With the school year about to end, the NGO Educo has wanted warn of the risk of helplessness and loneliness that more than half a million children between six and 13 years old will live, who will have to stay home alone due to the endless working hours of their parents.
In his report “Natives of the crisis: the children of the key”, Educo explains the precarious situation in Spain in eight out of ten poor families, who do not receive any kind of financial help who can take care of their children while they work.
The children of the key
They are children between the ages of six and 13 who spend their evenings at home alone or the whole day when summer comes. Children who eat breakfast, eat and even have dinner alone. They have no one to wait for them when they leave school, or anyone to take care of them when they get home. Children that no one will go to see act in the end of course function.
And not because her parents don't want to but because the economic situation of the family is so precarious, who are forced to work in endless days to get ahead, without any financial, family or social help.
More than two and a half million working people in Spain are poor, which would represent 14 percent of the salaried population; the highest percentage of all euro zone countries.
According to Educo's report, 77 percent of poor workers' homes did not receive any kind of financial aid during 2016. This makes parents cannot point their children to extracurricular activities or summer camps that can keep them occupied for longer and controlled by adults.
Therefore, these children are known as "children of the key" as they are responsible for entering and leaving their homes without any control. It is estimated that in Spain there are 580,000 children living this situation; 66 percent more than in 2009The director of Education and Social Action of Educo, Clarisa Giamello, warns that these figures are increasing and that there are two clear indicators that detect this profile of children:
On the one hand, the telephone calls of the directors of the schools to the social services of the town halls, when they realize that some children do not have anyone who is going to look for them when they leave the school.
Another clear indicator would be the house keys themselves, which many children even wear around their necks to prevent them from being lost.
The danger of being home alone
Surely on occasion the parents have asked us at what age can our children be left alone at home.
In Educo's report, Javier Urra, Ombudsman for Children between 1996 and 2001, explains that “leaving a child alone is very risky, since they are children and cannot respond to difficult situations as an adult would”.
The NGO warns of the dangers these children face when they are alone at home without any attention or care:
They spend a good deal of time in front of the television, exposed to all types of programming and advertising without filters
The children they can't tell anyone their problems or concerns. By not having an adult in their care, they lose the need to communicate something important to them at any given time.
But the situation is especially complicated between 11 and 12 years old, coinciding with the passage to ESO:
To the emotional problems derived from isolation and loneliness, there are other potential dangers such as alcohol and drugs
Further, one in five 15-year-olds becomes an "extreme user" of the Internet, without any filter or adult surveillance
With the passage to the institute, the children stop eating in the school canteen and become responsible for their food. Doctors warn that this poses a significant risk to the health of children, since they consume very caloric foods that in addition to being cheaper are easily at your fingertips
The loneliness of children increases in summer
But it is with the arrival of summer when this situation increases even more among the children of families with low resources, because there is the peculiarity that most of the family income comes from high-time jobs during the summer.
According to the report, the arrival of summer translates into two main problems for children:
- On the one hand, school vacations force children to be at home all day while their parents work. In the absence of financial resources, families cannot pay for summer camps, excursions or recreational activities.
- On the other hand, and not least, would be the issue of family holidays. Educo warns in his report that 58 percent of poor and working families with children between three and 16 years old could not go on vacation last summer for at least a week.
Not being able to enjoy free time with the family away from home is considered by the National Statistics Institute of Spain as one of the most important indicators of “severe material deficiency" But it is also a crucial indicator to observe the risk of poverty and social exclusion both in Spain and in Europe.
The summer dining scholarship program
For all this, and a few weeks after the school year ends, Educa has launched the summer dining scholarship program, which aims to serve families in Spain with economic difficulties, offering children a full meal a day and recreational activities and sports during the summer months.
Because no child should remain alone, either during the afternoons of the school year or during summer vacations.
And as long as conciliation policies are not promoted or more economic and social assistance is offered to low-income families, the number of "children of the key" will sadly continue to increase in our country
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