Do all services need to safeguard and protect children?
Yes, however the level should be proportional to the service and the risk identified. The QAF Guidance provides 4 levels of services that work with children: 1. Services where children are known to live (e.g. women’s refuges and teenage parent accommodation). 2. Services where children may live. 3. Services where children may visit (this is most services). 4. Services where children neither live nor visit, but clients still have access to them. Providers need to show how they would alert the social services if there was a child protection issue and how they would manage it internally. Services are not expected to lead on child protection investigations, but should demonstrate their alerting procedure and what is in place to safeguard and protect children.
