Oral Answers to Questions

Maria Caulfield Excerpts

Monday 26th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

8. What steps she is taking to ensure that safeguarding policies are in schools.

[The Minister for Children and Families (Edward Timpson)]

When carrying out their duties to safeguard and promote the welfare of children, schools must have regard to the statutory guidance we have issued, “Keeping children safe in education”, which includes ensuring an effective child protection policy, together with appropriate safeguarding responses to children going missing from education and procedures for handling allegations of peer-to-peer abuse.

[Maria Caulfield]

Further to that reply, can the Minister highlight what support is available to help parents, school governors and teachers who may have concerns about local issues to report those concerns?

[Edward Timpson]

Where there is a specific safeguarding incident that either a governor or parent wants to raise, they should contact their local authority’s children’s services safeguarding team; where there are concerns about safeguarding processes at a school, they should be raised through the school complaints process; and if the safeguarding processes at the local authority are causing concern, they should be raised with Ofsted. In law, it is the local safeguarding children’s board that is responsible for developing and scrutinising local procedures and arrangements, but I am sure my hon. Friend will also know that the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children has an excellent helpline to enable parents who have concerns about safeguarding in their school to raise them directly.