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Last updated: 21st January 2026

Scope

This policy applies to all staff, volunteers and trustees in Mental Health Innovations (MHI). Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility. Safeguarding in this context is the responsibility of the organisations to take reasonable steps to ensure that all staff, volunteers and trustees:

Changes to or departures from this policy must be agreed in advance by the Head of Safeguarding, Clinical Director and Head of Operations. The board of trustees should be informed.

Any failure to follow this guidance will be addressed and may result in disciplinary action or exclusion from the organisation or its services.

Policy Statement

Safeguarding is everybody's responsibility. We believe that everybody is different and that diversity should be respected and celebrated. Everybody should be treated fairly, with accessible information, advice and support to help them to stay safe and maintain control of their lives.

We are dedicated to safeguarding everybody who comes into contact with our services by valuing them, listening to and respecting them, and by providing a safe environment so they can access the support they need.

This policy is in harmony with UK legislation and guidance.

We will operate in a way that aims to prevent abuse, neglect, exploitation and harm, therefore safeguarding children we come in contact with directly, or indirectly through contact with adults who may have responsibility for children.

MHI recognises that children can be subject to multiple forms of abuse; emotional, physical, sexual, neglect, exploitation, bullying and online harms (for definitions and indicators see Appendix B).

MHI takes its responsibility to safeguard children seriously in work with any partners. We endeavour to ensure that satisfactory safeguarding due diligence is carried out that satisfies governance and accountability requirements.

Policy principles

Everyone, regardless of age, disability, gender, race, religious belief, sexual orientation, gender expression or identity and relationship status has the right to equal protection from all types of abuse under this policy.

We are dedicated to safeguarding children by valuing, listening to and respecting them, and by providing a safe environment so they can access the support they need.

We keep the child at the heart of our safeguarding practice, with an understanding of when to maintain and when to break confidentiality (see confidentiality point 8).

In all interactions with a service user we will attempt to establish the service user's age so we follow the appropriate legislation and to facilitate any related external reporting. This may happen through

While we may not be able to verify the service user’s age or statements such as these, we will use our best effort to establish age and will treat texters as children with regard to safeguarding where they give us reasonable grounds to.

Approaches to safeguarding children are underpinned by the following principles; empowerment, prevention, proportionality, protection, partnership and accountability

Legislation and guidance

Each UK home nation has its own child protection legislation.

Country

Key legislation relating to child safeguarding

England

Children Act 1989

Children Act 2004

Children and Social Work Act 2017

Wales

Social Services and Wellbeing (Wales) Act 2014

Children Act 1989

Children Act 2004

Rights of Children and Young Persons (2011)

Scotland

Children (Scotland) Act 1995

Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014

Northern Ireland

Children (Northern Ireland) Order 1995

Children’s Service Co-operation Act (Northern Ireland) 2015

In England, the Department for Education (DfE) provides the key statutory guidance for anyone working with children and young people: Working together to safeguard children (DfE, 2023). This sets out how organisations should work together to keep children safe. Chapter 4: Organisational responsibilities sets out the requirements for voluntary, charity, social enterprise, faith-based organisations and private sectors. In England, the Keeping Children Safe in Education (DfE, 2025) statutory guidance is also relevant to the work at MHI.

In Northern Ireland, the Department of Health has published Co-operating to safeguard children and young people in Northern Ireland (Department of Health, 2017). Section 3.8 sets out how voluntary, charitable, faith and community-based organisations should contribute to keep children safe.

In Scotland, the National guidance for child protection provides a framework for anyone who might face child protection issues (Scottish Government, 2023). This includes third sector organisations (voluntary and community organisations, charities, social enterprises, co-operatives and mutuals).

The Welsh Government has published Working together to safeguard people, a suite of guidance and codes of practice that sets out how agencies and practitioners should work together to safeguard children (Welsh Government, 2019). Volume 5 (PDF) focuses on handling individual cases to protect children at risk.

The Working together to safeguard people: code of safeguarding practice sets out safeguarding expectations for all individuals, groups and organisations providing activities or services to children and adults in Wales (Welsh Government, 2022).

The Wales Safeguarding Procedures provide a framework for how child protection referrals, actions and plans should be carried out (Wales Safeguarding Procedures Project Board, 2020).

Mental Capacity

UK Law assumes that all people over the age of 16 have the ability to make their own decisions, unless it has been proved that they are unable to do so. A person should not be deemed as unable to make a decision for themselves just because it is deemed unwise.

The Law says that to make a decision a person needs to:

A person’s ability to do this may be affected by things such as learning disability, dementia, mental health needs, acquired brain injury and physical ill health.

