ABTA partners with child welfare charity on updated online tool 

ABTA is launching a refreshed version of ‘Every child, everywhere’, an online tool to help staff working in the travel industry to protect children visiting and living in destinations. The training was developed in partnership with ECPAT UK – a leading children’s rights organisation.

The online tool covers all child-safeguarding issues relevant to the travel industry, including encouraging staff to report potential cases of child abuse and offering specific advice to staff responsible for managing the contracting and subcontracting supply chain.  
The refreshed e-learning has different courses for different audiences, and covers: 

• Risks to children of abuse and exploitation in travel and tourism sector
• Developing child safeguarding policies and procedures
• Implementing child safeguarding policies and procedures

ABTA’s aim is to ensure that travel industry staff – from travel agent staff to tour operator representatives based in resort - are well equipped to deal with any issues they may become aware of, recognising the important role they can have in looking out for and reporting potentially abusive behaviour. 

ABTA has been taking an active role in supporting child safeguarding, and has worked closely with ECPAT UK on child welfare issues for many years. Following the Modern Slavery Act and UN Guiding Principles, many businesses are increasingly managing the risks of trafficking and modern slavery in their operations and supply chain. To reflect this, ABTA has continued its work in this field by developing an updated version of the training. 

The training is the third course to be introduced on ABTA’s Knowledge Zone, an e-learning portal which is part of ABTA’s commitment to keeping the travel industry informed about key industry issues and to support on-going learning and career development. Members can access the Knowledge Zone either through ABTA’s new education and careers hub or directly at abta.com/abtaknowledgezone.

The online training will be free to ABTA Members. Non-Members can purchase the training tool for £29 per user via the ABTA shop, with discounts available when purchasing more than 10. 

Nikki White, ABTA Director of Destinations and Sustainability comments:
“As an industry we can support the protection of children by being aware of different types of issues and the risks that could arise with regards to child safety. 
“ABTA and our Members are taking a long term, active role in child safeguarding. This means putting procedures in place to deal with this very sensitive issue and to support the protection of both children travelling to destinations and those living there. 
“This training is relevant for all staff, as the welfare of children can cut across many parts of the businesses. Anyone who has completed this training before will find it helpful to do the updated course, which takes account of new developments in this area.”

Bharti Patel, Chief Executive of ECPAT UK said: 
“ECPAT has a long history of working with the travel industry on child safeguarding issues and we are happy to be working with ABTA once again to refresh this essential training tool. Children everywhere have a right to be kept safe from harm and this updated tool will give travel professionals an understanding of the specific risks children face in travel and tourism, the importance of robust child safeguarding policies, and procedures to identify and protect vulnerable children.”