VF Child Protection Policy
VF developed and institutionalized a set of policies to ensure the utmost protection of children under its care.
Visayan Forum Foundation, Inc. (VF)
A non-profit, non-stock and non-government organization in the Philippines established in 1991. VF works for the welfare of marginalized migrants, especially those working in the invisible and informal sectors, like child domestic workers and trafficked women and children.
It is licensed and accredited by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) to provide (residential care and community-based programs and services for women and children in especially difficult circumstances.”
It is most known for its pioneering and documented work on domestic workers in the Philippines, especially in pushing for the Domestic Workers Bill or the Batas Kasambahay. It is also in the forefront of providing services to trafficking victims through its Halfway Houses in major Philippine ports.
Vision
A society where marginalized migrants, especially the invisible working children are free and empowered.
Mission
To mobilize national and international efforts that contribute to the protection and development of marginalized migrants, especially working children.
Goals
1) To advocate for policies and programs that sustain long- term social changes involving women and children, communities, and other social partners.
2) To provide specialized care for migrants at risk, especially invisible working women and children, such as domestic workers and trafficked persons, using rights-based approaches.
3) To organize and build the capacities of migrants at risk, advocates, and other stakeholders.
4) To model integrated community-based programs that deal with the root causes of child labor, trafficking in persons, and migration.
5) To institutionalize child participation as a crosscutting development strategy.
Strategies
1) Providing specialized care, educational opportunities and legal support to abused migrants.
2) Organizing and training marginalized migrants, especially children.
3) Lobbying for the passage and enforcement of Magna Carta for House helpers, child labor and other related bills, that will protect both the interests of working children and their families.
4) Setting-up resource centers to disseminate basic data and information, to facilitate
5) exchanges and to encourage culturally sensitive researches.
6) Working with local and national institutions such as local government units (LGUs), employers’ associations, religious groups, educational institutions and the media.
7) Linking with international solidarity and actions, with special focus to help generate
8) efforts in Asian countries.
9) Modeling and replicating innovative community-based children’s programs anchored on stakeholders’ ownership of their child watch networks.
10) Institutionalizing preventive, protective, and proactive mechanisms in entry-exit points of trafficking such as ports.
11) Setting-up and sustaining socio-economic program such as micro-finance initiatives.
CHILD PROTECTION POLICY
Introduction
“States Parties shall protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse.” (UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989), Article 19)
Visayan Forum Foundation, Inc. (VF) adheres to the Philippine Government’s commitment as a party and signatory to the international instruments pledging to combat human trafficking, and elimination of worst forms of child labor and abuse, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime and its Supplementing Protocols, and the ILO Convention No. 182 on the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor.
VF has a common commitment to the prevention of child abuse and the protection of children.
This policy sets out VF’s common values, principles, and beliefs and describes its Vision-Mission-Goals and strategies in meeting its commitment to protect children and uphold their best interest.
Our Commitment to Protect Children
A major part of VF’s responsibility for children in our care is to ensure their safety and wellbeing at all times.
To help us do this effectively, we have implemented a Child Protection Policy which is designed to protect the children who are temporarily sheltered at our safe house and halfway houses at the ports, those accommodated at the Kasambahay Centers and the Bantay-Bata sa Komunidad (BBK) Center, and those taking part in planning workshops, seminars, capacity-building activities and advocacy work.
Our Commitment to Meaningful Child Participation
As part and parcel of our adherence to the principles of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, Visayan Forum Foundation strives towards meaningful participation of children and their duly-authorized representatives in the development, implementation, and monitoring of programs designed for children.
Visayan Forum views children as effective partners in all its initiatives. Hence, VF fosters an environment for active exchange of opinion between adult and children and creates the necessary avenues for such interactions in all programming levels.
Child Protection Policy Statement
The Visayan Forum Foundation, Inc. (VF) is committed to creating and maintaining the safest possible environment for children involved in any of its activities and for them to benefit from and enjoy all the opportunities the VF Centers have to offer including, Safe and Halfway Houses, Kasambahay Centers and Bantay-Bata sa Komunidad (BBK) Centers.
We do this by:
· Recognizing that all children have the right to freedom from abuse.
· Building the capacity of officers, staff, and children themselves to ensure meaningful participation in all decision-making and capacity-building activities and adherence to these policies
· Ensuring that all our staff and volunteers are carefully selected and have accepted responsibility for preventing the abuse of children in their care.
· Responding swiftly and appropriately to all suspicions or allegations of abuse, and providing children with the opportunity to voice any concerns they may have.
· Appointing a Protective Care Unit (PCU) Officer/Social Worker who will take specific responsibility for child safety and act as the main point of contact for parents, children and outside agencies.
· Restricting access to confidential information to Social Workers or the appropriate authorities.
· Reviewing the effectiveness of our Child Protection Policy annually.
How we will ensure our commitments above are met
· All VF Officers, Regional Coordinators, Field Officers, Staff and Volunteers will sign up to and abide by the attached code of conduct
· All social partners will sign and abide by the code of conduct
· All Officers, Regional Coordinators, Field Officers, Staff and Volunteers will have access to a copy of the child protection policy
· Recruitment of VF Staff such as Social Workers, House Parents and Training Officers will include checks on suitability for working with children and briefing on child protection issues
· The VF Main Office, Safe House, Port Halfway Houses, Regional Centers and Held Desks will display a copy of VF Child Protection Policy Statement and contact details for reporting possible child abuse, child trafficking and forced labor.
· Appropriate training and learning opportunities and support will be provided by Visayan Forum Foundation, Inc. to ensure adherence to policies and commitments.
· VF Execom shall ensure that there will be a yearly assessment of the Child Protection Policy involving VF staff and children.
