Consultant to Support the Developing Country-Specific Indicators on Children in Justice... Tender

Procurement Summary

Country : Montenegro

Summary : Consultant to Support the Developing Country-Specific Indicators on Children in Justice Proceedings and Their Integration

Deadline : 27 May 2019

Other Information

Notice Type : Tender

TOT Ref.No.: 32901158

Document Ref. No. :

Competition : ICB

Financier : United Nations Secretariat

Purchaser Ownership : -

Tender Value : Refer Document

Purchaser's Detail

Purchaser : UNITED NATIONS CHILDREN'S FUND
UNICEF Montenegro Stanka Dragojevica bb, UN Eco House 81 000 Podgorica, Telephone: +382-20 447 400 Fax: +382-20 447 471
Montenegro
Email :podgorica@unicef.org
URL :https://www.unicef.org

Tender Details

Montenegro: National Consultant to Support the Ministry of Justice of Montenegro in Developing Country-Specific Indicators on Children in Justice Proceedings and Their Integration into the New Judicial Information System (ISP).


title: National Consultant to support the Ministry of Justice of Montenegro in developing country-specific indicators on children in justice proceedings and their integration into the new judicial information system (ISP)


Background and Context: Montenegro made considerable progress in the reform of the country's judicial system with juvenile justice as an integral component. The comprehensive juvenile justice system reform started in early 2004 with a strong commitment of the Government of Montenegro, under the leadership of the Ministry of Justice and with the UNICEF technical assistance.

One of the important interventions during the juvenile justice reform process was the improvement of the juvenile justice data collection and information system as part of the overall Judicial Information System (PRIS). A uniform methodology for improvement of data collection on monitoring situation of children in conflict with the law, children victims and witnesses of crime was developed based on internationally recognized indicators developed and agreed among the UNODC and UNICEF and integrated into the Judicial Information System (PRIS). The existing Judicial information system (PRIS) is now outdated from both a technical and functional point of view and is not covering the current needs of the judiciary.

The Government of Montenegro (Ministry of Justice) therefore adopted a Strategy on information and communication technology for the judiciary (2016-2020) aimed at establishing a new, customized and user-friendly information system for the judiciary of Montenegro (hereinafter ISP). ISP is conceptually conceived as a unique information system that will cover the needs and key business processes of the Ministry of Justice, courts, state prosecutor’s office, misdemeanour court and the Institute for execution of criminal sanctions.

In line with Montenegro's commitments under international treaties, it will be necessary to develop a set of indicators related to children in justice processes (criminal, civil and administrative). These indicators should be an integral part of the new ISP so that situation of children in justice proceedings can be monitored, documented and that related policies are developed based on evidence.

In December 2018 UNICEF Montenegro became part of the sub regional initiative ‘Equitable Access to Justice for Children in the West Balkans States of Albania and Montenegro’ (2019 -2020) funded by the Government of Norway. This initiative is focused on two key result areas: 1) Justice and social welfare systems are adapted to the rights of children participating in justice processes; and b) Children, especially the most vulnerable, have knowledge and support to enable them to access justice. A strong emphasis of this initiative is on strengthening of administrative data in the country, primarily data related to children in the justice system.ÂÂ

UNDP supports the Ministry of Justice in the process of developing a new ISP system and its intervention will be focused on developing two subsystems for the judicial information system (Courts and Institute for the execution of criminal sanctions); business intelligence module for analytics and statistics and provision of technical assistance in business continuity and integrity of the data.

In partnership with UNDP, UNICEF will provide technical support to the Ministry of Justice to assess existing juvenile justice indicators and develop a full set of indicators related to children appearing in all court proceedings (criminal, civil and administrative). The ultimate aim is to develop a child rights related module and integrate it into ISP. Once the indicators are proposed and agreed with the Ministry of Justice’s IT Department and Judicial Council, it will be necessary to harmonize definitions proposed for the new ISP system with definitions used by the Montenegrin National Statistical Office (MONSTAT), so the two systems correspond to each other and report the same data on children in contact with the law. The national consultant will work in partnership with an international consultant who will be engaged for the assessment and development of indicators for children in justice proceedings.

