Safe and Child-sensitive Counselling, Complaint and Reporting Mechanisms to Address Violence Against Children
This report provides a set of guiding principles derived from existing human rights standards, and puts forward practical recommendations to accelerate progress in making safe, child sensitive and effective mechanisms available for all children. Violence is seldom reported and in many circumstances children feel pressed to conceal it, particularly when it is perpetrated by people they know and trust. The United Nations study recommended that mechanisms be established, including telephone helplines, through which children can report abuse, speak to a trained counsellor in confidence and ask for support and advice. It underscored the need to make all children aware of such mechanisms, and recommended that in every locality and every setting there should be well-publicized and easily accessible services to investigate reports of violence against children.
