Management Information Sheet

On 26 March 2015, the Department for Education (DfE) published revised versions of ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ and ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’. They became statutory with immediate effect and this is guidance that all schools and further education colleges must have regard to when carrying out their duties to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.

Advice for practitioners has also been updated by the DfE in the following areas: What to do if you're worried a child is being abused, DfE (March 2015) and Information Sharing: Advice for practitioners, DfE (March 2015)

The guidance and advice replaces previous versions published by HM Government.

What should Schools & Colleges do?

Whilst ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’ remains largely unchanged, all relevant policy documents and procedures should be reviewed and revised to reflect the most up to date documents cited above.

In respect of ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’ the key changes to consider are:

• Clarification that the guidance applies to all schools and colleges including maintained nursery schools and non-maintained special schools.
• The guidance should be read alongside statutory guidance Working Together to Safeguard Children (2015) and departmental advice What to do if you're worried a child is being abused, DfE (March 2015) and Information Sharing: Advice for practitioners, DfE (March 2015)
• A summary of all other changes to ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’ can be accessed here.

Please note that all relevant guidance, training and policy documents have been updated to reflect the changes in statutory guidance and will be available via the Norfolk Schools’ website as soon as possible. Throughout these documents, the term Senior Designated Professional (SDP) has now been replaced with Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) to reflect the terminology used within ‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’.

Guidance on the transfer of child protection records

‘Keeping Children Safe in Education’ (2015) now provides further guidance on the responsibility of the designated lead to ensure that child protection files are transferred to the child’s new school or college as soon as possible. The guidance states that the DSL should ensure secure transit of the file and obtain confirmation of receipt of the file. Evidence from the recent Local Authority audit of school safeguarding practice, indicates that some schools feel less confident about how to transfer child protection records when a child leaves. In response to the finding and the updated information included in the statutory guidance, further advice has been devised in order to support schools and colleges to fulfil their responsibilities in this area.