9th June 2023
The statutory guidance document for schools and colleges on safeguarding children and safer recruitment Keeping Children Safe in Education 2023 was published on 6 June with changes coming into effect on 1st September 2023. This year the document was not subject to consultation.
Changes affecting HR processes are minimal and include:
Part two: The management of safeguarding
- New text added to make clear staff training should include understanding roles and responsibilities in relation to children’s exposure to online harm and limiting filtering and monitoring risks from the school’s or college’s IT system. This training should be undertaken at induction & regularly updated
Part three: Safer recruitment
- Clarification that it is good practice for schools to inform shortlisted candidates that online searches will be carried out
- Additions to the 'Retention of Documents' paragraph confirming that copies of documents used to verify the successful candidate’s identity, right to work and required qualifications should be kept on their personnel file
Part four: Safeguarding concerns or allegations made about staff
- Clarification that schools should follow their safeguarding policies and procedures, in the event of an allegation regarding any incident that happened when an individual or an organisation was using their school premises to run activities for children
- Specification that records should be held of any allegations (that are not found to be malicious or false) and retained at least until the accused has reached normal pension age or for 10 years from the date of the allegation if that is longer (previously the guidance simply referred directly to the ICO published guidance on employment record retention)
The current statutory guidance Keeping Children Safe in Education 2022 will remain in force until 1 September 2023.
We will be updating relevant website resources over the coming months.
