Safeguarding and Early Help

Safeguarding

"Keeping children safe is everyone’s responsibility"

Barley Croft Primary School fully recognises the contribution it can make to protect children and support pupils in school. 

Our Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy and Procedures aim to provide all members of staff, volunteers, children and their families with a clear and secure framework for ensuring that all children in the school are protected from harm, both while at school and when off the school’s premises.

Practitioners who work with children in this school will have a full safeguarding induction delivered by the DSL prior to having any form of contact with the children

Operation Encompass

All Leicester City and Leicestershire County schools are part of Operation Encompass which is a safeguarding initiative aimed at improving outcomes for children and families affected by domestic violence and abuse.

Operation Encompass is a protocol whereby schools are formally notified of any reported incident of domestic violence at an address at which children are present or normally resident. It is run in partnership with Leicester City Council, Leicestershire County Council and with Leicestershire Police.

All public agencies currently share information where there are safeguarding concerns or risk of harm to children and the Police now share information about all incidents of domestic abuse through Operation Encompass. We are also part of the Operation Encompass Information Sharing Platform - our Police Force will also share with the Designated Safeguarding Lead information about police attended incidents where they feel that there has been a tangible impact upon a child is physical, emotional or mental well-being.

This information is shared so that our school can better understand children’s living experience and can support, nurture and care for them more effectively.

To further support the welfare of children, when any domestic abuse incident has been reported to the Police during the school term and one of our pupils was in the household, the information is shared with the Designated Safeguarding Lead.

This system has been introduced because domestic abuse in a household can have a huge impact on children, even if they do not see what is happening.

This information will be used to ensure the school is able to provide appropriate support to pupils. The information will remain confidential and will only be shared on a strictly need-to-know basis. For example, with the class teacher. It will not be shared with children.

Safeguarding: Out Of Hours Support

Should you require any advice or support with safeguarding, please refer to the following contacts:

Keeping Children Safe in Education 2023 (KCSIE): This document from the DfE sets out the legal duties school must follow to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.