Forgotten children. The living situation of undocumented children in the NetherlandsThe Netherlands signed the UN Convention for the Rights of the Child two decades ago. However, various measures taken by the Dutch Cabinet indicate a narrowing of the rights of children. These measures are attracting a great deal of criticism from the High Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe, the Children’s Ombudsman, human rights organizations and interest groups. They base their criticism primarily on research into children with residence status: children in refugee centres and family detention centres, and individual under-age refugees.There is virtually no information on undocumented children. By this, we mean children who are not staying in family detention centres, have never requested asylum, or children who have been denied refugee status. Researchers and organizations estimate this group of children to number in the thousands. No recent information is available about the current situation of undocumented children living in the City of Utrecht. This was the reason for conducting this study into the number of undocumented children and the conditions in which they live.Fanga Musow, a shelter project for undocumented women and children in Utrecht, initiated the study. Stichting Los (“National Support Point for Undocumented Migrants”), HU University of Applied Sciences Utrecht (Research group Innovation in Social Work) and Defence for Children were also all involved in this study. The request for a follow-up on this initiative came from the City of Utrecht. The municipality wanted to know what it could do to improve the situation of this group of children in the city.The objective of the study was to gain insight into the number of undocumented children and into their living and housing circumstances.There were four research questions: 1) How many undocumented children are there in the Netherlands and in the City of Utrecht? 2) How do undocumented children experience their housing and living conditions? 3) ...