The British media became obsessed with the disappearance of Madeline McCann, apparently kidnapped in Portugal in summer 2007. Tragic as the case was, the reaction was bizarre when you consider that an estimated 100,000 to 180,000 children go missing every year in the UK.
While newspapers flail about demanding ill-considered new laws and protective measures (forgotten when the next popular crusade comes along), British charity ‘Parents and Abducted Children Together’ or PACT, has been working for years to reduce the problem of child abduction, and to help when it happens.
PACT has quite a pedigree. It was established in 2000 by the wife of the British ambassador in Washington, with patrons Cherie Blair and Laura Bush. Originally, its remit was to fight parental child abduction, but it has since extended its net to include the location and retrieval of all missing children. Reflecting the often cross-border nature of the problem, PACT is an associate of the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children.
PACTS work is threefold: to prevent children running away or being abducted, to provide practical support when it happens, and to make it easier to find missing children.
PACT’s Preventative methods are counselling for children who are considering running away, school visits and web forums, and mediation in parental disputes over child custody. Practical support is specialist legal advice, help with publicity, and creating links between the disparate UK charities that support runaways.
To increase our chances of finding missing children, PACT has secured backing of Home Office and police for the Missing Kids Website (www.missingkids.co.uk), and promoted the Child Rescue Alert, which disseminates details of a missing child across the media. PACT has gained support in the highest echelons of government, and initiated parliamentary debate.
Although there’s no doubt that the disappearance of a child is about as traumatic as it gets, it would be some relief to know there’s a body of men and women calmly working to help.
www.pactonline.org
