Dr Willie McCarney was a university lecturer, training teachers to work with disaffected youth. He was also a lay magistrate in Belfast’s Youth Court and Family Proceedings Court for 34 years. He is a past president of the International Association of Youth and Family Judges and Magistrates. He travelled the world, on behalf of the United Nations Development Programme, UNICEF and the Council of Europe, training judges in the use of international instruments concerning the rights of the child. In his travels, he gained valuable insights into the various countries and the lives of the people who lived there. This book recounts the experiences and insights garnered over 30 years of travel.
Willie McCarney’s early years were studded with a series of traumatic incidents culminating in the death of his mother, when he was still under 10 years old. Everyone has to learn to deal with the ups and downs of life but Willie seemed to be getting more than his fair share of hard knocks. A Japa...
‘I was a most unlikely traveller. Growing up in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, I had no great ambitions to travel other than to visit friends and family within a two- or three-mile radius. From the age of 11, I had to take the bus each day to the nearest grammar school, 10 miles away in Omagh. A...