Where a person’s disturbance or impairment of the mind makes them unable to make a specific decision and all steps have been taken to support them to make the decision they are likely to be deemed to not have capacity to make that decision at the material time.

It is important to note that mental capacity is time and decision specific. Whilst a person may not be able to make decisions about one part of life they may be able to on another. Furthermore, mental capacity can fluctuate.

Mental capacity is important for safeguarding for several reasons:

For more information about Mental Capacity please see the Mental Capacity Policy which could be relevant for children aged 16-17.

PREVENT

Anybody concerned about, or making a report under PREVENT, must report their concern to the Head of Safeguarding.

Modern Slavery

MHI is not required to publish a Modern Slavery statement as it currently does not meet the criteria to do so. However, MHI fully supports the aims of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and operates under a Modern Slavery Statement which can be located within its policy library.

Safeguarding Team

Please do not share individual contact details or the on-call phone number with service users.

All general enquiries to the Safeguarding Team can be made via email to safeguarding@mhiuk.org.

Confidentiality

MHI operates in full compliance with the UK GDPR and Data Protection Act 2018, which set out individual rights and freedoms in respect of personal data.

In principle, MHI maintains confidentiality in respect of interactions or interventions that an individual may have with the organisation and its services.

However, if safeguarding concerns arise in relation to a service user, these concerns may be reported externally as appropriate in each case.

If there is a safeguarding concern relating to a member of staff, volunteer or trustee these will be strictly confidential and dealt with on a need to know basis within the organisation. Necessary information will be shared with external agencies on a need to know basis i.e. via safeguarding referral, Disclosure and Barring Service.

If a child disengages from an interaction it does not necessarily mean no further action will be taken. The welfare of the child is paramount and internal or external safeguarding reports can still be made depending on the risk disclosed before the person disengages. In some services we will be able to communicate this referral to the child via email, such as PeerChat or the Community.

Where a service user exercises their right to be forgotten by requesting their personal data is deleted, the request will not be processed until the Safeguarding Team has reviewed the interaction. This usually happens within 96 hours.

If we have a safeguarding concern that needs monitoring or reporting, or need to retain the interaction to meet an obligation to law enforcement, we may not fulfil the erasure request.

Roles and Responsibilities

In order to ensure all concerns, disclosures or allegations are handled appropriately and in a timely way, MHI has a number of designated positions that serve to develop and monitor safeguarding training and processes, and to ensure and facilitate compliance with relevant safeguarding obligations.

The list of roles is as follows (descriptions in Appendix C):

Trustees,

Chief Executive Officer,

Clinical Director,

Head of Safeguarding,

Safeguarding Manager,

Designated Safeguarding Officers,

Deputy Designated Safeguarding Officers,

Clinical Supervisors,

Qualified and Clinical Practitioners,

Volunteer Support Team Members,

Head of Counselling

Head of Youth Services

Counselling Supervisors

Community Manager

Community Officers/ Group Chat Supervisors

Volunteers.

Managing allegations against MHI employees and volunteers

Any allegation or concern that an employee or volunteer has harmed or may have harmed a child must be taken seriously, managed promptly and sensitively regardless of the location of where the alleged incident occurred.

Depending on the situation the police and/or children’s services may need to be involved.

Disciplinary action may be required but this must always be done with HR.

All allegations must be reported immediately to the Head of Safeguarding and the Clinical Director.

Measures, such as suspension, may be required to manage the risk during the investigation. This must always be done in consultation with HR. Suspension is a neutral act that safeguards the employee and the child. It is not to be used as punishment and is not an indication of guilt.

Following an investigation, it may be deemed necessary to share information with relevant regulatory bodies if the person is a registered professional.

Quality Assurance

We will carry out an independent external audit every three years.

Internal review of individual conversations by the Safeguarding Team on receipt of an internal safeguarding report. Previous conversations are examined for practice purposes but also for safeguarding quality i.e. missed opportunities, risk assessment and management. If any learning or development is identified the report is shared with the Volunteer Support Team and/or Clinical Supervision team for review.

Training

All volunteers must complete basic safeguarding training relevant to the service they are volunteering for before they come into contact with service users. This includes training in our obligations under the PREVENT duty.

All staff whose roles involve interactions with service users, or management of those staff/volunteers who conduct those interactions, including Clinical Supervisors, Community Officers, and Volunteer Support Team members are required to complete additional training equivalent to Level 3 for Safeguarding Adults and Children.

In addition, all members of the Safeguarding Team are required to complete training equivalent to Level 4 for Safeguarding Adults and Children.