Purpose and Objective(s)

The purpose of this assignment is to support the Ministry of Justice and judicial institutions to improve the data collection on children participating in all justice proceedings so that decisions are made in the best interests of children.

The objective of this assignment is to:
identify, assess and develop a sector relevant set of indicators on children participating in justice processes with reference to international standards and guidance;
Integrate indicators concerning children appearing in all court proceedings in the new Judicial Information System (ISP) to be used by the Ministry of Justice, courts and state prosecutors’ offices;
Enhance evidence-based planning and monitoring on the situation of children appearing in all court (including misdemeanor courts) and administrative proceedings.
Support the Montenegrin National Statistical Office (MONSTAT) in harmonizing definitions on children in justice proceedings with data/indicators developed for ISP.
Methodology and Technical Approach:The methodology will include:

desk review of the relevant legislative and policy documents and available statistics, surveys, and publications/reports on access to justice available through administrative data sources,
interviews with representatives of relevant sectors at the national level (primarily judiciary, Ministry of Justice, MONSTAT and others), UNDP and insight into reporting mechanisms and registries (without identifiable data); interviews will be scheduled with UNICEF support and conducted together with international consultant;
assistance to international consultant in assessment of the current situation and preparation of the report with proposed indicators to be integrated into the new judicial information system -ISP and MONSTAT;
validation of the proposed indicators and the methodology for data collection by national stakeholders.ÂÂ
The Consultant is expected to work as part of a team together with an International Consultant to be recruited for this assignment.

Further details are presented in the section below Activities and Tasks??.

Activities and Tasks: The activities of the assignment will be conducted under the supervision of UNICEFs Child Protection Officer, and in close cooperation with the relevant representatives of the Ministry of Justice, Judicial Council.

The consultant is expected:

To review and get familiar with relevant international instruments (UN CRC and other UN, CoE and EU instruments), and in particular CoE Guidelines on Child Friendly Justice, UNICEF Strategic Plan – Goal Area 3 (internal UNICEF document, will be provided by UNICEF) and related Manual/Guidance for the implementation of the Strategic Plan (Goal Area 3); MONSTAT’s Transmonee Country analytical report on Access to Justice (2016), both regional Synthesis Report and the Report for Montenegro; INSPIRE Indicator Guidance and Results Framework - Ending Violence Against Children: How to define and measure change (https://www.unicef.org/protection/57929_102933.html), UNICEF Manual for the Measurement of Indicators on Violence against Children (internal UNICEF document, will be provided by UNICEF), a set of Juvenile Justice indicators and sub-indicators developed by UNODC/UNICEF during the juvenile justice system reform in Montenegro including Guidance on Justice in Matters involving children victims and witnesses of crime; UNICEF MNE internal documents containing all indicators proposed globally and regionally, etc.;
To get familiar with available MoJ/UNDP project documentation related to ongoing process of development of the new ISP system;Â
To review and use as a framework: Act on the Treatment of Juveniles in Criminal Proceedings (2010), Criminal Code of Montenegro (2017); Amendments to the Family Law of Montenegro (2016), Bylaw on the education of the Support Persons to the Child in Family Law related proceedings, Law on Free Legal Aid; Law on civil proceedings; Law on Administrative Proceedings; Law on Misdemeanours, Law on Police and other relevant policy documents such as: Strategy on Informational and Communicational Technologies of judiciary (2016-2020); National Plan of Action for Children (2014-2018); Strategy on the Reform of Judiciary (2014-2018);
To assist the international expert in developing a uniform methodology for data collection with a list of definitions and country-relevant-specific indicators that will refer to children in all court proceedings (civil, criminal and administrative) in terms of:
more active and frequent engagement with stakeholders to obtain all necessary/additional information required for the final product;
providing clarifications and additional inputs to international consultant on national legislation, data collection and reporting;
translate parts of legislation and policy papers to English language for international consultant, if needed;
Based on the feedback received by stakeholders on the draft list of indicators and the methodology, to address counterparts' feedback in consultation with international consultant, which will be further validated by national stakeholders;
To work intensively with the Ministry of Justice, judicial bodies and MONSTAT, so that both ISP and MONSTAT have harmonised definitions and indicators on children in contact with the law which correspond to each other.
Key Deliverables and Timeframe:This assignment is expected to commence on 20 June 2019. The consultant is expected to spend a total of 20 working days on this assignment. She/he will spend up to 15 working days in Podgorica while the rest of the time s/he will be home based (if different from Podgorica).

