Brussels, 22 September 2026 – In just two years, the GUIDE project equipped hundreds of guardians and child protection professionals across Europe with practical skills, peer support and specialised tools, helping to address critical gaps in the support available to unaccompanied children.

Every year, thousands of unaccompanied children arrive in Europe seeking safety, making strong guardianship systems, well-trained professionals and effective cooperation essential to ensuring they receive the protection and care they need.

To respond to these challenges, the GUIDE (Supporting Guardians of Unaccompanied Children) project worked with professionals in Bulgaria, Greece, Slovakia, Italy and Poland, developing practical resources and recommendations to strengthen child protection and guardianship systems. These included service maps, national manuals, training programmes, peer-support Listening Circles, webinars and policy recommendations.

On 1 September, partners held a hybrid final event, Children Navigating Migration, at the European Economic and Social Committee in Brussels to share testimonials from guardians and children and to explore how Europe can improve child protection systems. While guardianship systems change from country to country, better coordination, stronger policies and funding, and greater government support are key to improving systems across Europe.

After two years, the project has contributed to stronger support systems for unaccompanied children and those working to protect them. Here are some of the achievements on the ground:

• In Bulgaria, GUIDE helped create a sustainable professional support network, engaging nearly 100 practitioners in Sofia, Ruse, Burgas and Stara Zagora through training and peer-support initiatives that continue beyond the project’s lifetime.
• In Greece, GUIDE trained 300+ guardians and professionals, nearly four times its national target, and strengthened cooperation between frontline services and public authorities. More than 60 people attended the national event.
• In Italy, GUIDE supported more than 60 professionals and developed national recommendations, co-created with public institutions, civil society organisations, academics and experts, helping to advance more coordinated and effective guardianship practices across the country.
• In Poland, several participants reported that the training and certification helped them secure positions in residential care facilities, including homes supporting children evacuated from Ukraine. The project also established five support circles for guardians, fostering peer learning and collaboration so effectively that participants requested their continuation beyond the project’s end.
• In Slovakia, GUIDE trained 50+ professionals, engaging 60+ participants through 36 peer-support Listening Circle sessions, and bringing together 70+ stakeholders through policy and awareness-raising events to improve coordination, training and long-term support systems.

This project demonstrates that improving cooperation between stakeholders can make a meaningful difference in the lives of unaccompanied children. All the GUIDE tools and resources will remain available to support future efforts to build more inclusive and effective child protection systems across Europe.

Download the resources and watch the short documentary

A year ago, the idea that technology platforms would have to prove they are safe for children might have sounded like wishful thinking. Last week, it sounded more like official European policy.

In her State of the Union address, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced an EU Kids Act that the burden of proof would be reversed: platforms will have to prove they are safe for children, rather than waiting for children to be harmed and asking what went wrong. It represents a step change in where responsibility sits for keeping children safe.

Building support for this kind of change is exactly why, with the support of the European Association of Communications Agencies, we launched Childhood Redrawn.

Through illustrations inspired by children’s scrawls and drawings, Childhood Redrawn brings the impact of tech design choices to life. It follows children across social media, games, streaming, messaging, AI chatbots, search engines and education platforms, capturing experiences of anxiety, loneliness, artificial dependency, public exposure and loss of critical thinking. These risks are not inevitable. They are designed. And if people designed them in, people can redesign them out.

For too long, when children encounter harm online, the response has been to ask what the child should have done differently. Should they have spent less time online? Used parental controls? Turned off notifications? Recognised an algorithm was manipulating their attention? Of course parents have a role. But children are entering digital environments designed by adults and often around commercial incentives that have little to do with their wellbeing.

Childhood Redrawn calls for four things: child-safety certification as a prerequisite for technology used by children; a legal ban on personalised services for under-13s; age-tiered protections for all under-18s that evolve as children grow; and regulatory powers to restrict services that expose children to serious risk and harm. Reading the new EU Kids Act, it looks like the European Commission was listening.

None of this is about keeping children away from technology. Children deserve access to its extraordinary opportunities. But we should not have to choose between those opportunities and their rights. We would not give a child a bicycle with faulty brakes and then hand them a leaflet explaining how to brake more carefully. We would fix the brakes. Technology should not get a special exemption.

