Rhythm & Groove is committed to ensuring the safety and wellbeing of all children and young people who are involved in our sport. Our policies and procedures seek to address risks to child safety and to establish a child safe culture and practices.  Our suite of child safe policies is:

• accessible in forms that are easy to understand;

• have been informed by stakeholder consultation; and

• are communicated to children, young people and their families, our staff and volunteers and the general public.

We regularly review our policies, gain endorsement of changes and advise our staff and volunteers of changes.

 

We are committed to keeping children & young people safe

Rhythm & Groove has a clear commitment to keeping children and young people safe from abuse and neglect. We communicate our commitment to all our staff and volunteers and give them access to a copy of our commitment statement.

 

Our staff and volunteers know the behaviour we expect

We ensure that each person involved in our delivery of services to children and young people understands their role and the behaviour we expect in relation to keeping children and young people safe from abuse and neglect through application of the Code of Behaviour. We utilise clear position descriptions which clearly state relevant child safe requirements. We have a Code of Behaviour, which is approved and endorsed from the highest levels of our organisation that outlines our expectations for behaviour towards children and young people. Our staff and volunteers are given a copy of and have access to the Code of Behaviour. Our staff and volunteers indicate, in writing, that they have read and are committed to the Code of Behaviour.

 

We minimise the likelihood of recruiting a person who is unsuitable

We have appropriate measures in place to minimise the likelihood that we recruit staff or volunteers who are unsuitable to work / volunteer with children or young people. We have recruitment procedures that ensure:

• our child safe commitment is communicated to potential applicants for positions

• face-to-face interviews are held which includes child safety related questions

• two professional reference checks are undertaken

• screening checks are undertaken, including identity, criminal record, working with children or equivalent checks and qualification checks.

 

Induction and training are part of our commitment

We provide all new staff and volunteers with information during their induction about our commitment to keep children safe including our policy, Code of Behaviour and child abuse reporting policy. We have a process for ensuring all staff and volunteers complete child safe training. We support ongoing education and training for our staff and volunteers to ensure child safe information is provided in an ongoing way.

 

We ensure that our staff and volunteers have up to date information relevant to specific legislation.

 

We encourage the involvement of children, young people and their parents

We involve and communicate with children and young people, and their families in developing a safe, inclusive and supportive environment. We provide information to children and their carers (such as brochures, posters, handbooks, guidelines) about:

•          our commitment to keeping children safe and communicating their rights

•          the behaviour we expect of our staff and volunteers and of themselves

•          our policy about responding to child abuse

We have processes for encouraging two-way communication with children and families. We seek their feedback and have a process for responding. We respect diversity and seek to facilitate effective communication and involvement.

 

Our staff and volunteers understand their responsibility for reporting child abuse

Our policy for responding to child abuse is approved and endorsed from the highest levels of our organisation and applies to all our staff and volunteers. The policy states that:

• staff and volunteers must immediately report abuse or neglect and any concerns with policies, practices or the behaviour of staff and volunteers.

• staff and volunteers must meet any legislated mandatory or other jurisdictional reporting requirements

• staff and volunteers must follow a specified process when reporting abuse or neglect including who will receive reports

• failure to report is serious misconduct

Our staff and volunteers are given a copy of and have access to the policy and understand the implications of the policy for their role. We document any allegation, disclosure or concern regarding child abuse and monitor responses to all allegations, disclosures or concerns.

 

We maintain and improve our policies and practices

We are committed to maintaining and improving our policies, procedures and practices to keep children and young people safe from neglect and abuse. We have assigned responsibility for maintaining and improving our policies and procedures to a General Manager.

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We monitor our staff and volunteers and external providers to ensure appropriate practice, behaviour, and policies are followed. We communicate with our staff and volunteers to ensure that they understand our policies and that the policies are effective in the work place. We require our staff and volunteers to disclose convictions or charges affecting their suitability to work with children and young people and we review police records and conduct other checks periodically.

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We have formally reviewed our service delivery to identify and document potential risks to children or young people. We undertake formal reviews, at least annually, to identify and document potential risks to children or young people associated our service delivery. We have a procedure to undertake annual reviews, as part of our ongoing compliance with child safe requirements.