The Pool of International Experts on Safe Sport held their second annual meeting on 5 December 2023 in hybrid format (Strasbourg and online). Organised by the Enlarged Partial Agreement on Sport (EPAS) in the framework of the “Start to Talk” project, the meeting included a roundtable entitled “Safer recruitment in sport: human rights-compliant screening of criminal and disciplinary records”.
The morning session, restricted to Pool members, was dedicated to sharing updates on the work of each member and discussing 2023 deliverables and the working programme for 2024. A decision was reached to focus on trauma-informed practice in the framework of safeguarding in sport at the 2024 annual meeting. Joyce Cook, Senior Advisor to the President’s Office at FIFA, presented the independent trauma-informed approach implemented by FIFA. Gloria Viseras, Senior Project Manager at the International Olympic Committee’s Safe Sport Unit, presented the IOC’s Safeguarding Regional Hub Model.
The afternoon roundtable allowed for an exchange of opinions and know-how between professionals from different sectors and addressed emerging human rights challenges in the national and international sharing of criminal and disciplinary backgrounds of employees and volunteers in regular contact with children in sport. Guest speakers included Sébastien Boueilh, General Director of the French association Colosse Aux Pieds D'Argile, Iris Janssen, policy officer at the Dutch Ministry of Justice and Security, and Caroline Nogueras-Flavigny, French journalist and producer of investigative reports and documentaries. Three members of the Pool also participated in the exchange: George Nikolaidis, Psychiatrist and Research Director of the Department of Mental Health and Social Welfare at the Greek Institute of Child Health, Håvard B. Øvregård, Senior Adviser at the Norwegian Olympic and Paralympic Committee and Confederation of Sports (NIF), and Ieuan Watkins, Safeguarding Consultant at Sport Safeguarding Limited in Wales, United Kingdom.
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