France's Education minister Najat Vallaud-Belkacem has unveiled new plans to tackle bullying in France, which affects up to 700,000 students every year. Victims will now be able to call a new hotline number and report bullying, anonymously, reports RFI.
The new emergency number for students being bullied is 3020.
Najat Vallaud-Belkacem unveiled the helpline service on Thursday, as part of the government's plans to stamp out bullying.
"Some people in our society imagine that bullying is a rite of passage in a student's life," the Education minister told reporters regrettingly. It's not.
Seven hundred thousand students are bullied every year in France, according to the ministry, a phenomenon that "can no longer be allowed to fester," Belkacem said.
Bullying can take several forms: threats, exclusion, aggression, or nowadays public humiliation on social networks like Facebook.