This guide is for people who work with children and young people in places of alternative care. It is intended to assist you in understanding and supporting the rights of children you work with. It should also help you in the important work you do. "Removal of a child from the care of the family should be seen as a measure of last resort and should be, whenever possible, temporary and for the shortest possible duration,” say the UN Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children
■ Experience from a number of different sectors and a number of different countries has shown that adopting a children’s rights approach to alternative care for children offers a more fulfilling, less stressful and more promising environment for all. It is also recognised as being the “right” approach: children and young people have rights just like adults. They are entitled to expect these rights to be respected by the adults they come into contact with.
■ A human rights-based approach to working in alternative care for children is: 3 more fulfilling, because relationships are built on trust and mutual respect. This is more rewarding both for you and for the children and young people with whom you work; 3 less stressful, because problems are more easily identified and decisions are “owned” by those who need to carry them out, which means they are more likely to be adhered to; 3 more promising, because it is more supportive of children and young people: it familiarises them with some of the challenges they will have to meet later in life and gives them strategies which they can use to meet these challenges.
■ This guide accompanies Discover your rights! a booklet which informs children and young people of their rights and shows them what they mean in practice. You are strongly advised to look at both texts and to introduce the booklet to the children and young people with whom you work. This will show them that you are serious, and it will help to develop trust on both sides.
