This guidance sets out the legal duties you must follow to safeguard and promote the welfare of children and young people under the age of 18 in schools and colleges.

It applies to all schools and colleges, and is for:

• headteachers, teachers and staff
• governing bodies, proprietors and management committees

All school and college staff should read part one of this guidance.

This guidance is for:

• statutory safeguarding partners (health, local authorities, and police)
• directors of children’s services
• education and childcare settings
• social workers
• health professionals
• police (including British Transport Police)
• adult social care services
• housing and homelessness services
• Prison and Probation Services
• children’s homes
• secure establishments (secure training centres and young offender institutions)
• youth offending teams
• UK Visas and Immigration, Immigration Enforcement, and Border Force
• Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass)
• the armed services
• Channel panels
• voluntary, charity, social enterprise (VCSE) and faith-based organisations, and private sectors
• sports clubs and organisations

It applies to:

• all organisations and agencies that have functions relating to children
• all education providers and childcare settings

Statutory guidance is issued by law. You must follow it unless there’s a good reason not to.

The guidance was updated in 2023, with a focus on:

• strengthening multi-agency working across the whole system of help, support and protection for children and their families
• keeping a child-centred approach while bringing a whole-family focus
• embedding strong, effective and consistent multi-agency child protection practice

The aim of Prevent is to stop people from becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism.

The objectives of Prevent are to:

• tackle the ideological causes of terrorism
• intervene early to support people susceptible to radicalisation
• enable people who have already engaged in terrorism to disengage and rehabilitate

This is statutory guidance for England and Wales, issued on 7 September 2023 under Section 29 of the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015. It came into force on 31 December 2023, replacing the 2015 guidance which came into force in July 2015.

This statutory guidance is intended for use by:

• senior leadership teams in any of the specified authorities listed in Part 1 of Schedule 6 of the CTSA 2015
• those with dedicated Prevent and/or safeguarding responsibilities
• people in specified authorities with responsibility for how resources and funding are used, and for external partnerships
• those in a frontline role and likely to engage with people who may be susceptible to radicalisation

This guidance may also inform best practice for other sectors that are not specified authorities but may wish to consider how to prevent the risk of people becoming terrorists or supporting terrorism.

www.nspcc.org.uk

NSPCC is the UK's leading children’s charity which has been working to stop child abuse and neglect for over 140 years. NSPCC is the only UK children’s charity with statutory powers, which means they can take action to safeguard children at risk of abuse.

NSPCC provide services across England to help give children and young people the support they need to thrive.

They have service centres in London, the South West, South East, Central and North of England. NSPCC work with children, families and professionals. They also support parents and families in caring for their children and provide therapeutic assistance to help children move on from abuse.

NSPCC also provide help and support through the NSPCC helpline, Childline and work with schools.

www.childline.org.uk

Childline is here to help anyone under 19 in the UK with any issue they’re going through.

You can talk about anything. Whether it’s something big or small, our trained counsellors are here to support you.

Childline is free, confidential and available any time, day or night. You can talk to us:

• by calling 0800 1111
• by email
• through 1-2-1 counsellor chat

Whatever feels best for you. 

www.ceop.police.uk

CEOP is a law enforcement agency and is here to help keep children and young people safe from sexual abuse and grooming online. CEOP help thousands of children and young people every year. CEOP are unable to respond to reports about bullying, fake accounts or account hacking.

CEOP are here to help and give you advice, and you can make a report directly if you are worried about online sexual abuse or something has happened online which has made you feel unsafe, scared or worried. This might be from someone you know in real life, or someone you have only ever met online.

If you make a report to CEOP about sexual abuse or grooming online it will be read by one of our Child Protection Advisors who will get in contact with you on the phone number or email address that you give to us to make sure that you are safe.  They will also discuss with you what will happen next. Please try not to worry, you have done nothing wrong and we will do all we can to help you.

CEOP work together with lots of other professionals whose jobs are also to make sure you are safe, this includes other police agencies.  If a crime has been committed we will work together and use our specialist skills to identify the person or people responsible and bring them into the criminal justice system.

www.saferinternet.org.uk

The UK Safer Internet Centre (UKSIC) is a leading global partnership helping to make the internet a great and safe place for everyone.

They provide support and services to children and young people, adults facing online harms, and professionals working with children.

A bridge between Government, industry, law enforcement and society, UKSIC are the engine of the online protection landscape in the UK, dealing with both prevention and response.

UKSIC are unique. Formed of three charities, Childnet, Internet Watch Foundation and SWGfL, they work together to identify threats and harms online and then create and deliver critical advice, resources, education and interventions that help keep children and young people, and adults, safe. We share our best practices across the UK and globally.

We focus our work around four functions:

An awareness centre:

Where UKSIC provide advice and support to children and young people, parents and carers, schools, and the children’s workforce.

Three helplines:

Which provide support to professionals working with children and young people with online safety issues, and support to all adults facing issues with harmful content and non-consensual intimate imagery online.

A hotline:

Which provides an anonymous and safe place to report and remove online child sexual abuse images and videos wherever they are found in the world.

A voice to young people:

UKSIC operate a Youth Advisory Board, and we nurture youth participation, providing a focus on youth voice to give young people agency to make a difference in their school communities.

www.liverpoolcatholic.org.uk/department/safeguarding

The Archdiocese of Liverpool Safeguarding Department is responsible for the implementation of national safeguarding policy and procedures within the archdiocese.

The Archdiocese of Liverpool Safeguarding Section works in close partnership with all statutory agencies to ensure that any allegations of abuse are promptly and properly investigated, so that victims and survivors are supported, and perpetrators are held to account.

For more information on safeguarding within the Catholic Church, and for all the policies and procedures that the Archdiocese of Liverpool follows, please visit the Catholic Safeguarding Standards Agency.

www.catholicsafeguarding.org.uk