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Voluntary Community and Faith (VCF)

Safeguarding in Voluntary, Community and Faith Sector

All Voluntary, Community and Faith organisations should have in place at a minimum:

  • A safeguarding children policy
  • A designated person for safeguarding children
  • Appropriate safeguarding training for all staff. The designated person should undertake the Kirklees level 2 multi-agency training course ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’.

All organisations also need to ensure that arrangements are in to include:

  • Procedures for staff and others to report concerns that they have about the children
  • Appropriate codes of practice for staff
  • Appropriate recruitment procedures
  • Appropriate training and supervision of staff and volunteers
  • All allegations against staff must be reported to the local authority designated officer (LADO) who will advise on what action needs to be taken.

Local Resources

TSL Safeguarding Children policy

TSL Safeguarding Children Policy Procedures Template 2020

Safeguarding Guidance

DfE OSS Safeguarding guidance 2023 Leaflet

DfE OSS Safeguarding Guidance 2023

FinalSafeguarding posters

Safeguarding Checklist

The Safeguarding Board recommends that voluntary and community groups use this checklist to assess their current level of safeguarding practice, identify any concerns and areas for improvement, and identify any support that may be needed to implement improvements:

West Yorkshire Sport

National Resources

The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) helps employers make safer recruitment decisions on more than four million people every year. DBS is an executive non-departmental public body, sponsored by the Home Office. They are responsible for:

  • processing requests for, and issuing, DBS checks for England, Wales, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man
  • making considered decisions regarding whether an individual should be barred from engaging in regulated activity with children, adults or both, in England, Wales and Northern Ireland
  • maintaining the children’s and adults’ barred lists

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/safeguarding-duties-for-charity-trustees

Government Guidance on what to do to protect people who come into contact with your charity through its work from abuse or mistreatment of any kind.

Keeping children safe in out-of-school settings

Department for Education

Keeping children safe during community activities, after-school clubs and tuition: non-statutory guidance for providers running out-of-school settings – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Keeping Children Safe: Code of practice (publishing.service.gov.uk)

Safeguarding Children in Sport

NSPCC guidance and support for the Voluntary, Community and Faith Sector

This set of recommended standards and accompanying guidance will help non-statutory organisations in England that work with children and young people up to the age of 25, to put clear safeguarding arrangements in place.

They are aimed at voluntary and community organisations, as well as social enterprises and not-for-profit organisations that may not consider themselves to be within the voluntary, community and faith sectors.

The standards help organisations to take responsibility for keeping children, young people and young adults safe; have a practical approach; and comply with legislation and national guidance. They provide useful templates, examples, and links to further information, and are designed to be used alongside our safeguarding tool.

These include:

NSPCC – About safeguarding in faith communities

About safeguarding in faith communities | NSPCC Learning

Mosque Management

Practical advice for successful madrassah and mosque management.  Provides guidance on how to instigate good management styles, how to improve record keeping and how to build on good teaching and learning practice.

The NSPCC have produced 7 short films of people talking about their faith and how safeguarding is central to their beliefs and work. The films are aimed at people working in faith settings and places of worship across the UK to help them keep children safe.

Key Lessons From Safeguarding Practice Reviews

Upcoming Training events

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