Click here to visit Ripon & Leeds Diocesan Website.
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DIOCESE OF RIPON AND LEEDS TAKING CARE POLICY Safeguarding children and young people.
As members of the Church of England we are concerned with the wholeness of each individual within God's purpose for everyone. We seek to safeguard all members of the church community, of all ages. It is the responsibility of each one of us to protect children and young people from physical, emotional and sexual abuse, and from neglect.
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The Child Protection Office for the Diocese of Ripon & Leeds is Sue Booth, and she should be your first contact if you have any queries or concerns about the welfare of children in your care. Sue can be contacted on: 0113 275 5266 If you get an answering machine, please leave your contact details and she will get straight back to you. EVEN IF A CONCERN SEEMS TRIVIAL TO YOU, PLEASE DO CONTACT HER - BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY... |
Taking Care Policy The Diocesan Taking Care Policy is a substantial document, which has recently been revised to include new sections on awareness of risks to children posed by use of the internet - and good practice when it comes use of images of children on your church's website, and in photographs or videos of events. You can look at, or download a .pdf copy of the Diocesan Taking Care Policy by clicking on this link. You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader to access this file. If you don't have it, you can download it for free if you click on this link!
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The following documents are samples of forms, following best practice, that you might find useful in your work. Please do adapt and use these as necessary: |
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Registration Form (for regular groups) This sample form should help you to keep comprehensive contact and emergency details for the children in your group(s). In order to comply with the Data Protection Act, you must have permission from parents or carers to transfer these details to a computer database, and you must keep them in a safe place where only the authorised leaders may access them. |
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Holiday Club Registration Form This sample form gives you the ingredients you need to make sure you have all the details you will require. It has a section confirming who will be collecting each child after the club ends. It also includes obtaining permission for photos or video to be taken, and for emergency medical treatment. If you plan to include activites that might run a higher than normal risk of allergic reaction (e.g. face painting) or physical injury (e.g. a bouncy castle, water-based or climbing activities) you should also list these and obtain parents/carers permission for their child to take part. |
| Outing Permission You will need to change all the details on this (!) - but hopefully it will prove a useful reminder of the kind of information you need to provide, and obtain in order to take a group on an outing. |
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Accident & Incident Report Sheet You should be keeping an Accident Book in a safe, but accessible place not only to make sure that there is a record in case of legal proceedings or safeguarding concerns, but also so that anything dangerous on your premises can be quickly made safe before it happens again! A loose leaf binder full of blank forms such as this, together with some carbon paper, is ideal. |
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Risk Assessment Check-List This is a really important, but surprisingly easy to use, document that you should be running through at least once a year in your regular premises - and also whenever you put on a special activity or club. You can no longer link to this document from this page, as a revised version can be found as "Appendix 1" of the Diocesan Policy document, which you can access above. |