Code of Conduct
All Visayan Forum Foundation staff and officers must strictly abide by this policy:
Visayan Forum officers must:
- Ensure that all staff, volunteers and others who are in contact with the children are aware of the problem of child abuse, child labor and the risks to children
- Ensure that all staff, volunteers, and others in contact with children have the capacity to respond appropriately
- Ensure that all staff, volunteers and others are clear on what steps to take or whom to report to when there are concerns regarding the protection and safety of children.
- Hire and accept staff and volunteers who are of good moral character, have no derogatory records and must not be in any way connected to an illegal recruitment agency either for local or international placement
- Establish partnership only with agencies and institutions who observe standards on protection for children and uphold the best interest of children
Visayan Forum staff and others must:
- Establish good relationships with the children and their families
- Respect the children, their views and their rights at all times
- Observe confidentiality of cases
- Serve as a role model to the children. They must not abuse (in any aspect) their own children, sibling, domestic workers, and other house hold members
- For security purposes, they must never:
Ø lend phone or allow the child to talk with any caller without the knowledge and permission of the child’s social worker in charge
Ø allow the child at risk to go out of the designated premises without official activity and permission from the social worker. The child must always be accompanied by a social worker, house parents or other authorized staff.
Ø ask the child to open the gate of the safe house and other temporary shelter facilities
Ø accept any visitors at the safehouse and halfway houses without the knowledge and permission of the social-worker in charge or the head of the protective care unit or other VF officers
- During training and seminars, VF officer-in-charge shall take full responsibility for the safety of children. As such, they will secure the written consent of parents or guardians of the children
- During training and seminars, VF shall make sure that children are prepared for the activity, that they know the objectives and what the organizers expect from them
- VF staff should make sure that children are not exposed to undue stress and hazards during the activity. They should be given ample time for rest and recreation
- The organizers of the learning activity should make sure that the medium for instruction and the methods are appropriate to the level of development of children
- VF will only send children in national and international conferences that have instituted child participation and protection mechanisms. It will also make sure that children are prepared for the conference and the representatives are chosen according to democratic procedures decided by the children themselves. VF may endorse children (with the permission of the endorsed child) without prior consultation with other children if the activity requires very specific backgrounds or experiences limiting eligibility. VF, however, must explain these standards of eligibility to other children thereby justifying the endorsement. VF must also ensure that the children delegates are given equal importance as adult delegates and children delegates should be taken seriously particularly in decision-making.
- VF will honor the right of the children NOT to participate if they choose not to do so at any time.
- VF will only send out child delegates/participants outside the country if they have accompanying chaperones. Chaperones must be gender-sensitive and child-sensitive and must be proven to be of good moral character. A proper orientation of the chaperone to the history of the child and the purpose of the activity shall be provided by VF staff.
- No child shall be subjected to media exposure without his/her expressed consent and without the expressed written approval of the social worker/parent/legal guardian of the child. A media consent form must be properly signed by the child and the social worker/parent/legal guardian.
- All media interviews with children shall be done in the presence of a guardian/chaperone, preferably the social worker handling the child’s case, to ensure that the rights of the child are not violated and that no critical/confidential information that may endanger the welfare of the child is made public. Children interviewed by the media may withdraw from the interview at any time even though they have provided their consent prior to the interview.
- Key VF staff will ensure that the Media is properly briefed of the child protection policy of the organization when conducting interviews with children. The Media must be informed of the shot restrictions both on the child as well as on the premises of the institution. The Media should also be properly advised about information that is approved for publication and sensitive information (that may have been accidentally shared by a child interviewee) that should be withheld from the public.
- The Media should be required to submit guide questions to the chaperone or accompanying social worker handling the case prior to the interview. The guide questions must be approved first by the chaperone or social worker before the interview starts. The chaperone/social worker must monitor the interview from start to end.
- Children with on-going legal cases are not allowed to speak to the Media about their case. Children with on-going legal cases under Republic Act 9208 or the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act of 2003 are not allowed to be interviewed by the Media in accordance with the law and with respect to VF’s partnership guidelines with institutions that provide legal support.
- VF staff will ensure proper briefing and debriefing of all children who participate in trainings/seminars and media exposure.
- VF will ensure grievance and feedback mechanism for children about any staff, volunteers and fellow children.
The following acts and behaviors are also inappropriate and unacceptable:
- hit, spank, pull hair or otherwise physically abuse children
- court a child and develop sexual relationship with children
- create issues that may cause conflict between the children
- show favoritism among children – every child must be treated equally
- discriminate among children
- shout, bully, tease and humiliate the children or otherwise perpetrate any form of emotional abuse
- name calling and throwing degrading and offensive words to the children
- Physical aggression, verbal conflict and profanity towards fellow staff in the presence of children
- sleep in the same bed with a child
- impose decision and manipulate children in violation of rights-based principle adhered to by the organization (unless the child is incapable of decision making – this could only be assessed after psychological and psychiatric evaluations)
- give false hope and promises to children
- ask personal favors from the children such as washing their clothes, massaging, and other favors
- do things for the child that are personal, which the child can do for him/herself, such as dressing and bathing.
- give personal gifts to a child without prior notice to the social worker in charge. This is to ensure fair treatment to all children and avoid misinterpretation, jealousy, conflict, and misunderstanding.
- Ignore what the children say including questions and request
- Deliberate failure to take action during situations where children are involved in any form of conflict or danger.
- Disrespect for the religious beliefs of children.
- smoke and drink alcoholic beverages inside the premise of the safe house and other temporary shelter facilities for children
- hire children as domestic workers or its equivalent
Any other action or behavior which may constitute poor practice and potentially abusive to the children are all inappropriate and unacceptable and may lead to the removal of the staff and/or other corresponding sanction/s in consonance with VF manual of operation and code of conduct.
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