Jill Evans MEP at the Earth Summit In Johannesburg

Of the 65,000 people from all kinds of organisations worldwide who have come to Johannesburg, one missing voice has been that of children.

On Wednesday, children themselves came to tell the world leaders that it was time this changed. A special session was held to discuss the situation of children, with input from the Young General Assembly, an organisation representing a million and a half children from all over the world.

They asked the United Nations to give children a voice in decision making by setting up elected children's committees in every country, which would advise governments.

They want the active participation of children in all aspects of community and family life.

What made the presentation so powerful was the testimony of Sipho Mathebula, who, seven years earlier, had been living on the streets of Johannesburg.

He described himself as "a snotty-nosed, glue-sniffing Johannesburg street kid" who only wanted love and a chance to make a future. He has succeeded. But what of the others?

Although much of Johannesburg city centre is a no-go area for Summit delegates, I have been through there at night on the Summit shuttle bus. All the warnings about crime make it a scary place. How many other "snotty-nosed kids" are out there sleeping on those pavements? How many are there on the streets of Caernarfon and Cardiff?

Each one could have told their own story to the World Summit on Sustainable Development. It is vital that they are heard because the two hundred world leaders getting together have a duty and a responsibility to put children first - to give them hope for the future.

But the evidence is that the voice of big business is louder than the voice of children. There are 200 representatives of companies at the summit, like BMW, whose huge balloon of the earth dominates the square next to the summit and is more typical of Greenpeace than a car manufacturer.

The announcement on Thursday of the US-EU proposal for partnerships to bring together government money, business sponsorships and interest groups indicates the way things are going.

These partnerships would take the onus off government to carry out development and will inevitably lead to more privatisation. Although the UN has approved them, the partnerships can never take the place of binding agreements with action plans and timetables for tackling poverty and deprivation.

Children are nearly a third of the world's population. We must take their advice. This week I saw girls going to school barefoot in Kwazulu Natal and spoke to a young boy in Alexandra Township who simply said that all he wanted was a home where he could be happy. Whether it is children in Wales or in South Africa, governments owe it to them to listen. They could probably do a much better job than the people deciding on our future in Johannesburg at the moment.

Diwedd/Ends.