Joan Laporta: “FC Barcelona wants to improve the prevention of any type of violence against children”
BARCELONA, 9 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) –
This Thursday, FC Barcelona presented its child protection system, with which they will cover nearly 200,000 children from different areas of activity of the club, such as La Masía, Barça Academy, amateur sports and programs of the ‘culé’ Foundation , to prevent any type of violence.
“Speaking about topics such as physical or verbal aggression, ‘bullying’, negligence or, especially, sexual abuse have always been taboo subjects in our society, but FC Barcelona wants to improve the prevention of any type of violence against children and go further there, because it is an issue that concerns us and in which we also want to be leaders”, said the president of the entity, Joan Laporta, in the presentation.
This system includes the new protection policy, the action protocol and other prevention, monitoring and management actions in the face of any type of violence: physical and verbal, sexual abuse, negligence and bullying, with the aim of promoting a space of tolerance zero and promote safe and protective spaces.
At the event held in the Auditori 1899, the Special Representative of the General Secretariat on violence against children of the United Nations, Dr. Najat Maalla M’ijd, congratulated the club through a video for this initiative and encouraged other institutions and sports clubs to implement similar systems.
“One of the highlights is to ensure that all spaces are safe and protective environments based on a child rights approach and the greatest interest of each child and adolescent. Our goal has been to achieve the highest international standards in terms of child protection”, said the general director of the Foundation, Dr. Marta Segú.
SCOPE OF ACTION
The scope of the system encompasses the prevention of any type of violence and is applied to all FC Barcelona groups in which children and adolescents participate. In this way, they will act in the Masia, where 550 minors reside; the Barça schools, spread all over the world, which include a total of 24,000 young people; amateur sports, with 800 young people and, finally, the Foundation, with 158,800 national and international beneficiaries.
The Child Protection Policy is the general framework that describes the actions and measures applied in this matter. These can be grouped into four large blocks. Among them that of the people, who are in charge of caring for the little ones; the environments and activities, in order to guarantee safety and well-being; situations of vulnerability, which will have an action protocol; and the organizational culture, where they adjust different processes of the entity, such as hiring, training and prevention actions.
“In recent years, changes in regulations and laws have meant that this project began in the 2017/18 season to implement the protection system for children and young people who participate in Club activities in all its sections and sports and of the Foundation as well”, declared Sergi Atienza, director of the FC Barcelona Compliance Department.
In this line, from the club they have made the protocol public as an act of transparency. “It shows all the standards that we take into account to avoid any type of violence against our children. Any person, company, entity, etc., must adapt to them and we show them to everyone,” he said.