Seabridge Primary School holds the safety, health, well-being and welfare of its students as paramount.
We all have a statutory duty to “safeguard and promote the welfare of children”. To maintain a professional attitude of “it could happen here” where safeguarding is concerned.
We are committed to safeguarding and work together to ensure that our pupils thrive in a safe and supportive environment, whatever their age, ethnicity, religion, disability, sexual identity or gender. All staff in the School are trained in Safeguarding and Child Protection issues and are kept up to date with changes in legislation and practice. We take any allegation and suspicion of abuse seriously and will respond to them promptly.
All staff recruited to the School undergo a rigorous safer recruitment process in line with the Statutory Guidance outlined by Keeping Children Safe in Education 2018 and as a consequence all of the necessary background checks for example DBS are completed before staff begin employment.
All staff are encouraged to report any concerns that they have and not see these as insignificant. On occasions, a referral is justified by a single incident such as an injury or disclosure of abuse. More often however, concerns accumulate over a period of time and are evidenced by building up a picture of harm over time; this is particularly true in cases of emotional abuse and neglect. In these circumstances, it is crucial that staff record and pass on concerns in accordance with this policy to allow the Designated Safeguarding Lead to build up a picture and access support for the child at the earliest opportunity.
We have adopted the definition of Safeguarding used in the Children Act 1989 and the Children Act 2004 and the DfE guidance document: Working Together to Safeguard Children March 2015 which focuses on safeguarding and promoting children, young people and vulnerable adult’s welfare.
We also make use of the online reporting service, Whisper, which allows any safeguarding concerns to be reported by parents or members of the local community, and this facility has also been shared with the children as an additional way to alert us to their worries and concerns. The submission of a report triggers an email to the DSL.
If you have a safeguarding concern where the child has been harmed or is at risk of harm e.g. physical, sexual, emotional abuse or neglect, you must talk to one of the safeguarding immediately. If you are unable to contact them you can ask the school office staff to find them and ask them to speak to you straight away about a confidential and urgent matter, or report the concern via Whisper.
Useful national contacts:
NSPCC: 0808 800500
Childline: 0800 1111
The Department for Education has commissioned the NSPCC to launch a new helpline called Report Abuse in Education, linked to peer-on-peer abuse: 0800136663
