The PROGUARD project in the European Guardianship Network is a promising project to strenghten effective guardianship and cross-border coordination across Europe. 

The provision of quality guardianship to unaccompanied children is key if they are to receive an appropriate level of care and protection and if they are to achieve their full potential. Quality guardians can play complementary roles of ensuring that all decisions are made in the best interests of the child and contributing to the provision of safe and effective decision making by State actors.

The European Commission has highlighted the crucial role guardians play in guaranteeing access to rights and safeguarding the interests of unaccompanied children regardless of whether or not they apply for asylum. Further, the Commission acknowledges the positive role guardians can play in protecting children from traffickers and otherwise going missing from their care settings. The Commission wishes to see guardianship systems strengthened, particularly around the number of qualified guardians and the timescales for their appointment to work directly with children. The Commission also believes that there is a need to share good practice and guidance among guardianship authorities and the guardians who are engaged by them.

It is clear that much progress has been made in the last decade. However, the daily work of guardians needs to be strengthened further. The differences in the quality and sustainability of guardianship within EU countries are large and cooperation between organisations both at national and international level needs to be strengthened. There needs to be an improvement in common standards and ways of working as well as the development of consistency in practice within the Member States. It is clear that the support of many children can and must be improved in order to safeguard their rights and strengthen their development perspective.

This is why the ProGuard project aims to strengthen and professionalise guardianship in Europe by creating a practical toolkit including a train-the-trainer methodology.

The toolkit will roll out and deliver previously tried and tested training modules and tools and best practices in a structured way. Specifically, the toolkit will help guardians in their efforts to work in the best interest of the child, by strengthening their professionalism, mandate and position. It will also help to identify and apply durable solutions in the best interest of the child.

ProGuard is co-funded by the EU and led by Nidos in the Netherlands. The partners include METAdrasi (EL), Danish Red Cross (DK), Jugendhilfe Süd-Niedersachsen (DE), Orphans court Latvia (LV), Amici dei Bambini (IT), Centre for missing and exploited children (HR), Child Circle (BE), National Institute for Health and Welfare (FI), Missing Children Europe and The Council of the Baltic Sea States. The project runs from October 2017 to 2019.