There’s a lot of talk about being safe these days. Some of us might remember that kids just used to walk to school without being dropped off. Others might recount that church and community youth activities were fun places where you did interesting activities but instead we now hear stories of abuse in these settings. On the international front we might consider aid workers in quite altruistic light as bringing aid to emergencies and empowering children and communities but there have been stories of abuse and exploitation that have generated headlines across the world. There’s a lot to think about.
When we think about safety we also need to think about power, rights and inequality. Its a given that there are people in positions of power and we expect them to use that power for good: politicians, police, teachers, clergy, parents. But just because we have expectations and assumptions that’s not always what happens. And that’s when we need to think about kinds of standards, rules or boundaries that help protect people, especially women and children and marginalised, from abuse of that power. Its guarding that safety; its safeguarding.
We don’t always recognise how we can exercise power. One thing that has caught my attention over the years has been glass or windows. When offices or rooms do not have visual access, an imbalance of power can occur within that space. At my church, all doors for enclosed spaces now have glass panels in them to ensure that there is visual access.
So what do some of these safeguarding arrangements look like. Let’s look at what happens in our office in Australia and then look at what we do with regard to our overseas activities.
In Australia, we have a Safeguarding policy. It is aligned to the international development sector standards, to the government standards, particularly the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFAT) as we get funds from them, and to The Leprosy Mission International standards. In one sense this is all compliance but we are actually more interested than that. We have people appointed to Safeguarding responsibilities: there is a Safeguarding Trustee on our Board and there are two senior staff members who are Designated Safeguarding Leads (DSL). In addition, we run training courses that all staff are required to complete and all new staff get a briefing on our standards. The DSLs also have quarterly meetings with our international office lead person who is interested to know what activities we have conducted in that quarter. If any incidents occur they need to be immediately reported to several locations.
Outside Australia, we include safeguarding within our Partner Agreements and are required to demonstrate to DFAT that we not only have those agreements but that our partners have policies and are actively using them. Sometimes our international office produces materials we can use. During last year they produced materials that set out scenarios for staff to consider. Situations included how women would be cared for when they came to clinics for screening: could they have been assisted in getting to the clinic safely; was their provision for privacy when being screened; were there female staff in attendance? Another situation might be when local or overseas staff were collecting stories: were there consent forms signed by the interviewee; were children or adults photographed in a respectful way; did the story depict the community in a positive light? We don’t want to be a party to ‘relief porn’! Nor can we just take a photo of somebody and post it on social media.
As we noted at the beginning things used to be different. Charities helped people but the often didn’t have policies in place. As times have changed and circumstances have changed, the depth and breadth of safeguards has changed. Standards have become more explicit regarding bullying, harassment, abuse (in various forms from sexual abuse to emotional abuse to financial abuse) and a lot more discussion about rights and promotion of well-being.
When incidents occur we strictly follow the protocols laid out by DFAT and TLMI and have reported even what might be considered minor incidents. The processes are in place. But at the end of the day, we are interested in guarding people’s safety. People affected by leprosy are some of the most marginalised people in the world and we want to ensure they are treated with dignity and are given opportunity to live fulfilling lives without being exploited. That’s our commitment. It’s a God given one because we know that all people are made in the image of God.
