Here at LimeCulture, we’re celebrating World Children’s Day and reflecting on what more we can do, through both our work and our partnerships, to ensure children’s rights are recognised, respected and upheld.
We see every day that the impacts of sexual violence on children and young people are severe and long lasting, and reach into every area of a child’s life. We know that interactions with the criminal justice system where their unique and distinct needs and risks are not recognised can compound trauma and distress for many children – and their families. And we know how hard it can be for a child or young person to access support, and sadly, that sometimes that support simply isn’t good enough.
But we also know that providing the right support to a child or young person, at the right time, can be empowering and life changing.
The right to be protected, and the right to recover
Importantly the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child enshrines in international law not only the right of every child to be protected from all forms of sexual exploitation and sexual abuse (Article 34), but also the right to recover (Article 39). It places clear obligations on governments – which include those public authorities commissioning or funding support – to take ‘all appropriate steps’ to promote children’s recovery from neglect, exploitation and abuse in an environment that promotes their health, self-respect and dignity.
Acknowledging children as ‘rights bearers’ first and foremost completely changes the foundation from which support services for children who have experienced sexual violence are designed, commissioned and delivered. Services designed specifically with children’s needs in mind must be put in place, not as an add-on to adult services, nor out of a gesture of kindness, but because children have a fundamental right to access tailored, specialist support.
The Convention give us a rights-based framework for designing and delivering specialist, age-differentiated recovery services for children and young people who have experienced sexual violence; with support that is equitable and accessible, guided by a child’s wishes and feelings, tailored to each child’s unique needs and risks, prioritises their best interests, and adapts to their evolving capacities.
For children and young people that have experienced sexual violence, children’s Independent Sexual Violence Advisers (ISVAs) are at the forefront of upholding their rights. They are a trusted and independent professional, outside of statutory services, there to help children and young people understand and navigate a bewildering array of information, support and services that will often feel overwhelming, and to ensure their wishes and feelings are heard.
Meeting our obligations to children
We’ve seen important progress over the last few years in recognising the rights of children and young people to sexual violence support, and a welcome move towards the commissioning of distinct ISVA services for children and young people in many local areas.
We’ve also been privileged at LimeCulture to contribute to equipping ISVAs to work with children and young people, and to see increasing specialism and capability emerging within local services to deliver rights-based support to children. Children are seldom supported in isolation, and we’ve also seen many examples of ISVAs working effectively with schools and within local safeguarding arrangements to support children and young people and of course, their families. Our Quality Standards for ISVA Services now include distinct standards and indicators for children’s ISVA services, informed by best practice from many local services. This means that many more children are benefiting from being able to access child-focused support near to their homes.
However, we know too that ISVA services for children and young people remain under-resourced and under-pressure, with children presenting with increasingly complex needs, ISVAs managing increasingly high caseloads and high levels of risk. All these challenges are set alongside the landscape of dreadfully long court delays, appalling criminal justice outcomes for so many children and young people and a general lack of appropriate therapeutic support services. Despite this, we know that ISVAs supporting children and young people continue to do their very best in the toughest of circumstances and for this we should be grateful.
On World Children’s Day, we remind local and national commissioners of their obligations to ensure children and young people can access high quality specialist sexual violence support, and urge them to make it an explicit priority.
Find out more about the Quality Standards for ISVA Services.
Find out more about our specialist training for children’s ISVAs.
By Sam Whyte, Director (Sexual Violence & Education)
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