Addictive diseases, abuse, sexual exploitation, human trafficking are just some of the risks to which minors who live and work on the street are exposed. Although the number of children on the street is not negligible, they are often invisible both to passers-by and to the system itself.
We are all obliged, from competent institutions to individuals, to fight for the best interests of the child and we are obliged to react if we judge that the child is in danger. However, such a picture is rarely encountered in practice.
The exact number of children on the street is not easy to determine. The most common reasons why they stay on the street are extreme poverty, fleeing violence and human trafficking.
"What is worrying is that most of these children are not without parents." Many of them have a home and living parents, but do not live with them. Some maintain contact with their parents, but are more on the street than in contact with them. They ended up there for different reasons. Many to increase the family budget. However, what should be an alarm to all of us, many of these children have run away from home to escape some form of abuse or psychological abuse and the like. There is also that number of children in certain cities who are part of the chain of human trafficking, who are forced to beg," says the supervisor at the Center for Social Work in Zubin Potok, psychologist and family psychotherapist, Simona Đurović.
It is children who are hungry and left to fend for themselves on the street, without adequate supervision, who are at the greatest risk of becoming victims.
"Children who live or work on the street are exposed to the highest levels of risk, not only from getting sick and using psychoactive substances, which are available on the street, and human trafficking. They are most often victims of both abuse and sexual exploitation. The easiest to recruit are children who are in extreme poverty, who will believe that they can find salvation in some promises that they will be paid super, employed", explains Đurović.
Working at night for children of any age is dangerous and harmful, the center for social work is obliged to react
According to the psychologist, any street work for children under the age of seven is considered both dangerous and harmful and is punishable. This also applies to children under the age of 14 who are not adequately supervised. However, the work of minors on the street can be tolerated if it is aimed at contributing to the household budget, but under the condition that the minor is under adequate supervision.
"Of course, if the center for social work has assessed that the child works with the intention of surviving, to help the household budget, and that no one abuses that money, but uses it exclusively to ensure the existence of him and other family members," explains Đurović.
On the other hand, working at night for children of any age is considered both dangerous and harmful, because, as shown by psychologists, it is not an optimal environment for a child's development. In such cases, the center for social work is also obliged to react.
"It is considered dangerous because it affects the child, interferes with his school activities, disrupts his quality of life." The child misses school, spends half the day sleeping because he was awake at night. "It's simply not an optimal environment for a child's development, and in that sense the center must react," Đurović points out.
Consequences of being on the street
And the consequences of being on the street and generally living in extreme poverty are very serious, both in social, personal and health aspects, he adds.
"These children often do not have the opportunity to develop to their full potential. Not to mention the consequences for moral, social and emotional development. Due to insufficient cognitive and intellectual stimulation, children do not go to school, they avoid it. They are at greater risk of going astray compared to children who are in the system. The problem is that they have weak ties with their parents, they are unsupervised, they are malnourished. You have never seen a fat child on the street, they are mostly thin, anemic. Not to mention that they don't even have the right to play, to childhood, they work at night, they sell something. The situation is alarming", emphasizes Đurović.
Measures taken by the Center for Social Work
Depending on the situation, preventive and corrective supervision are the measures that the center for social work should undertake when it comes to parents whose children are on the street.
As part of preventive supervision, as a first measure, the idea is for the center to help parents properly fulfill their obligations. This means that preventive supervision occurs if the center believes that the parents are doing everything else well, but due to extreme poverty, they are forced to make the decision that the child contributes to the household budget.
"The center recommends what should not be done, what behaviors are and are not allowed in accordance with the child's age and needs, condition, etc. If he has the cooperation and consent of his parents, then it goes easily. A protection plan is being made, how to strengthen them. They are helped by some permanent and continuous cash social assistance. Income is provided in some other way, so that the child does not have to earn on behalf of everyone," Đurović explains.
"It is not in our interest to break up the family system if we don't have to." All that you see in the movies where social workers are 'badass', break into houses and take away children or I don't know what, that is simply not true. We only do that with a heavy heart when we have to. Protecting the child's best interests is our number one priority and we don't act until we have to."
Corrective supervision is applied if the parents continue with actions that are not optimal for the child's growth and development - they force him to do something, grossly neglect him, abuse him, etc.