Under the supervision of the Child Protection Officer, the Consultant is expected to produce the following key deliverables:

Key Deliverables

Number of days

Timeframe


Desk review of legal texts, international documents, existing data collection methodologies and indicators for children in judicial system in Montenegro and documents related to establishment of the ISP system

4 days (home based)

By end of June 2018

Assistance to international expert in developing of a uniform methodology for data collection with definitions and a list of country-relevant-specific indicators that will refer to children in all court proceedings (civil, criminal and administrative) as well as a list of proposed definitions and indicators to MONSTAT (elaborated under Activities and Tasks section)

12 days (in Montenegro, likely to be in Podgorica)

By end September 2019
Based on the feedback received by stakeholders on the draft methodology, provide inputs to a final report, that will be further validated by national stakeholders

4 days

By end October 2019
Total number of days

20 days


Management and Organisation

Management: The Consultant/s will be supervised by the UNICEF Child Protection Officer.

Organization: National Consultant/s will be required for this consultancy. If more than one consultant is engaged for the assignment, the fee for each consultant will be negotiated depending on their qualifications, the scope of work required from each consultant and the duration of their engagement.

Schedule: This assignment will commence on 20 June 2019.

Qualifications/specialized knowledge/experience required to complete the task:

The Consultant is expected to have the following qualifications, specialized knowledge and experience to complete the task:

Education:

Faculty degree in law or other related social science;
An advance degree will be considered as an advantage;
Experience:

Three (3) or more years of experience in child rights and justice system reforms;
Familiarity with the local context in Montenegro in particular the justice system and access to justice is a strong asset;
Proven experience in report writing and data compilation;
Previous work experience with UN/UNICEF or other international organizations will be considered as an advantage.
Other:

Demonstrated experience on child rights indicators and interpreting various data sources on child rights, e.g. administrative data, household surveys etc;
Strong communication skills – both verbal and in writing;
Language:

Excellent command of English and Montenegrin language;
Application procedure:

To apply for the vacant position please submit P-11 form through Apply❠button;
Candidates are requested to submit a financial offer as a separate document consisting of a daily professional fee, travel costs of three visits to Montenegro and DSA costs for up to 10 days to be spend in Podgorica, Montenegro.
Selection Method: All applicants will be screened against qualifications and requirements set above. Candidates fully meeting all the requirements will be further evaluated based on the criteria below.

1. Technical Criteria - Interview 70 % of total evaluation / max. 70 points

Education: 10 points
Previous experience: 20 points
Technical questions at the interview: 30 points
Other: 10 points
Only candidates who obtained at least 70% of points from the technical part (who will score at least 49 points) will be qualified for considering for financial proposal evaluation.

2. Financial Criteria - 30 % of total evaluation / max. 30 points.

Financial scores will be calculated using the formula [lowest offer / financial offer of the candidate x 30].
REMARK:

Mandatory learning: Upon concluding the recruitment process and prior to signing the contract, all Consultants and Individual Contractors, including those working from home, mustcomplete the following three online courses

Ethics and Integrity at UNICEF
Prevention of Sexual Harassment and Abuse of Authority
Sexual Exploitation Abuse (PSEA)
In addition, Consultants and Individual Contractors must completethe following coursebefore commencement of any travel on behalf of UNICEF.

BSAFE security training
The courses can be found on the following link: UNICEF Mandatory Training/Learning Classes .

Payments:The payments will be made upon successful completion of the deliverables and submission of invoices.

Recourse:UNICEF reserves the right to withhold all or a portion of payment if performance is unsatisfactory, if work/outputs is incomplete, not delivered or for failure to meet deadlines.


UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce and encourages qualified female and male candidates from all national, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities to apply.


Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.



How to apply:
UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages qualified female and male candidates from all national, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of our organization. To apply, click on the following link http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/?job=522097

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