Sign up for e-updates
There is an urgent need to take action on behalf of children without parental care
We are calling on governments and international donors to recognise the right of every child to grow up in a loving family environment.
We urgently need your help to tell world leaders that failure to keep children in families, out of residential institutions and off the streets, will be another barrier to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and condemn a generation of children to a life of abuse and neglect without the support and protection of parents.
There are at least 24 million children growing up without a family and their number is growing fast. Without adult protection children are more likely to die at an early age, are at greater risk of malnutrition, violence and exploitation and more likely to miss out on school. Despite this, preventing the loss of parental care is disgracefully absent from international development and aid policies.
EveryChild is asking people to sign up to a campaign that calls on the world leaders to put family care and child protection at the centre of international development policy.
> Go to www.everychilddeservesafamily.org.uk to sign-up to the petition and comment on the campaign.
What do we want UK politicians to do?
We are calling on the UK Government to recognise the right of every child to grow up in a loving family environment and to mainstream child protection issues and children left without parental care in its interventions on global poverty reduction.
> Watch and listen to EveryChild Chief Executive Anna Feuchtwang explain why urgent action is needed.
Who else can help keep children in loving families in poor countries?
Governments around the world and charities too can make a real difference. They need to commit to promoting family based care, in accordance with new UN Guidelines on child care, particularly by supporting poor families instead of building harmful children’s homes.
> See a message from Malawi calling for the full implementation of the UN Guidelines
Follow us