The detail of the EU Kids Act will matter enormously. The rules must be coherent, comprehensive, future-proof and enforceable, wherever children are and whatever technology they use. At this crucial moment, we must keep the pressure up for meaningful change. You can help by downloading and sharing the Childhood Redrawn campaign assets, now translated into twelve European languages, and helping us build support for a digital world that is safe for children by design and by default.

A safer digital childhood is not something we should have to redraw from scratch every time a new technology arrives. We can design it better now.

Explore and share Childhood Redrawn

Venue: Council of Europe, Agora, G 03, Strasbourg and online
Date: 2 October 2026, 9.30 -12.00 
Deadline for registration: 30 September 2026, CoB.

Please note that the participation link will be provided after confirmation of registration. When you submit this form, it will not automatically collect your details like name and email address, unless you provide them yourself.

REGISTRATION FORM

President von der Leyen’s State of the Union (SOTEU) address placed security, Ukraine, competitiveness, climate change and Europe’s strategic independence at the centre of the EU agenda. It also introduced an important new focus on protecting children online through the proposed EU Kids Act. But where were the children facing the greatest barriers to exercising their rights?

For Eurochild, children’s rights must remain visible across Europe’s wider agenda – from online safety, tackling child poverty and implementing the European Child Guarantee to education, mental health, housing, care and the next EU budget. These issues are deeply interconnected.

The coming year will be decisive. The negotiations on the 2028–2034 Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) will shape how the EU invests in children, families and communities for the next seven years. Alongside the implementation of existing commitments, including the European Child Guarantee and the European Pillar of Social Rights, the next EU budget must ensure that resources reach the children and families facing the greatest barriers to their rights and opportunities. 

A welcome shift on online safety

Eurochild welcomes the focus on children’s online safety and the proposed EU Kids Act.

The debate has moved beyond the polarising choice between a “ban” and “no ban”, which obscures the real issue: whether we accept a digital environment designed around profit and attention capture, or insist that platforms are accountable, transparent and safe by design for children.

We look forward to analysing the proposal, consulting our members and engaging constructively to ensure that it fully protects and promotes children’s rights. This must include children’s rights to protection, participation, privacy, freedom of expression and access to information. While we welcome the reference to the prohibition of AI-generated child sexual abuse material, introduced last year, greater attention is needed to prevent and address child sexual abuse and exploitation, including through the swift adoption of a permanent and effective EU Regulation to prevent and combat child sexual abuse.  We also look forward to contributing to the Digital Fairness Act and the revision of the Audiovisual Media Services Directive.

However, children do not experience the digital world separately from their material circumstances, family situation or place of residence. Meaningful access to the digital world depends on suitable devices, reliable connectivity, digital skills and trusted adults, as well as services designed to respect children’s rights and keep them safe. Protecting children online therefore also requires investment in children, families and communities offline. 

Tackling poverty, housing challenge and regional inequalities

We welcome the recognition that care, housing, and staying in the region are rights, not privileges. For children, access to adequate housing, care, education, healthcare and other essential services can shape the course of an entire lifetime.

Families continue to face high food, housing and energy costs, economic insecurity and increasing pressure on public services. Regional inequalities also persist. Poverty rates are highest in cities and other urban areas, meaning a larger proportion of children may live in households experiencing poverty there. On the other hand, rural and remote areas are losing populations and essential services, leaving some children without access to the professionals and support they need. 

The announced European Care Deal, investment in regions and renewed commitment to the European Pillar of Social Rights must focus on children, particularly those experiencing poverty, children with disabilities, children with a migrant or ethnic minority background, children in alternative care, children in single-parent or large families, and those living in disadvantaged areas. We welcome the Climate Insurance Alliance, the European Heatwave Plan and the commitment to identify the 100 territories most at risk from climate change. This agenda must explicitly include children and recognise that vulnerability is often cumulative: poverty, inadequate housing, exclusion, environmental risks and limited access to services can reinforce one another. 

Defending rights and democracy

We welcome the strong defence of fundamental rights and the recognition of threats to democracy. Civil society organisations, including Eurochild’s members, are indispensable to this work. They reach children and families whom public systems may not reach, provide trusted support, identify emerging needs and bring children’s experiences into policymaking. Yet many face insufficient and increasingly uncertain funding.

