Dear members and visitors of the UEFA child safeguarding platform,
On 20 November, we celebrate World Children’s Day – an occasion to advocate for, promote and celebrate children’s rights. On that day in 1959, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child. And on the same day in 1989, the UN General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
This is the perfect moment to reiterate our commitment to respecting human rights and ensuring the welfare of children and young people in football at all levels of the game.
At UEFA, we strongly believe that all children and young people have a right to enjoy football in a safe and positive environment. Everybody who has contact with children and young people has a role to play in keeping them safe and upholding their rights.
“UEFA recognises and will act on its responsibility to ensure respect, child protection and safeguarding, as well as upholding children’s and human rights and protecting the environment in a football context,” says Michele Uva, UEFA’s director of football and social responsibility.
Many of us work directly or indirectly with children in football settings. Part of our duty of care involves helping to prevent abuse, recognising, and tackling it, and ensuring that children feel safe and are protected. To be able to do this effectively, it is essential that we continuously acquire knowledge and skills in child safeguarding, as well as sharing experiences and best practices with others.
Together, we have already achieved a great deal. We have delivered a platform containing a range of specialist e-learning courses, news on safeguarding across the UEFA region and a library of other resources and good practices, and we have trained 54 national associations’ child safeguarding focal points.
Thank you!
We will continue to support member associations on this journey, and we are delighted to see the progress that has been made by so many in this regard. In January 2022, national associations’ child safeguarding focal points will be invited to an online networking event, where they will be able to exchange best practices and hear the latest news from experts in child safeguarding. We are also developing a new training course for recently appointed focal points. And finally, a new module is being prepared on involving children in our safeguarding efforts, since child participation is one of the core principles of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
To mark World Children’s Day, we are launching a social media campaign in cooperation with our partner, Terre des hommes (Tdh). That campaign aims to raise awareness of child safeguarding in football and encourages everyone to help keep children safe and football fun. Over the next two months, we will be regularly sharing educational messages on UEFA and TDH social media channels.
Follow our channels and help us to spread the word!
UEFA:
Terre des hommes:
- www.facebook.com/TdhEurope, www.facebook.com/tdh.ch
- twitter.com/TdhEurope, twitter.com/tdh_ch
- www.instagram.com/tdh_ch
How are you celebrating World Children’s Day? Let us know, and we will gladly share your initiatives on our platform, www.uefa-safeguarding.eu.
We take this opportunity to remind you that our online courses are available in English, French, German and Russian, as well as:
- Italian, courtesy of the Italian Football Federation;
- Dutch, courtesy of the Royal Belgian Football Association;
- Romanian, courtesy of the Romanian Football Federation; and
- Latvian (newly added), courtesy of the Latvian Football Federation.
Soon, courses will also be available in Polish and Portuguese, and adapted to the Swiss context (Italian, French and German).
If your association would be interested in translating our e-courses into your official language(s), please contact childsafeguarding@uefa.ch.