1.Purpose & Scope
1.1. Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility, Fairhive, as a housing provider, has an important role to play in keeping people safe.
1.2. We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and adults who use or are connected to our services and to protecting them from abuse or neglect. This policy applies across all tenures and to all of our employees, including Board Members, sub-contractors, agents or volunteers operating on our behalf as well as tenants, other household members and children.
1.3. The policy and supporting procedures recognise the lead responsibility of local authorities in co-ordinating safeguarding work and our own role in alerting child/adult services of any appropriate concerns regarding safety. Any suspected or actual crime will be reported to the Police.
2. Definition
2.1. Safeguarding is a term which is broader than ‘child protection’ and relates to the action taken to promote the welfare of children and protect them from harm. Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility. Safeguarding is defined in the statutory Government guidance document ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018’ as:
- Protecting children from maltreatment.
- Preventing impairment of children’s health and development.
- Ensuring that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care.
- Taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes.
2.2. A child is anyone who has not yet reached their 18th birthday. The fact that a child has reached 16 years of age, is living independently or is in further education, is a member of the armed forces, is in hospital or in custody in the secure estate, does not change their status or entitlements to service or protection.
2.3. Somebody may abuse or neglect a child by inflicting harm, or by failing to act to prevent harm. Children are at risk of abuse within a family, in an institutional or community setting, by those known to them or, rarely, by a stranger. Children may be abused by an adult or adults or another child/children.
2.4. Safeguarding duties set out in the Care Act 2014 apply to an adult (any person aged 18 or over) who:
- Has needs for care and support (whether or not the local authority is meeting any of those needs).
- Is experiencing, or is at risk of, abuse and neglect.
- As a result of those needs is unable to protect them against abuse or neglect, or the risk of it.
2.5. The extent to which someone is at risk will be determined by a range of factors including personal characteristics (e.g. mental capacity, ability to communicate, degree of physical dependency) and factors associated with their situation (e.g. extent of support network).
2.6. Safeguarding includes the following categories:
- Physical Abuse.
- Domestic Violence/Abuse: Following the passing of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, children are now explicitly recognised as victims of domestic abuse if they see, hear or experience the effects of abuse. The Act has extended the controlling or coercive behaviour offence to cover any post-separation abuse.
- Sexual Abuse: The Domestic Abuse Act 2014 has also introduced a new standalone offence of non-fatal strangulation and threats to share intimate images is also now a criminal offence.
- Psychological Abuse.
- Financial Abuse.
- Discriminatory Abuse.
- Organisational Abuse.
- Modern Slavery.
- Hate Crime.
- Neglect.
- Self-Neglect.
- Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).
- Mate Crime/Cuckooing.
- Cyber Scams/Crime.
- Honour Based Violence.
- Forced Marriage.
- Radicalisation Exploitation.
- Suicidal Tendencies.
3. Policy Statement
3.1. Our Board, through the Chief Executive has overall responsibility for this Policy, its development, review and monitoring. The Assistant Director of Housing has overall responsibility for the implementation of this policy.
3.2. All employees who work with children, young people and vulnerable adults either directly or indirectly have responsibility for the implementation of the policy in their day to day work.
3.3. The following principles will apply to safeguarding children, young people and adults. We will:
- Apply this policy to all children, young people and adults at risk, regardless of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partner status, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion and belief, sex and sexual orientation.
- Share relevant personal information about children and families with lead agencies where there are safeguarding concerns in line with the Data Protection Act 2018. In all other circumstances agencies need to obtain consent.
- Share relevant personal information about adults at risk with the relevant Local Authority, lead partners, external agencies and/or the Police in line with the Data Protection Act 2018 where there are safeguarding concerns.
- Follow the Care Act 2014’s six key safeguarding principles when working with adults at risk: empowerment, protection, prevention, proportionality, partnership and accountability.
- Have in place arrangements which clearly set out the processes and timescales for sharing information with the relevant Local Authority, lead partners, external agencies and/or the Police.
