Removing barriers: Supporting children to speak up about harm

Creating safe environments where children feel empowered to speak up if they are being harmed is central to the Child Safe Standards recommended by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

Yet many children still face barriers that discourage them from disclosing harm. According to the NSW Office of the Children’s Guardian (OCG), these barriers include:

• Fear they will not be believed
• Having no trusted adult to speak to
• Feeling intimidated, including by the perpetrator
• Personal vulnerabilities or previous experiences of harm
• Inaccessible or confusing reporting processes

For early childhood education and care (ECEC) services, understanding these barriers is critical. While educators work tirelessly to keep children safe, children’s voices can easily be overlooked if environments do not actively invite, support, and respond to disclosures.

The National Quality Standard (NQS) Quality Area 2 requires services to protect children’s health, safety and wellbeing. Beyond compliance, this means creating cultures where children feel secure, valued, and confident that they will be taken seriously if something goes wrong.

The Early Years Learning Framework (V2.0) also reinforces children’s rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, emphasising that children have a right to be heard in all matters affecting them.

For young children, speaking up often looks different — through behaviours, body language, or play. Educators play a vital role in noticing, interpreting, and responding to these cues with sensitivity.

The OCG has released a series of free posters designed to help organisations communicate reporting processes with children and young people in accessible ways. These resources can be adapted for use in early learning settings to:

• Make reporting processes visible and child-friendly
• Reassure children that they will be believed and supported
• Signal that adults in the service are approachable and trustworthy
• Encourage children to share worries in ways that feel safe to them

Services can access the posters here: Child Safe posters OCG NSW.

Removing barriers is not just about posters or policies,  it’s about embedding a culture where children know their voices matter. For ECEC leaders and educators, this can involve:

• Training staff to recognise the subtle ways children may communicate harm
• Establishing clear, accessible reporting pathways that are explained to children and families
• Actively building relationships of trust so every child feels they have a safe adult to turn to
• Regularly reviewing and adapting practices to ensure they remain inclusive and effective

By addressing the barriers and ensuring reporting processes are accessible, ECEC services take an important step towards making children safer and ensuring that every child knows they will be heard, believed, and protected.