Understand How to Set Up a Home Based Childcare Service

Any individual who comes into contact with children in their daily line of work “has a duty to safeguard and promote the welfare of children”.

Children Act 2006 – Is an Act that defines the new duties imposed on the Local Authorities in respect to improving the Every Child Matters outcomes for pre-school children. The Act also defines new rules in relation to childcare for working parents as well as parental information services. It is aimed at improving the well-being of young children. It emphasises the importance of safeguarding children and young people within an educational setting. If a child discloses neglect or abuse; an establishment should have instructions to help the child. This could be referral to an outside organisation or internally.

Children Act 1989 – Determines the duty of early year’s practitioners to identify and meet the separate and distinctive needs of children and to keep them safe. It initiated the belief that the child ought to be at the centre of planning and that a child’s well-being and safety are vital when judgements are made concerning them. This act also recognises the accountabilities of parents in keeping their offspring safe. In this act there are two particular segments that relate to the duty of local authority with concern to child protection, these are-

1.1 outline current legislation, guidelines, policies and procedures within own UK home nation affecting the safeguarding of children and young people.

Children and young people should feel happy, safe, respected and included in the school or early years setting environment and all staff should be proactive in promoting positive behavior in the classroom, playground and the wider community. Policies and practice which make sure the safety and wellbeing of children should already be in place and it is this legislation develop through many years and experiences, and mistakes, that underpin the working practices that are used today.

This means keeping children safe from accidents (i.e. road safety), crime and bullying and actively promoting their well-being in a healthy, safe and supportive environment. It also encompasses issues such as pupil health and safety and bullying, about which there are specific statutory requirements, and a range of other issues, for example, arrangements for meeting the medical needs of children with medical conditions, providing first aid, school security, drugs and substance misuse.

| Section 175 of the Education Act 2002 requires local education authorities and governing bodies of maintained schools and FE colleges to make arrangements to ensure that their functions are carried out with a view to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children.All children deserve the opportunity to achieve their full potential.  The five outcomes that are key to children’s and young people’s wellbeing are: * Stay safe * Be healthy * Enjoy and achieve * Make a positive contribution * Achieve economic wellbeing The school should give effect to their duty to safeguard and promote the welfare of their pupils (students under the age of 18 years of age) under the Education Act 2002 and , where appropriate, under the Children Act 1989 by: * Creating and maintaining a safe learning environment for children and young people. * Identifying where there are child welfare concerns and taking action to address them in partnership with other

It is everybody’s responsibility to safeguard children – This means every single staff member within a setting; irrelevant of what role they may have there. This also includes non-staff members, such as volunteers, student’s third-party companies (visitors, service providers etc). Each setting should therefore adopt their own safeguarding policy, of which has to be kept up to date and followed at all times.

Ensuring children and young people’s safety and welfare in the work setting is an essential part of safeguarding. While children are at school, practitioners act in ‘loco parentis’ while their parents are away. As part of their legal and professional obligations, practitioners hold positions of trust and a duty of care to the children in their school, and therefore should always act in their best interests and ensure their safety – the welfare of the child is paramount (Children Act 1989). The Children Act 2004 came in with the Every Child Matters (ECM) guidelines and greatly impacted the way schools look at the care and welfare of pupils. Children and young people should be helped to learn and thrive and be given the opportunity to

It is important to ensure children and young people are protected from harm within the setting, as the parents are leaving their children in your care with the expectation that they can trust you and your colleagues to keep their children from harm. It is difficult for parents to leave their children in an education or care setting and then go to work; they need to be confident that their children will be in safe supportive hands with people that will help them develop.

Adults who work with children and young people will come to know most of the personal information like date of birth, address and contact details and also sensitive information like behavioural issues, some medical information, family background, whether parents are divorcing and so on. It is the responsibility of the adult to keep this information confidential. They must protect the identity of the child they work with and that of their families and carers. They must do everything in their power to protect the privacy of every child and adult.

Risk assessments should be carried out regularly to make sure that there are no safe guard threats towards the children in the setting. Childcare settings need risk assessing for example is there entrances and exits to the building that an unauthorised person could use? Could a child leave the setting without anyone noticing? Could a child get seriously hurt due to a broken piece of equipment?

xxxx takes all safeguarding issues very importantly. Whilst we may focus on vulnerable adults we do have young member of staff who would still be classed as children for Safeguarding purposes. We also have children who visit the home. We adhere that all staff on the premises are adequately checked at employment and we risk assess the adults who live within the home to the impact that they may pose to children on the premises. Sxxxxxx adheres to the 4LSCB procedures and we have a policy in place for the staff members to follow should they be worried about any child on the premises. A child’s safety is paramount and we have a duty to protect that child. Our staff members understand abuse, signs and

Once the authorities are told, they will decide on the best way forward. The school's role is then limited. School staff will not take part in an investigation, though they may be called on to give information. They may also be asked to give support to the child or young person. To discuss concerns about child abuse contact: Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) Gateway Service Teams in the Health and Social Care Trusts Preventing inappropriate relationships at

A schools policy on safeguarding children should always be used as the guideline as this will ensure the correct procedure has been followed. Within the schools they have strict policies in relation to sharing information, when they receive confidential information from the council which could be from social services or in reference to staff, they get informed that they have a document via email. This is in the form of an encrypted folder which they need to log into to be able to access the information. This will be sent to the office or directly to the Headeacher, it is the same when sending information back to the relevant party, this is also used by the police and other important services. Sometimes you need to take care when informing family as you may be putting the child at a greater risk.