Protecting democracy also means protecting the principles through which children’s rights are understood. Children must always be recognised as rights-holders, not only as vulnerable individuals or future workers and citizens, in all contexts, including when they are in contact with the law. 

The future cannot be genuinely equal while women continue to carry a disproportionate share of unpaid care responsibilities. Affordable, accessible and high-quality care is essential to women’s rights, participation and access to employment, and to children’s wellbeing. 

Children on the move 

The Commission announced an EU Emergency Response Framework for large-scale migration situations, including temporary flexibility in existing procedures, which could risk reducing the rights of children on the move. 

For Eurochild, children’s rights must remain explicit and non-negotiable in all migration and asylum responses. This includes protecting family unity, unaccompanied children, reception conditions, access to education and healthcare, child protection and safeguarding.

This is particularly important when increased returns are presented as a measure of success. Migration policies must be assessed not only by how efficiently returns are carried out, but by whether children’s rights, safety and wellbeing are fully protected throughout the process. 

Children affected by war

Eurochild welcomes the continued support for a resilient Ukraine and the recognition of Ukrainian children and young people not only as victims, but also for their strength, resilience and contribution.

We also welcome the Commission’s recognition that Israeli settlement projects are unacceptable and its commitment to supporting. We regret the omission of any reference to accountability for alleged war crimes committed by Israel and the absence of a discussion of the EU’s decision not to suspend the EU-Israel Association Agreement, despite persistent concerns regarding compliance with international law and the protection of children’s rights in the occupied Palestinian territory. 

Armed conflict inherently violates children’s rights. Supporting children affected by war must go hand in hand with efforts to achieve peace, uphold international law and ensure accountability.

From commitments to implementation

Any discussion of children’s rights risks becoming empty if it overlooks the children facing the greatest barriers. Disadvantages frequently overlap: poverty, disability, migration status, discrimination, inadequate housing, alternative care and geographic isolation can create multiple and mutually reinforcing inequalities.

Eurochild will monitor how the commitments announced in the SOTEU translate into concrete policies, funding and improvements in children’s lives. In particular, we will advocate for:

• Adequate and traceable investment in children in the 2028-2034 EU budget; 
• Strong implementation of the European Child Guarantee, the EU Anti-Poverty Strategy and the European Pillar of Social Rights, supported by effective monitoring through the European Semester; 
• An EU Kids Act and wider digital framework, including the Digital Fairness Act, the revision of the AVMSD and permanent strong legislation addressing child sexual abuse; 
• Children’s explicit inclusion in EU action on housing, care, climate resilience, migration, enlargement and intergenerational fairness; 
• Integrated child protection systems that invest in prevention, family strengthening and accessible services, including mental-health support for every child, including through the Action Plan on children involved in crime. 
• Meaningful child participation and sustained support for civil society organisations, ensuring that children’s experiences and expertise inform EU policymaking; and 
• A strong defence of children’s rights against discrimination, anti-rights movements and democratic backsliding.

The SOTEU sets a direction for the year ahead. Eurochild’s role is to ensure that all children remain visible within that agenda, not only as a group requiring protection, but as rights-holders whose wellbeing, participation and opportunities must be central to Europe’s future.

According to ENAR, after ten months of questioning, auditing, and profound uncertainty, the organisation was notified late in July that its operating grant for 2026–2028 had been terminated, apparently over concerns about its operational and organisational capacity.  

It should be noted that a year earlier, in July 2025, along with other EU grantees, ENAR was informed that it had successfully passed the evaluation required to sign its grant agreement. However, among the 70 successful EU grantees, ENAR was the only one left without a signed agreement and, eventually, to face termination.  

While ENAR has stated publicly that it has launched a legal challenge against this decision following its disagreement with the assessment behind the decision, the network faces a serious risk of closure. We support ENAR’s decision to seek legal recourse to assert its rights.

At a time when anti-racist organisations across Europe are operating in an increasingly hostile environment, the consequences of weakening the infrastructure that supports more than 140+ independent anti-racist civil society organisations extend far beyond a single organisation. 

Further information

• Read about Eurochild’s campaign Fighting Anti-Rights Movements
• Listen to theEurochild podcast episodes on the attacks on civil society and on shrinking funds for NGOs.

