I really enjoy safeguarding training whether face to face – usually in Yorkshire – or further afield…as well as by Zoom. It is great to work with volunteers, staff, trustees and directors who are passionate about safeguarding whether that be children or adults at risk. Indeed, there is often an overlap between the 2 groups.
One of the things we talk about is keeping yourself up to date. In these days of the internet that can be even more challenging as things change so quickly. I always promise learners that I will try to promote any changes via my website. At the end of last year the government guidance ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ was updated. This was an update which would have been easy to miss as it was just before Christmas!
The full document can be found here.
The main changes to be aware of are:
- There is a set of principles for working with parents and carers that centre the importance of building positive, trusting and co-operative relationships to deliver tailored support to families
- The expectations for multi-agency working are strengthened with clear guidance
- A focus on better outcomes for children through new national multi-agency child protection standards.
There is a full summary produced by the NSPCC found here.
Remember – this is statutory guidance so MUST be followed.
Call to action – what should you do?
- Familiarise yourself with the changes
- Update your safeguarding policies to ensure that any reference to Working Together is the most up to date
- Check your policy – which should be updated each year – to ensure that the changes are reflected in your policy
- If you are a Designated Safeguarding Lead or responsible for staff who have safeguarding as part of their role, take some time to update staff. It would be useful to use this as a basis for a conversation. What does this mean for us? What good practice do we have in this area? Where can we look to improve?
As always if I can be of any help do let me know!