- Listen to children and young people and take in to account their feelings and wishes whilst not promising confidentiality where the child or young person may be at risk.
- Ensure photographs and filming will only take place with the explicit consent to parents or guardians.
- Assume that adults have mental capacity to make informed choices about their own safety and how they live their lives. The Mental Capacity Act 2015 is central to actions and decisions in safeguarding adults.
- Aim to prevent, detect and report significant harm to adults at risk from abuse or other types of exploitation, whilst supporting individuals in maintaining control over their lives and making informed decisions.
- Ensure the wishes of the adult at risk are taken into account at all times and if a person does not have the capacity to make informed decisions, judgements of what is in their best interests will be made, where appropriate, through discussions with relatives, carers and other agencies.
- Record and refer all concerns, suspicions or allegations of abuse, harm or neglect where there is consent from the adult at risk, unless there is public interest consideration; or where there is immediate risk of harm; or where the adult requires urgent medical attention; or where there is a duty of care; or there is clear professional evidence of lack of capacity.
- Establish clear lines of responsibility and accountability for the detection, recording and reporting of safeguarding concerns.
- Ensure any systems related to the recording of safeguarding matters are confidential, robust and secure.
- Establish leadership responsibility at Board Level and a senior managerial level lead for our safeguarding arrangements.
- Undertake quarterly case reviews of all referrals to ensure policies and procedures have been followed.
- Work to ensure that contractors have an effective safeguarding policy in place, and, where not, that they are willing to work in accordance with our policy and processes.
- Provide appropriate supervision and support for employees, creating an environment where employees feel able to raise concerns and feel supported in their safeguarding role.
- Treat reports from employees who are at risk of reprisals as anonymous where possible but we cannot guarantee reporters will remain anonymous.
- Ensure recruitment processes follow the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) requirements, which include checking certain groups of employees and volunteers. DBS was set up to prevent unsuitable people from working with children and vulnerable adults.
- Ensure allegations and complaints against our employees or volunteers (people in positions of trust ‘PIPOT’) are treated seriously. If any allegations are made of this nature then they will be referred to the Assistant Director of Housing for further investigation and in accordance with the disciplinary policy in conjunction with the Head of Employee Engagement.
- Alternatively, employees or volunteers may have concerns regarding behaviour they have witnessed from employees employed by external agencies or volunteers (people in positions of trust ‘PIPOT’). In this instance the disclosure or concern will be raised with the Assistant Director of Housing.
- Record and refer all concerns, suspicions or allegations of abuse, harm or neglect referrals promptly to the lead agencies responsible for carrying out safeguarding assessments and enquiries; namely the relevant Local Authority Safeguarding Board, lead partners, external agencies and/or the Police. We will record the reasons why if a decision is made not to refer a concern.
- Work together with the lead agencies, and other statutory and voluntary agencies to protect the wellbeing of children and young people by contributing to multi-agency meetings, case conferences, or serious case reviews when requested to do so.
- Recognise that a child perpetrator may be a child in need of protection.
- Ensure all relevant employees receive training on safeguarding and their roles and responsibilities to identify, record and report concerns of abuse, harm and neglect.
- Recognise that all staff have a personal, professional and ethical responsibility to conduct themselves in a responsible manner at all times, and to protect the interests of residents. Where an incident of abuse involves a member of staff, action will be taken in accordance with relevant HR policies and procedures.
3.4. The Buckinghamshire Safeguarding Children/Adult Board provides a comprehensive guide for our employees with guidance when making referrals. The links to the guidance are located below:
3.5. Buckinghamshire Council has now merged the Safeguarding Children & Young People and Safeguarding Adults websites to provide one centralised online location for their Safeguarding services:
https://www.buckssafeguarding.org.uk/
3.6. We will ensure that our procedures reflect that we work not just with Buckinghamshire Council but also with other councils as well including Oxfordshire, Hertfordshire, Slough Borough and Northamptonshire County Councils and any other local authorities where we may have properties in the future.