"Then the center for social work imposes measures of first corrective supervision, where it tells them exactly which behaviors they need to correct - they refer them to counseling, ask them to account for how they spend that money, and the like. If the parent turns a deaf ear and there is no cooperation in this sense, the center can go further and initiate proceedings for partial or complete deprivation of parental rights before the competent authorities and to determine in what way the parent contributed to the fact that the child in the environment in which he is, is not safe, there are no optimal conditions for growth and development, there is a risk of abuse, neglect and the like", he explains further.
Custodial protection measures are taken in the case when the child is without parental care.
"By providing him with some temporary or long-term accommodation in accordance with his assessment of needs." The child should constantly participate in it. Otherwise, that plan won't work if you don't have his consent for what you decide with him. Not instead of him. Sometimes you have to do it for him, but those are situations when he is not aware of how much danger he is in. But mostly you work so that the child actively participates all the time and he just says what he wants and what he doesn't want."
How and to whom to report?
If an individual, institution, organization or anyone who is interested in the protection of children, assesses that a minor who is on the street is in danger, they can report it to the center for social work in writing, orally or by phone, says Đurović.
"In the application, you should provide information about the child and the family that you know and for which you have some suspicion that something is happening that you consider inappropriate for the child's age, that there is some risk that the child is being abused, neglected, whatever you suspect." You also state the reasons why you think it is abuse, neglect or some abuse of a child."
If the application is made orally, in that case the applicant reports in person to the center for social work in order to conduct an interview.
When it comes to the application by phone, it is additionally necessary to submit the application in writing within 48 hours.
"The triager, i.e. the reception worker at the center for social work, based on the information you provided, as a citizen or an institution, organization (...) decides whether that information will be further considered within the center or whether they will give you information to which service in the community you should contact. Based on all available data - previous records at the center, possibly some medical documentation and information obtained from the conversation with you, the center takes into account and makes a decision whether there is any suspicion of abuse and neglect, how well-founded it is, and whether there is a need for some emergency protection."
Upon application, the center for social work within its competence also has the possibility to intervene urgently.
"If it is considered that the suspicion is justified, the police department and the prosecutor's office are immediately informed. The procedure is initiated and a conclusion is reached on the urgent provision of accommodation for the child. So, moving out of an environment that we believe is not safe for the child, that the child is in some danger. A temporary guardian is appointed. There is usually someone from the ranks of the center for social work, and certain criminal-legal responsibility procedures are initiated for parents, guardians, adults who abused, mistreated, or neglected a child in some way."
Feedback upon application
If the application is submitted anonymously, the Center for Social Work is not obliged to provide feedback. However, if the application is submitted orally or in writing, that is, it is known exactly who the applicant is, the center for social work is obliged to provide the applicant with certain information regarding the given case within 10 days from the date of submission of the application.
"In that feedback, we would give a written notice of the measures we took, the decisions we made in relation to the circumstances and the situation that caused concern for the child among a certain person, institution, organization (...)." Of course, all the while respecting privacy and data confidentiality. So, there is a way to inform the applicant what we did specifically with the application," Đurović reveals to us.
What if the applicant suspects that the center for social work has not acted adequately?
If the applicant suspects that the center for social work is not fulfilling its obligations in an adequate manner in connection with the given case, the address to which he can turn is the competent ministry. In this case, it is the Ministry of Labour, Employment, Veterans and Social Affairs, as well as the Ministry of Family Care and Demography.
"They will monitor the quality of our work, they will ask for information related to what you reported." In any case, you have the right to ask a higher instance to investigate whether the quality of the work was at a satisfactory level, whether we did what we were legally obligated to do."
Obligations of a social worker outside of working hours
The social worker must find time, even in the case when he himself notices or comes to some knowledge that there is a suspicion that the child is at risk. It is his duty to assess how well-founded this suspicion is. Moreover, based on the assessment that the suspicion is justified, he is obliged to inform the public prosecutor's office and the internal affairs authority about it as soon as possible, notes Đurović.
"It is impossible to close our eyes to such things. It is our duty and obligation to react and inform higher authorities. The fact that we are in Kosovo in no way puts us in a situation where we can avoid some of our duties. On the contrary, I think that here we have to try twice as hard to protect our children precisely because our circumstances are specific. As centers for social work, we work according to the laws of the Republic of Serbia. There is a clearly defined legal framework for the prevention and prevention of violence, abuse and neglect of children. All centers in the north work according to the general Protocol for the protection of children from abuse and neglect. Judicial bodies and the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Education also have special protocols. The method of work is the same for everyone and we cannot avoid it."