The Head of Safeguarding and the Safeguarding Manager will also complete Level 5 training for Safeguarding Adults and Children.

Trustees are required to complete charity trustee safeguarding training provided by the NSPCC.

Related policies

Whistleblowing MHI has a separate Whistleblowing Policy that contains guidance on Whistleblowing and sets out how we will handle whistleblowing allegations.

Safer recruitment

MHI has a separate Safer Recruitment Policy that outlines our approach to safer recruitment.

Harassment and bullying

MHI has a separate Harassment and bullying policy which outlines our approach to allegations of harassment and bullying.

Review

This policy should be reviewed at least annually.

Any changes to legislation or guidance should prompt an earlier review to ensure that the policy remains up to date.

Appendix A: Definitions of a Child (NSPCC)

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) defines a child as everyone under 18 unless, "under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier".

England

In England, a child is defined as anyone who has not yet reached their 18th birthday. Child protection guidance points out that even if a child has reached 16 years of age and is:

they are still legally children and should be given the same protection and entitlements as any other child (Department for Education, 2023).

Northern Ireland

In Northern Ireland, The Children (Northern Ireland) Order 1995 defines a 'child' as a person under the age of 18.

Scotland

In Scotland, the definition of a child varies in different legal contexts, but statutory guidance which supports the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014, includes all children and young people up to the age of 18.

Where a young person between the age of 16 and 18 requires support and protection, services will need to consider which legal framework best fits each persons’ needs and circumstances. The National Guidance for Child Protection in Scotland gives more detail about this and explains how professionals should act to protect young people from harm in different circumstances (Scottish Government, 2023a).

Wales

Section 3 of the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 states that a child is a person who is aged under 18.

Appendix B: Types of abuse and neglect

These categories of abuse and neglect are drawn from relevant legislation and statutory guidance. Further detail in respect of individual categories can be found in the following link: Types of abuse.

It is essential that all MHI employees, contractors and volunteers are alert to the signs of abuse and neglect. Unless indicated otherwise, all of the below categories of abuse and neglect are potentially applicable to adults at risk as well as to children.

Abuse

The term abuse is used to describe when a person is intentionally harmed by another. This can be over a period of time but can also be a one-off action. It can be physical, sexual or emotional and it can happen in person or online. It can also be a lack of love, care and attention – this is neglect.

There are four main categories of abuse as follows:

Physical abuse

Physical abuse is when someone hurts or harms an individual on purpose. It includes:

It is important to remember that physical abuse is any way of intentionally causing physical harm to a person. It also includes making up the symptoms of an illness or causing a person to become unwell.

Neglect

Neglect is the persistent failure to meet an individual’s basic physical or psychological needs, likely to result in the serious impairment of the individual’s health or development. Neglect may occur during pregnancy, as a result of maternal substance abuse. For children and/or adults at risk, neglect may involve a parent or carer failing to:

Emotional abuse

Emotional abuse is any type of abuse that involves the continual emotional mistreatment of a child or adult at risk. It is sometimes called psychological abuse. Emotional abuse can involve deliberately trying to scare, humiliate, isolate or ignore the individual.

Emotional abuse is almost always a part of other kinds of abuse, which means it can be difficult to spot the signs or tell the difference, though it can also happen on its own.

Emotional abuse includes:

Some level of emotional abuse is involved in all types of maltreatment of a child or adult at risk, though it may occur alone.

Sexual abuse

In respect of adults at risk, sexual abuse includes the following:

The following points should also be kept in mind:

Those who were sexually abused as children and continue to be abused by perpetrators once they turn 18 should become the subject of a safeguarding adult enquiry if they have not already been subject to safeguarding children procedures.

Even when the sexual abuse, physical abuse and psychological abuse has stopped, many survivors will require some level of care and support as adults, due to the complex personal issues which they suffer as a result of the trauma they experienced. These can include mental ill health, self-harm, problematic use of illicit drugs or alcohol which can be compounded by interrupted education resulting in unemployment or low paid jobs with resulting economic insecurity. They may have already been involved with children’s social care, especially if they have been Children who are Looked After by the Local Authority.

In addition, some young adults may also be vulnerable to organised sexual abuse (OSA); being targeted for the first time as adults not as children. Those who have care and support needs due to learning or physical disabilities, especially if they are in residential accommodation, can be particularly vulnerable to such abuse.

Other Safeguarding concerns

The below sections set out additional circumstances and types of behaviour and events that would present safeguarding concerns. This is not an exhaustive list.

Domestic abuse

Domestic abuse is any type of controlling, coercive, or threatening behaviour, violence or abuse between people who are, or who have been in a relationship, regardless of gender or sexuality. It can also happen between adults who are related to one another and can include physical, sexual, psychological, emotional or financial abuse.

