After the holiday camp case – the professional ban for child molesters must be tightened

Care must be taken to ensure that children and young people in the leisure and sports area are not exposed to violent caregivers, Plakom said: “Everything must be done to protect the children.” She is “in close and intensive consultation” with Minister Raab to introduce corresponding legal regulations.

Ban on activities also in the voluntary sector
Raab said in the “Ö1-Mittagsjournal” that it must be ensured that anyone convicted of child abuse “should never work with children again”. In this direction, people with previous convictions “would have no place in child and youth work,” Plakolm said. The State Secretary for Youth is therefore seeking a general ban on working with children and young people in the field of children and young people if they have been sentenced to more than one year in prison for violations of sexual integrity and self-reliance. provision. According to Plakolm, this should not only apply to paid professional activities, but also to voluntary work.

Work bans are currently not automatically imposed
Family Minister Raab also favors the possibility that courts could prohibit indefinitely labor and activities in accordance with Article 220b of the Criminal Code, even in cases where the perpetrators had not yet had professional association with children at the time of the arrest. conviction. Currently, courts can prohibit convicted sex offenders from practicing their profession, but only if they have been sentenced to a year or more in prison and have previously worked with children, either professionally or as a volunteer. For example, if an offender is convicted of sexual abuse within his own family, he can return to work with children after serving his sentence. In addition, courts are currently required to review and, if necessary, lift the professional ban every five years.

Criminal record extract for children’s and youth work
In conversation with the APA, Plakolm can also imagine that in the future every volunteer who wants to take care of children and young people in an association will have to submit the extensive “criminal record for children and youth care” that has been in existence since 2014. Professional and activity bans and any instructions resulting from a judicial conviction or judicial supervision of sexually motivated acts of violence only appear in this, but not in the conventional criminal record. Plakolm is also considering extending existing payback periods for sex offenses – currently only prison sentences over five years are irrevocable.

Above all, it is also about giving the clubs, which are often founded on a voluntary basis, “legal certainty and guidance”, emphasized the State Secretary for Youth. They should be given the necessary tools to protect the children in their care. The aim should be to prevent men who have previously been convicted or who are prone to physical contact with children and young people from working or volunteering for unfair reasons.

Green indicates approval
The Green coalition partner gave its approval on Tuesday. “The fight against violence and abuse is also a political task. We cannot just leave the verification to the organizations, we have to create preconditions that all child and youth care providers must meet,” explains Barbara Neßler, spokeswoman for children and young people of the Greens. In a press release, she argued at the suggestion of the child protection organization Möwe for the mandatory introduction of a quality mark for providers of courses for children and young people that meet quality criteria and thus guarantee the well-being of the child.

In this regard, the Greens are pushing for an Austrian child protection law that would lay down these quality criteria for anyone providing services to children and young people. “It must be ensured that people who work with children go through a careful selection process and can demonstrate well-founded pedagogical education and further training,” says Neßler. She hopes that both the Youth State Secretariat and the Ministry of Education will take immediate action and present appropriate concepts aimed at the well-being of children and young people.

The FPÖ also wants tightening
“To protect the children, we demand very clearly that sex crimes should not be erased,” said liberal women’s spokeswoman Rosa Ecker and FPÖ spokesman for justice Harald Stefan. Corresponding criminal records should stand for life, they said in a joint press release. Both reiterated the demand for a general ban on working with children and young people for those with previous convictions for child abuse and similar crimes. The FPÖ also supports a child protection law that applies throughout Austria. “People with a criminal record for sexual abuse should no longer give leisure or sports courses to children with a liberal profession,” say Ecker and Stefan.