World Day against Child Labour

While the adults are voting on the Lisbon Treaty in Ireland today, young children are voting with their feet in the fight against Child Labour.

At Dublin’s Spire, primary school pupils from 60 schools, mainly from Griffeen Valley Educate Together School in Lucan, are flying kites and releasing 218 balloons. Every balloon represents one million children, who are working instead of being at school. Well over an estimated 218 million children are working in the world today.

The young people at the Spire today-as well as schools and youth clubs throughout the country-are showing their solidarity for their less privileged counterparts around the world, who are forced to work when they should be at school.

Concern’s Stop Child Labour campaign organised the event to mark the World Day Against Child Labour.

Concern is asking people to take note of what the youngsters at the Spire are doing today. They are asking people to support the children at the Spire by buying ethical products, looking behind the label and never being afraid or shy to ask where something is made.

Oyin Lawal from Lucan and in sixth class at Griffeen Valley Educate Together School says, “Each kite had a sign saying ‘Stop Child Labour’. Children should just work in school,” she says.

Alex Kiernan, a classmate of Oyin’s, thinks it is scary that small children should be made work.
“My little five-year old sister is at school while children just her age are made work,” he says.

Ten-year-old Bhawana Chandel discovered that in Nicaragua children have to spray chemicals on crops and often get chemicals in their eyes.
“That’s not fair,” she says.

Nadia Khan, also 10, explains, “We are using our voices for the children in Child Labour because they cannot use theirs”.

And Cían McGlynn, in fourth class, says that they wrote a poem, a song and a play about the issue.

One of their teachers, Denise Ahern, points out that the idea of 218 million child labourers was a figure above the children’s imagination, so they made up a fictional child and called him ‘Makako’ and then used him to represent the plight of child labourers.