Children’s rights are universal. Yet we observe that rights are increasingly becoming conditional and are not realised to the same extent for every child. On October 22, STEKR will bring together professionals from research, practice, policy, and civil society in Brussels to examine this trend. With speakers from Eurochild, the Federal Institute for Human Rights, Kif Kif, Odisee University of Applied Sciences, the Network Against Poverty, and the Children’s Rights Commissioner, among others, we will delve into fundamental social rights, the hardening of the view of the child, and educational inequality.

The conditionality of rights means that you must meet certain conditions before you gain access to a right. Or conversely: by meeting certain conditions, you gain more or less access to rights. That in itself is not necessarily good or bad-consider, for example, child benefit, to which you are entitled if you raise children. However, the consequences of that conditionality can put children’s rights under pressure. 

The universality of children’s rights is also under pressure: not all children’s rights appear to apply to all children to the same extent. Moreover, this trend is not limited to children and young people. It is more broadly visible in social policy and among various vulnerable groups.

Where? Les Ateliers des Tanneurs, Huidevettersstraat 60A, 1000 Brussels 

Price? 120 euros (100 euros for members of the Children’s Rights Network)

Event in Dutch.

Read the agenda and register

Children’s rights must be an essential part of the EU enlargement process. As candidate and potential candidate countries work towards EU membership, monitoring progress on fundamental rights is crucial to ensuring that children’s rights are protected not only in law, but also in practice.

For many years, Eurochild has worked with children’s rights organisations across the enlargement countries to bring national evidence, expertise and children’s perspectives into the European Commission’s Enlargement Package. During the 2026 enlargement cycle, Eurochild mobilised its network of more than 40 members to gather evidence, share key findings with the European Commission, submit written contributions and support national organisations in consultations on fundamental rights.

This report, covering Eurochild’s engagement from January to June 2026, highlights the key issues raised by members and demonstrates the important role of civil society in ensuring that children’s rights remain visible throughout the EU enlargement process.

Read the full report

The European Committee of Social Rights organises the annual training for civil society organisations (CSOs) to enhance their capacity to contribute to the monitoring and implementation of the European Social Charter. 

Venue: Council of Europe, Agora, G 03, Strasbourg and online.

Submit your response by 30 Sept 2026

Eurochild welcomes the publication of the report by the Co-Chairs of the Special Panel on Child Safety Online. The report is the result of a broad consultation process involving researchers, practitioners, children and youth representatives, civil society organisations, public authorities and industry. The report acknowledges that its analysis was informed by civil society and other specialists, while clarifying that the final recommendations remain the responsibility of the Co-Chairs.

Alongside our participation in the Panel, Eurochild has brought its position into the wider public and institutional debate, including through media engagement. We are pleased to see that many of the concerns raised by Eurochild, our members and children themselves have found a clear place in the final report.

The report adopts a notably comprehensive approach. It addresses platform responsibility, harmful business models and design features, safety by design and by default, privacy-preserving age assurance, children’s participation, access to platform data, research, education, support for parents and investment in offline alternatives. It reflects the central message of Eurochild’s position: age restrictions alone will not protect children if the digital environment itself remains unsafe.

Read our full reaction

In their letter, the signatories welcome the EU Commission’s expert panel’s report for its focus on safety-by-design and age-appropriate design. They support the recommendation that providers should bear the burden of demonstrating that services accessible to children are safe.

They are calling on President von der Leyen to use the State of the European Union address to commit to a harmonised EU approach that makes safety a condition of providing digital services to children.

They recommend establishing:

• Mandatory age-appropriate safety norms for digital products and services, with age-tiered gating of risky features and functionalities as well as positive safeguards.
• Independent risk assessments on child safety and pre-certification processes requiring companies to demonstrate compliance before launching, operating or updating services accessible to children.
• Independent auditing and strong enforcement to ensure compliance.

Mieke Schuurman, Eurochild Director of Child Rights and Capacity Building said, “Children should not be expected to carry the burden of keeping themselves safe in digital environments designed to maximise engagement and profit. The EU has an opportunity to set a clear standard grounded in children’s rights: digital services accessible to children must be safe by design and by default, backed by independent risk assessments and strong enforcement.“

Read the full letter