Within Y-PEER, Child Safeguarding is making Y-PEER safe for children. It is our individual and collective responsibility to ensure all children are protected from deliberate or unintentional acts that lead to the risk of, or actual, harm caused by Y-PEER staff, representatives, partners, volunteers, contractors and visitors to our country programmes.
Y-PEER acknowledges fully the duty to safeguard and promote the welfare of children, and ensure all our safeguarding measures are embedded, accessible and communicated clearly to staff, partners, children and their communities, in a language they understand.
Y-PEER is aware that there may be additional vulnerabilities facing children associated with their age, socio-economic background, disability, gender, racial heritage, religious belief, identity, sexual orientation or identity, and is committed to ensuring this does not form barriers to effective safeguarding.
Y-PEER will take all reasonable steps to make itself safe, both as an organisation and in the conduct of all aspects of its day-to-day operations of emergency, humanitarian, developmental, policy and campaigning work.
Y-PEER SOMALIA’s Board, including a Safeguarding Trustee, plus the Senior Leadership Team, will ensure that adequate steps are taken to best reflect the cost of implementing this policy in operational plans, budgets and funding proposals.
This includes:
• providing an appropriate safeguarding staffing infrastructure for Y-PEER SOMALIA;
• providing finances, information, guidance, training, learning and development at regional, country and program levels;
• assigning a designated Board Member with the responsibility for child safeguarding oversight through proactively ‘checking and challenging’ that safeguarding is effective throughout the organisation, and is considered in relevant Board decisions;
• implementing appropriate responses to alleged breaches of this policy;
• providing ‘Minimum Safeguarding Requirements’ to ensure consistency of safeguarding provision across Y-PEER SOMALIA and its partner network.
Y-PEER SOMALIA commits to:
• valuing and listening to all children and young people;
• ensuring that all staff and people directly associated with our work understand their personal responsibility to prevent and report any form of child abuse and sexual exploitation of children;
• diligently implement our child safeguarding system by applying relevant policies, procedures, training and other learning opportunities across Y-PEER SOMALIA and with our partners and relevant third parties;
• ensuring that the organisation creates the right culture and a safe and trusted environment for anyone to report child safeguarding incidents and/or concerns verbally or in writing and through child friendly and accessible mechanisms;
• all safeguarding actions and decisions are taken in the best interests of the child and put the safety and welfare of the child first;
• reporting suspected or known child safeguarding concerns, violations of this policy and Code of Conduct through the Y-PEER SOMALIA incident reporting system (DATIX) within 24 hours of the incident coming to Y-PEER SOMALIA’s attention. Local reporting requirements for child abuse and potential criminal offences also apply and should be done in accordance with applicable legal standards;
• ensuring that detailed and accurate records of all safeguarding concerns are collected, processed and stored securely, in accordance with the relevant data protection laws;
• implement systems and processes to ensure we do not knowingly employ or contract anyone who poses a risk to children or brings them into contact with children connected to Y-PEER SOMALIA;
• applying the safeguarding components as set out within the partnership procedures and tools;
• addressing failure to comply with this policy without delay, which may ultimately result in termination of contracts or agreements, including dismissal;
• prompt reporting of serious child safeguarding incidents, by the Y-PEER SOMALIA legal team, to the Charity Commission and other law enforcement agencies and regulators as required.
This policy has been approved in its entirety and must not be modified or customised without the express authorisation of the Senior Leadership team through the Country Director, Y-PEER SOMALIA.