YOUNGSTERS in East Lancashire will be visited by ChildLine volunteers who will talk to them about abuse and how to stay safe as part of an ambitious national programme.

Using assemblies and workshops, the new service is designed to encourage children to recognise situations where they may need help and to tell them ways of accessing support.

Delivered by volunteers, the ChildLine Schools Service programme will enable them to understand how to keep themselves safe and where to get help if they need it.

The sessions are sensitively tailored to ensure topics are suitable for nine to 11-year-olds.

Across Lancashire the service needs to recruit 80 volunteers to reach the 568 schools and over 101,962 children in three years.

Andrew Hutchinson, a Lancashire ChildLine Schools Service volunteer, said: “Many abused children do not understand that what is happening to them is abuse.

“The assemblies and workshops empowers the children. It gives them a voice.”

The NSPCC will launch a national appeal to raise money for this ground- breaking service early next year.