4. Prevention Measures
4.1. We recognise the value in promoting Safeguarding so that residents can safeguard themselves and their children. We will take a pro-active approach to prevention, which will include (but is not limited to):
- Ensuring new residents are fully aware of their tenancy or occupancy obligations and our commitment to dealing with abuse before they move into their new home.
- Providing advice and assistance and a supportive environment, which encourages people to report abuse to us, the local authority, the Police or other relevant agencies.
- Using publicity in residents’ newsletters and other appropriate methods, to raise awareness of abuse, how to report abuse, and to provide information about available support and specialist agencies.
- Ensuring support needs and/or the need for protection is identified and is accessed by working in partnership with other specialist agencies, and that, where appropriate, this is ongoing.
- Ensuring that where a resident or applicant is a known risk (or potential risk) to others, that a risk assessment is undertaken regarding the appropriateness of the tenancy/letting and to consider how risks will be managed. We will work in partnership with the relevant agencies in this respect.
5. Monitoring & Review
5.1 The Board has overall responsibility in terms of challenging and monitoring our safeguarding practice as well as ensuring we are achieving our objectives and responsibilities in this area.
5.2. We will monitor the Policy to ensure it delivers the expected outcomes. Periodic case reviews are typical of the monitoring systems in use.We will also produce an annual safeguarding report for the Board.
5.3. We will review this policy when an organisational need arises. Typically we will review policies on a three year cycle.Our review programme is driven by service improvement initiatives, changes to legislation, regulation, best practice or as aresult of feedback from key stake holders.
6. Impacts
Resident/Staff Implications - We will ensure that our recruitment process follows the DBS regulations to assist in preventing unsuitable people from working with vulnerable children and adults.
All relevant employees will receive training on safeguarding and their roles and responsibilities to identify, record and report concerns of abuse, harm or neglect.
Equality, Diversity & Inclusion - A key principle of safeguarding is that people are listened to, have their views taken into account, are supported to make their own decisions and are treated with dignity and respect at all times. In accordance with our Equality and Diversity Policy we will ensure that this policy is applied fairly and we do not discriminate on the grounds of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partner status, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion and belief, sex and sexual orientation. To this aim we will complete an Equality Impact Assessment and monitor the application of the policy and procedures.
No child or group of children will be treated any less favourably than others in being able to access effective services that meet their particular needs. This applies to the process of identification of need and risk faced by the individual child and the process of assessment.
The implementation of procedures will be sensitive to the specific needs of individual tenants in accordance with our Equality and Diversity Policy.
Value for Money - Our primary objective within this policy is to set out our commitment to safeguarding children, young people and adults.
Through the implementation of the safeguarding children, young adults and adults procedure we will link with key partners to ensure all cases are managed effectively and efficiently and will achieve value for money.
Data Protection - We ensure that any systems related to the recording of safeguarding matters are confidential, robust and secure.
Accountability - We have consulted with the appropriate local authority Safeguarding Teams in the preparation of this policy. This policy will be available on request.
Quality - We look to ensure that our residents are safe in their home by supporting the provision of well-maintained homes which are in line with legislative and regulatory requirements.
When things go wrong - Residents can communicate concerns through our formal channels.
7. Related legislation and other documents:
Domestic Abuse Act 2021
Data Protection Act 2018
Children Act 1989 and 2004
Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018 (Statutory Government Guidance Document)
Information Sharing: advice for practitioners providing safeguarding services to children, young people, parents and carers 2015
Equality Act 2010
The Care Act 2014
Mental Capacity Act 2005
Anti-Social Behaviour Policy
Hate Crime & Harassment Policy
Domestic Abuse Policy
Access & Customer Care Policy
Disclosure & Barring Service Policy 2012
Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003 – Section 5b
Equality & Diversity Policy
Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking Statement 2018
PVP Procedure
Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006
| Author | Mark Frayne-Johnson |
| Job title | Housing Services Manager |
| Date approved | March 2023 |
| Review due date | March 2026 |