Domestic abuse can include:

Domestic abuse always has an impact on children. Being exposed to domestic abuse in childhood is child abuse. Children may experience domestic abuse directly, but they can also experience it indirectly by:

Extremism and PREVENT duty

In respect of extremism, terrorism and radicalisation, MHI follows statutory PREVENT duty guidance. Any concerns about radicalisation and extremist views or behaviours in relation to adults at risk or children must be reported as a safeguarding concern and will be dealt with according to our Tackling Extremism and Radicalisation Policy.

Extremism goes beyond terrorism and includes people who target the vulnerable - including the young- by seeking to sow division between communities on the basis of race, faith or denomination; justify discrimination towards women and girls; persuade others that minorities are inferior; or argue against the primacy of democracy and the rule of law in our society. Extremism is defined in the Government’s Counter Extremism Strategy 2015 as: “the vocal or active opposition to our fundamental values, including the rule of law, individual liberty and the mutual respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs. We also regard calls for the death of members of our armed forces as extremist”.

Female genital mutilation (FGM)

Concerns that a child or adult at risk has been, or may be about to be, subjected to female genital mutilation (FGM), fall under this policy and must be reported as a safeguarding concern. FGM involves the partial or total removal of external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons.

Forced marriage

In forced marriage, one or both spouses do not consent to the marriage and some element of duress is involved. Duress includes both physical and emotional pressure and abuse.

Forced marriage is primarily, but not exclusively, an issue of violence against females. Most cases involve young women and girls aged between 13 and 30, although there is evidence to suggest that as many as 15% of victims are male.

Honour based abuse

The term ‘honour crime’ or ‘honour-based violence’ embraces a variety of crimes of violence (mainly but not exclusively against women), including assault, imprisonment and murder where their family or their community is punishing the person. They are being punished for (actually or allegedly) undermining what the family or community believes to be the correct code of behaviour. In transgressing this purported code of behaviour, the person shows that they have not been properly controlled to conform by their family and this is to the ‘shame’ or ‘dishonour’ of the family.

Peer-on-peer abuse

Peer on peer abuse is most likely to include, but may not be limited to:

Online harms

Online harm (which includes online abuse and exposure to harmful content) is any type of harm that happens on the internet, facilitated through technology such as computers, tablets, mobile phones and other internet-enabled devices.

It can happen anywhere online that allows digital communication, such as, but not limited to:

The breadth of issues classified as relating to online safety is considerable. They can be categorised into four principal areas of risk:

Content: being exposed to illegal, inappropriate or harmful content (for example, pornography, fake news, racism, misogyny, self-harm, suicide, anti-Semitism, radicalisation and extremism).

Contact: being subjected to harmful online interaction with other users (for example, peer to peer pressure, commercial advertising and adults posing as children or young adults with the intention to groom or exploit others for sexual, criminal, financial or other purposes).

Conduct: personal online behaviour that increases the likelihood of, or causes, harm (for example, making, sending and receiving explicit images, including the consensual and non-consensual sharing of nudes and semi-nudes and/or pornography, sharing other explicit images and online bullying).

Commerce: risks such as online gambling, inappropriate advertising, phishing and / or financial scams.

Exploitation

The below sections set out examples of exploitation that raise safeguarding concerns as well as constituting, in many cases, criminal activity on the part of the perpetrator(s).

Child sexual exploitation (CSE)

CSE can happen in person or online. An abuser will gain a child's trust or control them through violence or blackmail before moving on to sexually abusing them.

When a child is sexually exploited online they might be persuaded or forced to:

Gangs use sexual exploitation:

Children or young people might be invited to parties or gatherings with others their own age or adults and given drugs and alcohol. They may be assaulted and sexually abused by one person or multiple perpetrators. The sexual assaults and abuse can be violent, humiliating and degrading.

County lines

As set out in the Government’s Serious Violence Strategy, published by the Home Office, county lines is a term used to describe gangs and organised criminal networks involved in exporting illegal drugs into one or more importing areas within the UK, using dedicated mobile phone lines or other form of ‘deal line’. They are likely to exploit children and adults at risk to move and store the drugs and money, and they will often use coercion, intimidation, violence (including sexual violence) and weapons.

Child criminal exploitation

As further set out in the Government’s Serious Violence Strategy, where an individual or group takes advantage of an imbalance of power to coerce, control, manipulate or deceive a child or young person under the age of 18 into any criminal activity: (a) in exchange for something the victim needs or wants; and/or (b) for the financial or other advantage of the perpetrator or facilitator; and/or (c) through violence or the threat of violence, the victim may have been criminally exploited even if the activity appears consensual. Child criminal exploitation does not always involve physical contact; it can also occur through the use of technology.

