CASW is committed to safeguarding all children, young people and adults that it comes into contact with. Whilst the organisation has a statutory obligation CASW also recognises a moral duty to ensure it functions in a way that safeguards and promotes the welfare of its staff, volunteers, clients and visitors.

CASW believes that all individuals have an equal right to protection from abuse, regardless of any personal or social characteristic and considers the welfare of the individual as paramount.

Our Safeguarding Commitment

CASW will take every reasonable step to ensure that children, young people and adults are protected. We will safeguard individuals by:

• valuing them, listening to and respecting them;
   
• providing a safe environment for children, young people and adults use our services;
   
• identifying individuals who are suffering, or at risk of suffering significant harm, and report concerns swiftly to relevant agencies;
• working in partnership with other relevant agencies to support multi-agency safeguarding work;
   
• responding effectively to any circumstances giving grounds for concern, or where formal complaints or expressions of anxiety are relayed;
   
• providing safeguarding training to all staff to ensure they are aware of their responsibilities and are knowledgeable of the types and signs of abuse;
   
• recruiting all staff and volunteers safely by ensuring that references, Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS); professional registration and the right to work in the UK checks are made to support managers making appropriate recruitment decisions;
   
• regularly monitoring and evaluating how our policies, procedures and practices are working to safeguard children and adults.

What is a Safeguarding Concern?

A safeguarding concern is when an individual is concerned about their own or someone’s else’s safety and, or well-being. It may be something they have seen or even been told.

These concerns may be about a friend, family member or a neighbour.  A safeguarding concern may also be about a colleague or a representative from an organisation who may be placing others or themselves at risk of harm.

Extremism and Prevent

Prevent is a key part of the Government’s Counter Terrorist Strategy. It is CASW’s duty to have regard for the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism. Preventing radicalisation remains part of our commitment to keeping children, young people and adults safe. We see no difference between safeguarding children, young people and adults from radicalisation than from other forms of harm.

We will also ensure that:

• staff understand the issues of radicalisation, can recognise the signs of vulnerability or radicalisation and know how to refer their concerns;
   
• CASW and its staff respond to preventing radicalisation on a day to day basis;
   
• all staff conduct is consistent with preventing radicalisation;
   
• we work with partners, including local authority and police and make referrals where appropriate to agencies regarding concerns about radicalisation.

What does this mean when accessing our services?

We aim to offer our service users a supportive and proactive service from employees who have the knowledge, skills and abilities to deliver to high professional standards. This includes our statutory duties to protect and support the wellbeing of those individuals whom we deliver to, and the wider communities we serve.

Protecting individuals from abuse and neglect; we will be proactive in seeking service users consent in taking action that may affect them unless it would place them or others at risk of serious harm. We will work in partnership with other agencies in the community, including community safety partnerships and other statutory agencies such as Children Services and Adult Social Care.

If you are accessing our services and have a safeguarding or extremism concern, please do not hesitate to ask to speak to our designated safeguarding officers.