Open Trail Safeguarding
Commitment
Open Trail recognises our moral and statutory responsibility to safeguard and promote the welfare of all children and adults whom we work with. We endeavour to provide a safe and welcoming environment where children and adults are respected and valued. We are alert to the signs of abuse and neglect and follow our procedures to ensure that children receive effective support, protection and justice. Child protection forms part of our safeguarding responsibilities and so we will take all reports of concerns seriously and in an accountable and transparent way.
Open Trail believes that it is always unacceptable for a child or young person to experience abuse of any kind and recognises its responsibility to safeguard the welfare of all children and young people, by a commitment to practice which protects them. We believe safeguarding is everybody’s business and intervention and support is timely and right for individuals, families, schools and community groups we work with.
Introduction to
Safeguarding
When we talk about safeguarding we are describing all the actions taken to protect anyone who may, in any way, be vulnerable (including but not exclusively anyone under the age of 18 and adults with care and support needs) from abuse, bullying, neglect and exploitation, which causes distress or may
cause the impairment of mental and physical health or development and actions taken to prevent these situations developing.
What you might be
concerned about Safeguarding
It can be really hard to tell someone if you are experiencing harm or you are worried about someone else, or someone else’s behaviour. Because of that, we have made it as easy as possible for you to tell us if you have concerns about:
• The wellbeing of someone at Open Trail, including safeguarding
concerns about abuse, neglect or exploitation
• The conduct of a team member at Open Trail (staff or volunteers),
including allegations of harmful behaviour toward participants
• How a safeguarding concern is being managed (this is often
called Whistleblowing)
• OR to make a complaint about Open Trail
Reporting concerns, including the form
If you have concerns about any of these things you can tell us by filling in our online form.
You can get to the form by clicking on this link or following the QR code or tapping on it
If the person you are concerned about is in immediate danger please don’t worry about this form, but call 999 and tell the police. Their job is to act quickly, where we may need to take a couple of days to ensure the right response.
If you are happy to, you could talk to a member of the Open Trail team. They are trained to listen to and act on concerns and they will also fill in the form with your concern.
The form allows you to report your concern without leaving your name, so you can do it completely anonymously. That’s fine, but we may not be able to do anything with your concerns if we don’t have enough information and can’t follow it up with a phone call.
The safeguarding lead at Open Trail is Hannah Escott and so whoever you tell, they will also speak to her about the issue, unless the issue involves her.
You can also report your concern to the local safeguarding team at the Council. We’ve put the websites and numbers at the bottom of the page.
Explanation of safeguarding governance arrangements
So that we can ensure our safeguarding practice is as strong as possible, we invest in a partnership with Keep Governance and Safeguarding which ensures a transparent and accountable response to all safeguarding concerns.
All concerns are reported through a secure form and are stored in a dedicated, purpose-built system called RecordMy. Keep Governance and Safeguarding will receive, review and manage all reported concerns which will then be acted upon by Open Trail.
The management of concerns in this way is secure and compliant with data protection law and we will only use it for the specific purposes of responding to the concern and improving safeguarding at Open Trail.
Keep Governance and Safeguarding check our safeguarding policies and procedures every year and support us with our safeguarding practice. Because we meet their best practice standards they give us their safeguarding quality mark, which in turn lets you know that we go above and beyond to meet our safeguarding commitments. You can even check that our quality mark is genuine by visiting www.keepsafeguarding.com/quality-mark-verification.
For more information about how safeguarding works at Open Trail and how we expect our team members to behave, whether they are employed or are volunteers, you can read our safeguarding policy and our staff and volunteer Code of Conduct.
Local safeguarding referrals
If you want to get in touch with your local council safeguarding teams their contact details are available by searching for “safeguarding in your nearest town”. Those for the areas Open Trail work in are here:
Where
Concerned about an adult
Concerned about an Child
Worcestershire,
including Wyre Forest
01905 768053 or visit
the adult safeguarding webpage
Visit the child safeguarding webpage
Shropshire
0345 678 9044 or visit
the adult safeguarding webpage
0345 678 9021 or visit
the children’s safeguarding webpage
Sandwell Safeguarding Team
Dudley Safeguarding Team
Contact Us
hannah@opentrail.co.uk
Locations
Open Trail is based in Kidderminster; we work with schools, community groups, families and individuals in Worcestershire and The Black Country, are able to provide our activities on your site, Burlish Bike Park or at local BMX tracks.