Children on the street are invisible both to individuals and to the system
In our climate, the awareness that cases of children on the street should be reported has not yet been developed. In such a situation, we are more inclined to turn our heads and say "it's none of my business", instead of looking at it as a responsibility.
"Somehow we all tend to close our eyes. That because of all our problems, some of us say 'I just need that care, I'm not going to get involved'. This is what worries and saddens me as a person who lives here, but also as a professional working in social protection, because we are becoming both blind and deaf to the cries of people who are clearly on the margins and at high risk of abuse. abuse and violence".
"What is stopping us? Why do we turn our heads? That is the question we should ask ourselves. Would we turn our heads if my sister, cousin, godmother, friend were in that girl's place? We just have to develop empathy. I know that we live in difficult circumstances, but we have no excuse for insensitivity, for the autism we are increasingly entering, we are alienating ourselves from each other and this must not happen, because this is how we disrupt society. We ourselves will not be well in such a society 'in the end'."
An additional problem that occurs with many children in a street situation is the lack of systemic protection, to which they have every right.
"Many of them are not registered in the birth register at all, they do not have a basic document. You can imagine the range of rights they are denied when they do not have one basic document on the basis of which they can exercise those rights. From enrolling in school, realizing the right to financial social assistance (...) Millions of rights are denied because of such a single thing because they are invisible to the system," Đurović points out.
Plan for the protection of children in street situations
Until recently, in the legal sense of Serbia, it was not precisely and clearly defined how to protect children who are in a street situation. The news is that in May of this year, the Ministry of Family Care, the Ministry of Social Work, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Republic Public Prosecutor's Office and the City of Belgrade signed the Plan for the Protection of Children in Street Situations from Violence, Neglect and Exploitation.
"In the sense of clearly delegating who will be responsible, which are the competent authorities and institutions that should implement that protection plan." First of all, there are centers for social work, the police administration, higher and basic public prosecutor's offices, but of course organizations and all those bodies that have a legal obligation or are interested in solving the problems of children in street situations. There are health institutions, schools, kindergartens, civil society organizations, communal militia and all citizens, in fact," says Đurović.
With this plan, the priority for all competent institutions should be to reduce the number of children on the streets, or at best to eradicate them.
"By signing this plan, the idea is that all representatives of the guardianship authorities and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the prosecution, civil organizations, deal with how many children are on the street and accordingly make strategies, plans, how and with which activities to keep these children off the street .”
Advantages and disadvantages of two separate systems
In Kosovo and Metohija, in most places with a Serbian majority, there are two centers for social work each, which function according to the Serbian and Kosovo systems. Psychologist Simona Đurović does not see this as an obstacle, because, according to her, in addition to the Serbian one, social work centers under the Kosovo system are also oriented towards protecting the best interests of the child.
"And they work in accordance with the UN Convention on the Protection and Rights of Children. According to the Family Law and the Social Protection Law, they also have a defined way of protecting oneself from violence, abuse, and abuse. The interventions they carry out are the same - to stop the abuse, to ensure safety as soon as possible, to create smooth conditions for functioning, for the development of the child in the family, to contribute to reducing the risk of repeated abuse, to remediate the consequences somehow. Therefore, the working principle is the same, the measures are the same."
The only aggravating circumstance, according to her, is the language barrier.
"We have a problem when some social protection services are developed in the south and do not exist in the north, and then we have users who do not speak Albanian, but exclusively Serbian, and it is simply not acceptable from a moral point of view to send such children to a shelter or a children's home without parental care that exists e.g. in Pristina, where the staff speaks exclusively Albanian."
On the other hand, in certain situations, it can be an advantage.
"It is also an advantage that we have both institutions at our disposal, so when we have a child of Albanian nationality, we can ensure that he has some kind of social protection service in his native language. On the other hand, we use Serbia's resources for everything - for housing and in homes, for the elderly and for children without parental care, a maternity home (...) Therefore, we use all the resources of the Republic of Serbia that are available. When we cannot implement something, sometimes we have the opportunity to choose between systems, so as to ensure a more comprehensive protection for the user."
The disadvantage of both systems is that certain services are not developed because they lack financial stability.
"You don't have money from the budget to finance a shelter, and you know how many children you would save from the streets. These are things that make it difficult to implement any kind of protection", underlines Simona Đurović.
Listen to the full show here:
