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Safeguarding Policy

Updated

Safeguarding Policy

 

Key Contacts:

 

NSPCC helpline: 0800 800 5000

 

Jemma Phibbs (Designated Safeguarding Lead - DSL): jemma@school-space.org / 020 3369 3269

 

James Lloyd (Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead - DDSL): james@school-space.org

 

Local Authority Designated Officer (LADO) for all areas School Space operates in can be found here.

 

School Space Out of Hours On Call Line: London: 0800 311 8322 / Oxfordshire & Berkshire: 0800 311 8445

 

The scope of this policy

This policy applies to all staff at School Space and all of our hirers. It should be considered by School Space hirers in conjunction with the policies of the individual schools they hire, and their own safeguarding policies. It is with reference to the legislation and government guidance listed below. This policy should also be considered with reference to School Space’s Terms of Hire and School Space’s Health and Safety Policy and relevant procedures in our workplaces and partner schools.

 

We are committed to an annual review of our safeguarding procedures and policy.

 

Guidance

DfE Statutory guidance Working together to safeguard children 2023 

DfE Statutory guidance Keeping children safe in education September 2023

DfE Statutory guidance Keeping children safe in out-of-school settings 2020 (and its 2022 updates)

HM Government Guidance What to do if you’re worried a child is being abused

Home Office Guidance Mandatory Reporting of FGM

 

Legislation

The Children Act 1989

Education Act 2021

Children Act 2004

Children and Social Work Act 2017

 

Last Review date: June 2023



School Space’s Safeguarding Statement:

 

School Space believes that no child or vulnerable person should ever have to experience abuse of any kind. School Space is committed to the safeguarding of children and recognises that as an organisation we have a responsibility to ensure our staff members are trained and supported to recognise safeguarding concerns and that we promote safeguarding best practice. We also have a responsibility to ensure our hirers and all stakeholders we work with have taken the necessary steps to protect children and keep them safe, whether school students or attendees of the community groups who use our spaces. We aim to foster an understanding in each of our team members and hirers of their safeguarding responsibilities, whilst putting in place procedures to support everyone who uses a school space to safeguard children’s wellbeing and protect them from harm.

 

The purpose of this policy and our processes are:

  • To protect children, young people and vulnerable adults who hire School Space’s spaces
  • To protect children, young people and vulnerable adults in the schools we partner and work with
  • To provide all staff and associates of School Space with the overarching principles that guide our approach to safeguarding and child protection
  • To provide all staff with the correct information and tools to report safeguarding referrals or concerns within School Space, and to safeguarding partners where necessary

 

This policy refers to a number of procedures and documentation which is internal or for specific stakeholders. The aim of the policy is to give an overview of our approach to safeguarding, but we are always happy to respond to queries or provide further guidance, and will actively share further documentation with our partner schools.

 

 

Our Safeguarding Approach at School Space

 

Hirers

 

School Space exists to promote the use of school facilities out of hours by the local community. We work carefully to take steps to ensure this is done in a safe and appropriate way, and the procedures most relevant to safeguarding are listed below.

 

Our hirers are responsible for safeguarding their attendees, especially if they are children. Whilst they accept our terms and conditions before bookings, all hirers must also either opt out or read and accept a safeguarding declaration before they are allowed to hire any school sites. If they are working with young people or vulnerable adults, they must also upload a safeguarding policy and are subject to routine spot checks both of their policies and their on site usage. Below is a summary of the main steps we take in regards to establishing safeguarding expectations for hirers:

 

  • School Space ensure all hirers accept our Terms and Conditions upon booking. These can be read here: http://school-space.org/terms-conditions. 
  • These Terms and Conditions require the hirer to have their own safeguarding policies in place, and to ensure those working with children have adequate DBS checks. 
  • Our Terms and Conditions also require customers to comply with “Keeping Children safe in out-of-school settings”, and allows us to terminate the booking with immediate effect if they do not.
  • Our Terms and Conditions also ensure the person booking the event takes responsibility for their attendees on site — including the responsibility of appropriately supervising children.
  • Our Terms and Conditions also make specific reference to the Prevent Agenda, and state lettings are required to have adequate policies and procedures in place in relation to it. Customers who are religious groups have to confirm that their values align with British Values, and any groups who have political or religious elements to their organisation are subject to further vetting by our team.
  • Alongside our Terms and Conditions, we require hirers who work with young people or vulnerable adults to provide a safeguarding policy as part of our booking process. If hirers do work with children, we require a policy. If hirers do not work with children or vulnerable adults, they complete an opt out declaration.
  • We will conduct site based spot checks of hirers using a safeguarding checklist, to assess adherence to their own policies that they have provided us with, government guidance, and safeguarding of their attendees. Further information about these spot checks can be found below.
  • We are careful about the bookings we accept at all of our schools, including rigorous vetting procedures. Among our procedures are checks on all bookings Public Liability Insurance certificates, not allowing consumption of alcohol, appropriate limitations on types of usage and number of attendees, and requiring each booking to speak to a member of staff as well as completing checks via our online booking system.
  • Where possible hirers are grouped in areas to limit child and adult mixing, particularly in regards to toilet usage. Where this is not possible all hirers are responsible for ensuring that their attendees are supervised appropriately on site, and our staff are also trained to report unsupervised children at bookings.



Schools

 

School Space has a close contractual and practical relationship with each of its partner schools. It is key that we work with our schools to ensure that there is a safe handover time between lettings and hirers. Our partner schools are made aware at onboarding and review meetings that after this time (i.e during lettings, or “after hours” site usage) if students are present they are accompanied on site. We will report back to the school if any risks to this procedure are identified (for example, if in relation to an after school club which may not be a School Space hirer), or if a school student attends site unaccompanied during letting hours.

 

All safeguarding incidents during lettings hours are reported to our schools (and other safeguarding partners if appropriate) and all records of safeguarding incidents or concerns are available to our partner schools. We will actively share updates with our partner schools on safeguarding investigations and incidents according to our process and dependent on the nature of the incident. If a safeguarding concern is ever about a school student or presents a risk to school students, the school will be made aware as soon as possible and within one working day. 

 

  • We conduct an enhanced DBS check of each member of staff who works on a school site or has keys provided as part of their role working on school sites. Please see the ‘School Space’ section below for more information on training.
  • We provide these DBS numbers to our partner schools for all School Space staff required to be on-site, as well as vetting forms and date of safeguarding training if required for their records or Single Central Record.
  • Our partner schools work with us to ensure a safe and efficient handover between the end of the school day and lettings arriving on site. We will arrange the time that lettings can arrive on site. If there are students on site at this time, it is crucial they are supervised by a member of staff, as not all users of the site and their attendees  (for example adult only football) will have a DBS in place.
  • We conduct a risk assessment during onboarding to ensure access to confidential information within the school is restricted, both to our staff and hirers.
  • We share updates about any safeguarding incidents we are aware of on the school site, and in particular if they are regarding school students we will immediately contact the school’s DSL.



School Space

 

Our on site staff (Community Connectors and the Operations Team) are subject to Safer Recruitment Procedures, undergo an enhanced DBS check and are provided with safeguarding training and our own specific online training relating to lettings. In particular it is important that our staff are aware of how to raise safeguarding concerns, as whilst their role does not include responsibility for children, they are key in our oversight of hirers and our safeguarding aims. We use a number of methods (namely Incident Forms and our Safeguarding Form) to ensure that safeguarding concerns are flagged appropriately and swiftly via our reporting processes and that serious safeguarding concerns are reported immediately to our On Call team and our Designated Safeguarding Lead.

 

  • For any queries about our own safeguarding, Jemma Phibbs (Director) is the designated lead and has undertaken Designated Safeguarding Lead training, refreshed regularly, and Prevent Awareness Training.
  • The DSL will be available regarding safeguarding concerns via email or our office line during the working day, and via our On Call team as a form of escalation at all times of our operation. During Annual Leave arrangements for cover by the DDSL are made.
  • Our HR team have attended Safer Recruitment training, ensuring we can hire our site staff according to safer hiring procedures. We are committed to safer recruitment practices, including reference checks and enhanced DBS checks for all staff on school sites.
  • Our HR team follow a thorough process of vetting staff and then informing partner schools of their onboarding or offboard process, so that all partner schools are aware of who is employed at the site to manage hirers. At this point if there is any further safeguarding procedures or training requirements from the school we will arrange on an individual basis.
  • All site staff have a uniform, hi vis vest and personalised ID so they are easily identifiable to school staff and hirers.
  • Every member of our Head Office team whose role relates to our schools or hirers has received basic safeguarding training in order to understand what a safeguarding concern looks like and how to report incidents.
  • We are committed to safer recruitment practices, including reference checks and enhanced DBS checks for all staff on school sites.
  • Community Connectors should never have direct responsibility for children. They are trained in how to report safeguarding concerns regarding hirers or schools, and what to do if a school student or child does approach them. Each and every staff member undergoes our Safeguarding training, based on KCSIE Guidance, so that they are aware of the exact requirements of working on school sites after hours and how and when to report safeguarding issues to their manager.
  • Community Connectors are trained in how to use Incident Forms and our Safeguarding Form to report incidents or concerns. Our On Call team are also trained in how to identify and report safeguarding concerns and when to escalate these to our DSL.



How we manage reported safeguarding concerns

 

Safeguarding Concerns tend to be reported to us in the following ways:

 

  • Via our on site staff who may witness a safeguarding incident or have concerns about a particular community group
  • Via our school partners who may witness a safeguarding incident or have concerns about a particular community group
  • Via a school or a safeguarding partner who may be investigating a community group 
  • Via community users who may witness a safeguarding incident or have concerns about a different community group
  • Via the general public or community group attendees.

 

Our staff’s role is usually to escalate safeguarding concerns regarding groups or school students on site when they should not be, as it is rare that our staff members directly have children disclose to them due to the nature of their role. However, they are trained in what to do if this ever is the case, and we would work closely with the relevant safeguarding partner to manage a referral in this case. This does mean that it is especially important that we encourage a culture of reporting safeguarding concerns about community groups and the tools to do so, promoting and recognising best practice regardless of a lack of direct interaction with children.

 

Some of the tools we use to encourage a culture of referring safeguarding concerns: 

 

  • Spot checks of hirers on site
  • Spot checks of hirers on policies
  • Regular communication with and reporting to our schools - both SLT and Site teams
  • Training of all our staff in what constitutes a safeguarding concern, refreshed regularly
  • Incident forms and safeguarding forms and measures to make these as accessible as possible to team members
  • Provision of a full time On Call service and escalation point where safeguarding concerns can always be raised

 

Spot checks

 

There are two types of spot checks carried out on hirers at School Space - at random or due to a concern or incident reported. If we are conducting a check following a concern raised or incident reported, this may be to gather more information and is usually conducted by or overseen by our DSL in order to provide a more complete incident report to a LADO or school partner.

 

When we are conducting a random spot check, this can be done either of a safeguarding policy (stored on our platform) or during usage of a school site. For these we use a checklist to establish a ‘pass’ or ‘fail’ of the check. These are adapted from the Government Guidance “Keeping Children safe in out-of-school settings”.

 

If a hirer group fails either check, depending on the severity of the situation this is either reported to them to improve with further follow up checks, or to the relevant safeguarding partner. In serious cases School Space may suspend a hirer for a limited time, or permanently from using any of our school partners’ spaces, as well as informing the school and the relevant LADO.

 

Incident Reporting and Referral Process

 

Most team members are encouraged to use our Safeguarding Form, accessible on mobile phones (i.e. when on a shift without computer access) to ensure immediate and accurate reporting to our DSL. If there is no internet available, the risk to children is immediate or severe, or they are not sure whether to report a concern, to call our On Call line for guidance. This will then be escalated immediately to the DSL unless in Annual Leave periods, where it is escalated to the DDSL. They would then assess the risk and if necessary follow the process of a referral to children’s social care, or call the police if appropriate and the incident has occurred out of hours. If the DSL assessment determines that no referral can or should be made, an internal process of investigating the safeguarding incident will be conducted, with results shared with the school or LADO at each juncture.



Allegations involving School Space staff

 

Allegations or concerns about a member of staff, worker or volunteer must immediately be notified to School Space’s DSL (or the CEO if the concern is about the DSL). This guidance should be followed where it is alleged that anyone working within School Space:

 

  • Behaved in a way that has harmed a child, or may have harmed a child and/or;
  • Possibly committed a criminal offence against or related to a child and/or;
  • Behaved towards a child or children in a way that indicates he or she may pose a risk of harm to children; and/or
  • Behaved or may have behaved in a way that indicates they may not be suitable to work with children.
  • Or there are other concerns around the behaviour of School Space staff in relation to safeguarding.

 

The DSL will then determine if the allegation constitutes a low level concern or is of the threshold to inform the LADO. If there is any doubt about whether the information in fact meets the harm threshold, they will consult with the appropriate LADO.

 

The LADO will conduct any investigation, convene an Allegations Against Staff/Volunteers Meeting (ASV) and involve other agencies as appropriate. Following consultation, the DSL (or CEO) will decide on appropriate action, which may include consideration of disciplinary proceedings. 

Low level concerns that do not meet the criteria for an allegation, but the person has acted in a way that is inconsistent with the staff code of conduct, including inappropriate conduct outside of work, will be managed by our DSL. 

 

If the concern has been raised by a third party, the DSL will collect as much evidence as possible, including by speaking directly to the person who raised the concern and the individual involved. Low level concerns will be recorded in writing and kept confidential, although reviewed to identify potential patterns of problematic behaviour, or processes, policies or training that can be improved. If appropriate this may be managed in line with School Space’s disciplinary procedures or retraining provided.

 

School Space will promote an open and transparent culture in which all concerns about all adults working in or on behalf of School Space are dealt with promptly and appropriately. This should encourage an open and transparent culture; enable anyone in the organisation to  identify concerning, problematic or inappropriate behaviour early; minimise the risk of abuse; and ensure that staff are clear about professional boundaries and act within these boundaries, and in accordance with the ethos and values at School Space.

 

Further information as to how we log and track the process of Safeguarding incidents or concerns and when and how we share this with our partner schools and appropriate safeguarding partners can be found in our Safeguarding Procedures, available on request and to all of our partner schools on onboarding with School Space.

 

We are committed to reviewing our Safeguarding policy and good practice, annually.

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