office for Disabled People and senior social worker in a joint welfare service operated by seven municipalities. She is currently a project manager for the Prosperity Council of South Iceland.

Her experience includes general social counselling, support for disabled children and their families, work with children facing complex difficulties, child protection, counselling for people with psychiatric disabilities and welfare-policy development. She also served for 16 years on the municipal council of Árborg and has sat on numerous administrative committees.

Sigurður Örn completed his medical studies in 1980. He is a specialist in family medicine, psychiatry and addiction medicine and has held senior medical positions in the addiction psychiatry department at Landspítali hospital, a prison mental-health team and the Directorate of Health.

His areas of expertise also include psychiatric individual and group therapy, with a focus on the relationship between mental and physical health. He has extensive experience working with courts, police, prison authorities and other public institutions as an assessor, lay judge and consulting expert.

Three-part investigation

The investigation has three objectives under the legislation. It will describe the system governing the placement of children in private homes and the official supervision of those placements during the relevant period.

Where a particular home is examined, the committee will seek to establish, as far as possible, whether children lived in conditions or experienced treatment that did not comply with the rules, standards or general requirements for children’s welfare in force at the time.

It will also examine whether there were shortcomings in the arrangements for placements and in the issuing of permits.