Cuckooing

Cuckooing is a practice where people take over a person’s home and use the property to facilitate exploitation such as drug-dealing. It takes the name from cuckoos who take over the nests of other birds.

Victims of ‘cuckooing’ are often drug users but can include older people, those suffering from mental or physical health problems, female sex workers, single parents and those living in poverty. Victims may suffer from other forms of addiction, such as alcoholism, and are often already known to the police. Dealers often approach the victim offering free drugs in return for using their home for dealing.

Once they gain control, gangs move in with the risk of domestic abuse, sexual exploitation and violence. Children as well as adults can be used as drug runners. It is common for gangs to have access to several addresses. They move quickly between vulnerable people’s homes for just a few hours, a couple of days or sometimes longer. This helps gangs evade detection. By ‘cuckooing’, the criminals can operate from a discreet property which is out of sight, making it an attractive option. They can then use the premises to deal and manufacture drugs in an environment under the police radar. These gangs may use accommodation in rural areas, including serviced apartments, holiday lets, budget hotels and caravan parks.

When the criminals use the victim’s property for criminal enterprises, the inhabitants become terrified of going to the police for fear of being suspected of involvement in drug dealing or being identified as a member of the group, which would result in their eviction from the property. Some adults at risk may be forced to leave their homes, making themselves homeless and leaving the gangs free to sell drugs in their absence.

Organ harvesting

The trafficking in organs involves removing a part of the body, commonly the kidneys or a lobe of the liver, to sell often as an illegal trade. Organs can be taken illegally in a number of ways:

Trade – a victim formally or informally agrees to sell an organ, but are then cheated because they are not paid for the organ, or are paid less than the promised price

Ailments – a vulnerable person is treated for an ailment, which may or may not exist, and the organs are removed without the victim’s knowledge.

Extortion – a victim may be kidnapped from their family and organs removed without consent.

Forced criminality

Forced criminality occurs when somebody is forced to carry out criminal activity through coercion or deception. Forced criminality can take many forms, including forcing a person to carry out the following:

Forced criminality also encompasses social welfare fraud. This takes place when exploiters falsely apply for tax credits and other welfare benefits using the victim's details. It is not only the state that is the victim of social welfare fraud; there is often abuse used against the individual in order to coerce them into falsely applying for benefits.

Modern slavery

Modern slavery is a form of exploitation that both adults at risk and children may be subject to. This is referred to in more detail in our Modern Slavery Statement.

Disclosures of non-recent abuse

MHI recognises the long-lasting impact of historical abuse. Where possible we aim to identify any ongoing risks to the survivor as well as any other individuals. We aim to follow our reporting guidelines where others may still be at risk.

Appendix C: Roles and Responsibilities

Trustees

The Charity Commission stipulates that safeguarding should be a leading priority for all trustees. As part of their duties, trustees should ensure that MHI:

One trustee must fulfil the role of Designated Trustee for Safeguarding (DTS), and take responsibility for safeguarding governance and practice. This trustee:

Chief Executive Officer (CEO)

The CEO of MHI is responsible for:

Clinical Director

The Clinical Director holds lead responsibility for safeguarding within MHI’s Senior Management Team and is responsible for:

Head of Safeguarding

MHI’s dedicated Safeguarding Team is led by the Head of Safeguarding who is responsible for:

Safeguarding Manager

The Safeguarding Manager reports to the Head of Safeguarding and is responsible for:

Designated Safeguarding Officers

The Designated Safeguarding Officers (DSOs) are members of the Safeguarding Team and are responsible for:

Deputy Designated Safeguarding Officers

The Deputy Designated Safeguarding Officers (DDSOs) are members of the Safeguarding Team and are responsible for:

Clinical Supervisors

Clinical Supervisors are responsible for:

Volunteer Support Team

Members of the Volunteer Support Team are responsible for:

Head of Youth Services/ Community Manager

The Head of Youth Services/ Community Manager is responsible for:

Head of Counselling/ Counselling Supervisors

Counselling Supervisors are responsible for:

Community Officers

Community Officers are responsible for:

Peer-Chat Co-ordinators

PeerChat Co-ordinators are responsible for:

Group Chat Supervisors

Group Chat Supervisors are responsible for:

Paid Conversation Takers/ PeerChat Supporters

Paid Conversation Takers PeerChat Supporters are responsible for:

Volunteers

Volunteers are responsible for: