Yaxley Infant School is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

Safeguarding means:

• protecting children from abuse and maltreatment
• preventing harm to children’s health or development
• ensuring children grow up with the provision of safe and effective care
• taking action to enable all children and young people to have the best outcomes.

Please click on the link to see Peterborough's Children Safeguarding Board procedures:  http://www.safeguardingpeterborough.org.uk/children-board/professionals/procedures/

Please click here for the latest version of Keeping Children Safe in Education.

The Safeguarding team:

Laura Wales	Headteacher	head@yaxley.cambs.sch.uk
Bianca Liguori	Teacher	bliguori@yaxley.cambs.sch.uk
Abbie Richards	SENCO	arichards@yaxley.cambs.sch.uk

 

Key Contact List for Peterborough

Children's Social Care Contact Centre	(01733) 864170 / 864180
Children's Social Care out of hour Emergencies	(01733) 234724
Police	(01480) 456111 or 101
Early Helpline	(01733) 863649
LA Designated Officer (LADO)	(01733) 864038

 

Safeguarding and child protection Policy

Safeguarding and Child Protection Statement

Yaxley Infant School is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of all children. We aim to provide a safe, secure and welcoming environment where children are respected, valued and listened to.

Under section 175 of the Education Act 2002 (as amended), *the Education (Independent School Standards) Regulations 2014, the Non-Maintained Special Schools (England) Regulations 2015, and the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009 (as amended) to have arrangements in place to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.

We will endeavour to provide a safe and welcoming environment where children are respected and valued.

The school will therefore be alert to signs of abuse, neglect and exploitation and will follow the Cambridgeshire Safeguarding Children Partnership Board’s procedures to ensure that children receive appropriate and effective support and protection.Parents/carers should know that the law requires all school staff to pass on information which gives rise to a concern about a child’s welfare, including risk from neglect, physical, emotional or sexual abuse and exploitation. Parents/carers should know that records of safeguarding concerns may be kept about their child.  They should be informed that school staff will seek, in general, to discuss any concerns with them including referrals to other agencies.

Local procedures state that “Consent should always be sought from an adult with parental responsibility for the child/young person before passing information about them to Children’s Social Care, unless seeking consent would place the child at risk of significant harm or may lead to the loss of evidence for example destroying evidence of a crime or influencing a child about a disclosure made.”  This includes allowing them to share information without consent, if it is not possible to gain consent, if it cannot be reasonably expected that a professional gains consent, or if to gain consent would place a child at risk.

Where there is a need to share special category personal data, the Data Protection Act 2018 contains ‘safeguarding of children and individuals at risk’ as a processing condition that allows professionals to share information.

In accordance with legislation and local Information Sharing protocols, we will ensure that information is shared securely and sensitively.  Information will only be shared with other services where it is deemed necessary and proportionate to ensure that children and young people are safe and receive the right service. In all circumstances, the safety of the child will be the paramount concern.

Schools will contact Children’s Social Care when they have reasonable cause to suspect a child may be suffering or likely to suffer significant harm. Occasionally, concerns are passed on which are later shown to be unfounded.  Parents/carers will appreciate that the member of staff in the school with responsibility for child protection (known as the Designated Safeguarding Lead or Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead) was carrying out their responsibilities in accordance with the law and acting in the best interests of all children.

Holding power

Under Section 3 (5) of the Children Act 1989, any person who has care of a child “may….do what is reasonable in all the circumstances of the case for the purpose of safeguarding promoting the child’s welfare”.  This means that on rare occasions, a school may need to “hold” a child in school whilst Social Care and the Police investigate any concerns further.

Prevent Duty

Yaxley Infant School recognises that children can be vulnerable to extremist ideology and radicalisation. As part of our safeguarding responsibilities, we are committed to protecting pupils from these risks.

We work in partnership with relevant agencies, including the Local Authority and the Police, where appropriate. We actively promote fundamental British values and encourage pupils to treat people of all faiths, cultures and backgrounds with respect and tolerance, helping them to develop the knowledge and resilience needed to challenge extremist views.

For further information, please refer to our Child Protection and Safeguarding Policy or contact the school's Designated Safeguarding Lead.

Our PREVENT Action plan can be found here