The great gap in the national and public child protection system and the eternal responsibilities of the State

The familiar is no longer safe. What we think is secure eventually gets breached. Persons above suspicion are precipitated. The Juvenile Supervisor of the Kalamata Court and Public Relations Manager of the Association of Social Workers of Greece (SKLE) Angeliki Roumeliotou highlights the great gap in the national and public child protection system and the timeless responsibilities of the State, which once again it fails to protect puberty as sacred.

Συνέντευξη στη Νικολέττα Κολυβάρη

- Another case of serial rape of a 12-year-old child "shocks" the whole of Greece. I emphasize "one more time" and I wonder what you notice differently in this case, in relation to the interest shown by the average citizen?

The citizen discovers once again and in an extremely tragic way how vulnerable he is and how easy it is to become a victim of sacred immaturity. He fears for his individual vulnerability, the vulnerability of his family, his children. He can smell the stench of danger too close to what he thought was safe. More generally, people when they witness such tragic situations, which happen to others, develop an internal mechanism to place themselves almost unconsciously and virtually in a hypothetical scenario that includes them. "What if it happened to me?", they ask themselves a lot internally. Sometimes, by answering to themselves that it is not happening to them, they confirm the safety in which they and their significant others live. So they can continue. In cases like this, what do we learn? The familiar is no longer safe. What we think is secure eventually gets breached. Persons above suspicion are precipitated. The citizen finds that he is exposed to danger within his own fortress, in which he had hitherto considered himself to be in no danger. The walls of the family that guard its members from the outsider seem to be shaking. "Who is the dangerous one?", is the question that arises. “Who can be hostile? And how will I know?" And finally how will I protect myself and protect myself if I cannot perceive the dangerousness of people who until yesterday seemed to be familiar?

– How can a child for 4 months be betrayed by traffickers and raped by more than 200 "customers" and this go unnoticed?

The entire child protection system goes unnoticed, unfortunately. What is demonstrated once again is the great gap in the national and public child protection system, where there will be unified coordination, multidisciplinarity, thorough working protocols and individualized intervention plans that will support children and protect their rights. We all know that in our country even the fundamental principles of the International Convention on the Rights of the Child such as the best interests of the child or the priority in the development and protection of each child, which are also part of the UN Recommendations, are being circumvented. When these principles are circumvented, back doors are opened through which even crime against the child occurs.

 

- But finally, is this national action plan for the rights of the child still working or not, or are we talking here about blatant ignorance on the part of the school and at the same time the absence of serious and systematic training for professionals who manage incidents of sexual abuse?

No such plan, national and public, has ever worked in substance. It has been in the making for many years now but unfortunately stumbles on key deficits with great sacrifice to the minor and his best interest. Schools are constantly appealing for help in their work, as are professionals who are anxious to live up to their highest duty to act as guardians of children's rights.

A huge necessity in the field we are referring to is the adequate staffing of the social services of the local self-government organizations which are the primary and emergency social care services. It is enough to think that the social workers of the Social Services of the municipalities are asked to meet the needs of citizens at a ratio of one social worker per 40,000 inhabitants or more and are forced to work at a ratio of 1 social worker per 400 or more beneficiaries, individuals or families, recording a among the highest ratios at European level and far exceeding internationally accepted standards, with dramatic consequences on the efficiency of the services provided. The staffing of services and schools, with permanent and stable staff, the provision of services with material, equipment and resources, the continuous training and supervision of professionals, their institutional protection with regard to confidentiality and non-persecution when they express their findings combined with the institutionalization of intervention protocols and interdisciplinarity are those that will be the main foundations of an essential national action plan.

– I will insist, is there a protocol for managing such incidents? And if it doesn't exist, how is minors protected in our country?

In the recent joint letter of the president of SKLE, Mr. Athanasiou and the assistant Ombudsman for Children's Rights, Mr. Koufonikolakou, to the Central Union of Municipalities of Greece, regarding the social protection system and social services of the country's municipalities, it is stated in detail that "the absence of a common line and protocols for conducting social research but also for monitoring and supporting families contributes to the weakening of the system given that the management of cases of abuse/neglect should result from a single and structured institutional framework for the operation of services" . Professionals have received full training but are developing interventions in a high-risk setting. So they themselves feel safer and more valid when the process they develop is the one foreseen and the one that will connect them with the rest of the social welfare network in the middle of which the child and his family are placed. So we need the protocols which will record as an institutionalized reason the path of the interventions ensuring the professional himself, but mainly the child himself. Because this is the point, to protect minors as sacred.

– And one last question, Mr. Roumeliotou, what must be done to protect this child and every child from victimization during the criminal procedure and from his social environment?

The basic principles established in the provisions concerning the judicial examination of minors and which specify the time, frequency, place, persons of examination of a child should be applied. I am referring to Law 4478/2017 and YA 7320/2019 (Government Gazette B 2238/10.06.2019) which refers to the operation of the Independent Offices for the Protection of Minor Victims "Children's House". It is also very crucial that the safety nets for the protection of the child operate as defined by the International Convention on the Rights of the Child which has been ratified by law in our country since 1992. So we have legislative texts, what is needed is for them to be implemented.

The main principle of protection for this child and every child is the safeguarding of their sensitive personal details and their childhood, which, however, as we have seen, were violated multiple times. Unfortunately! Unfortunately, because the damage from such an overexposure is huge and possibly intractable.