A/HRC/28/33 such as children’s clubs – can be a useful way to involve children in budgeting processes and support State institutions in planning and exercising their own budgetary monitoring functions. 1. Transparency and participation 45. Transparency at all stages of the budget cycle, including budget allocation and spending, both internally and externally, is crucial to effective accountability. As the Committee on the Rights of the Child emphasized during its day of general discussion in 2007, internal transparency requires that information on revenues and expenditures be available to all governmental bodies conducting impact assessments on how major spending decisions are likely to affect children’s rights. External transparency obliges the Government to ensure that the budget is open and available to all stakeholders, including civil society. All public resources (including contingency funds and earmarked resources) and spending should be taken into account, including at all levels of government, so that a broad overview of all available resources and use of funds for children can be achieved. 46. Budget documents should be available and accessible to the public in a timely manner. A child-friendly citizen’s budget should be produced, with information sufficiently disaggregated to enable children and other stakeholders to identify and track budget line items intended to benefit children. States should act proactively to help children to understand the budget and its implications for them. Information on budget allocations and choices should be made available in a comprehensible, easy-to-understand and childfriendly manner, but also be linked to more detailed explanations to provide a simple access point for those who want to know more. 31 47. Not only is transparency vital for accountability; it also enables and enhances participation. Without access to information, it is difficult for citizens to hold Governments to account, and to participate in policy and budgetary processes. It is the responsibility of Governments to create a supportive and enabling environment for the participation of all citizens, including children, in accordance with article 12 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. To ensure the existence of a supportive environment, States must guarantee children’s civil rights and freedoms, including the rights to freedom of expression, association and peaceful assembly, and ensure that the development of their citizenship skills are guaranteed in practice, including through civic education and financial literacy programmes. States should facilitate consultation with children, including those from vulnerable groups, at every stage of the budgeting process. This is in line with States’ human right obligations, and creates the opportunity for feedback to learn and progressively improve the design and implementation of the budget. 48. Governments should develop a direct relationship with children that goes beyond the active advocacy role that civil society and human rights institutions play for and on behalf of children.32 Consultations between children and executive bodies should be conducted at the time of budget formulation; with parliamentarians, to empower them in their oversight role of budgeting processes; and through the implementation stage, as a complement to other internal and external accountability processes. 2. Child rights impact assessments and evaluations 49. In addition to strengthening their public finance management systems and ensuring accountability for public resources, States must create mechanisms for systematic 31 32 12 Vivek Ramkumar and Isaac Shapiro, Guide to Transparency in Government Budget Reports (Washington DC, International Budget Partnership), p. 19. CRC/GC/2003/5, para. 12.