Safeguarding
Safeguarding at Merrylands Primary School
Merrylands Primary School is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of all children. We expect all staff, parents, volunteers and visitors to share this commitment and understand that safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility.
What is Safeguarding?
Working Together to Safeguard Children (2018) defines Safeguarding as promoting the welfare of children, as follows:
- protecting children from maltreatment
- preventing impairment of children’s mental and physical health or development
- ensuring that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care
- taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes.
What We Do
The safety and wellbeing of all children is the central priority in everything we do at Merrylands. We are completely committed to ensuring that consistent effective safeguarding procedures are in place to support families, children and staff at school. All concerns are passed through trained, designated members of staff, responsible for safeguarding and child protection.
We have a number of policies and procedures in place that contribute to our safeguarding commitment, including our Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy which can be viewed in the policies section of our website.
Sometimes, we may need to share information and work in partnership with other agencies, when there are concerns about a child's welfare. We will ensure that our concerns about our pupils are discussed with parents/carers first, unless we have reason to believe that such a move would be contrary to the child's welfare.
Our Designated Safeguarding Lead is Mr Phil Andrews (Acting Deputy Teacher). Our Deputy Designated Safeguarding Lead is Mrs Gemma Pryer (Acting Head of School). The Governor with responsibility for safeguarding within our school is Ms J Melanaphy.
Please look at the policies section for current policies and procedures.
Report immediate risk of significant harm
If a child or young person is in immediate danger, call the police on 999.
If a child you’re concerned about is at immediate risk of harm call our Children & Families Hub on 0345 603 7627 and ask for the priority line.
This number is open Monday to Thursday 8:45am to 5pm and Fridays 8:45am to 4:15pm.
For out-of-hours or bank holidays, contact our Emergency Duty Team:
Telephone: 0345 606 1212
Email: emergency.dutyteamoutofhours@essex.gov.uk
NSPCC
The NSPCC is the country’s leading children charity and has been supporting children for over 130 years. Their website contains a wealth of additional advice and guidance: NSPCC
If you are under 18, you can contact Childline on 0800 1111.
Operation Encompass
Essex Police will be implementing Operation Encompass with effect from 1 October. Operation Encompass is a national initiative that ensures children who are witnessing domestic abuse receive timely safeguarding and holistic help.