THE association which represents child care workers is expected to decide today to expel members who fail to report "untoward" behaviour by colleagues.
The move is to be included in a new code of ethics to be put to the annual general meeting in Dublin of the Irish Association of Care Workers.
The association's members work with children who are in residential care or attend childcare projects in the community.
The absence of a State licensing system for child care workers continues to hamper efforts to protect children in care, according to the IACW's national spokesman, Mr Pat Dolan.
Child care workers were placed at risk by the absence of any regularised procedures for investigating allegations against them, he said.
The absence of such procedures left workers feeling very vulnerable.
One of the saddest aspects of the situation, he said, was that many child care workers were wary about giving an "appropriate" hug to a child.
There was a need to rebuild the trust children could place in teachers as guardians, leaders and educators, the vice president of the University of Limerick, Prof Kieran R. Byrne, said yesterday. This need arose from "recent events and disclosures in many European countries revealing an obscene pattern of child abuse and exploitation".
Teachers, he said, were expected "to repair and remediate all the injuries done to a broader society", but they could not do it alone. If education was going to be driven by the need to respond to crises, then quality would suffer.
He announced that the university was to provide a formal diploma in systemic family therapy which would be closely related to the existing teacher training programmes.
. Children comprised half the casualties of modern wars, said Ms Maura Quinn executive director of UNICEF Ireland. "Many are killed by bombs and bullets, others are mutilated by landmines," she said in a statement to coincide with the presentation of a UN report on the effects of war on children.
"Many more die as a result of the more indirect and intangible evils of war, the destruction of health centres and water supplies and the tearing apart of families and communities," she added.