North Inner City children launch “Listen to Us” podcast on safety and bullying

A record 96,666 child protection and welfare referrals were made to Tusla in 2024, according to Tusla’s Annual Report 2024. More recent figures presented to the Oireachtas Children and Youth Affairs Committee show that 98,122 referrals were recorded in the first eleven months of 2025, with the annual total expected to reach around 106,000, highlighting increasing pressure on child protection services and growing awareness of children’s safety needs.

In response to these concerns, children from Dublin’s North Inner City will launch “Listen to Us” on Tuesday, 24 March 2026, a four-week child-led awareness campaign organised by the Community After Schools Project (CASPr). The campaign shares children’s reflections on safety, bullying, kindness and emotional wellbeing through short podcast episodes and video reels recorded during workshops.

The initiative is designed to bring children’s experiences and perspectives into wider conversations about community safety, bullying, emotional well-being and violence prevention.

“Children understand their communities in ways adults can sometimes overlook. When we take the time to listen, we hear not only their concerns but also their ideas for creating safer and kinder communities,” said Tom O’Brien, CEO of CASPr.

The children themselves emphasised the importance of everyday kindness and inclusion in preventing harm.

“Kindness means including people and helping someone who feels sad,” said one of the children who took part in the workshops.

At the centre of the campaign are eight podcast episodes and eight short video reels documenting the children’s reflections and creative process during the workshops. The podcasts will be released in pairs, twice per week, over the four-week campaign.

Episodes will be available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and through the campaign website https://listentous.ie/. Each episode lasts approximately 1 to 4 minutes.

The project is aimed at children, schools, early years services, educators, policymakers, community organisations and political leaders, encouraging adults and institutions to listen to children’s experiences when shaping responses to violence and community safety.

The project is supported through the Daphne-CHILD programme, a European initiative led by Eurochild and Terre des Hommes and funded by the European Union through the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values (CERV) programme. The programme supports grassroots organisations across nine European countries that work to prevent violence against children, while ensuring that children themselves participate in shaping solutions.

The campaign will culminate in an advocacy seminar on 15 May 2026 in Dublin, bringing together educators, policymakers, youth organisations and child protection professionals to discuss the key messages emerging from the project and explore how children’s perspectives can better inform policy and practice.

For more information, visit https://listentous.ie.