On Monday, a conference entitled For a Better Future of Children was held at the National Assembly. The participants were addressed by the Prime Minister, Robert Golob, while preceding him, the President of the National Assembly, Urška Klakočar Zupančič, who had given the initiative for the conference, delivered the opening address. A number of events, consultations, workshops and circus performances organised by the Slovenian Association of Friends of Youth will take place throughout the week as part of the main topic entitled "Together we have a good time".

At Monday’s conference in the National Assembly, representatives of non-governmental organisations pointed out that children with special needs and children living in poverty and violence are often ignored or lost in the system, and they also presented proposals for solutions to improve the situation of such children and their parents. According to Prime Minister Robert Glob, the state or society can also help children with special needs by helping their parents, who face various difficulties in caring for their children. In Mr Golob’s opinion, finding solutions to improve the situation of children with special needs and their parents does not require a large amount of money but a lot of understanding, which is the task of society as a whole.

"Children with special needs have special rights and expectations, and once we internalise this and once our understanding of these children begins to change, the whole society will benefit from it. A child with special needs can be born into anyone's family. No one expects it, but such things do happen. Once we internalise that these children are therefore the children of the whole society and that their parents enrich the whole society, we will be able to take a step forward," said Mr Golob.

At Monday’s conference, held under the same title as the topic of the week, the Slovenian Association of Friends of Youth pointed out that children’s mental health deteriorated during the COVID-19 epidemic, and due to the measures taken to fight the epidemic children were educated at home, and consequently socializing and interactions, which are necessary for their social and psychological development, were lacking. The participants highlighted the importance of mutual relations, friendship, cooperation and confidence from various points of view.