New System to Support Safeguarding

A new IT system aimed to reducing the workload and improving compliance for parish safeguarding officers and those in ministry across the Diocese is making rapid progress.

The Disclosure and Barring Service Project (DBS Project) brings together in one place all data with respect to DBS certificates and safeguarding training history. This will make it easier for Parish Safeguarding Officers and Admin staff in parishes to see when DBS checks need to be renewed or started. It also show where parish volunteers, clergy or staff need to undertake Safeguarding training or else refresh training they have taken in the past.

Adrian Smale, the Diocesan Safeguarding Administrator who is managing the project, said, “What is significant about this is that it will automatically notify Parish Safeguarding Representatives and any admin staff of anyone needing to complete checks or training. People at parish level will not have to proactively run a report to find this out.

“It will also reduce the burden of record keeping considerably both for parishes and at Church House.

“This is just stage one of a seven-stage project which will eventually allow safeguarding officers to manage all the record keeping and training management aspects of their role within the same software system.

“The system is currently in testing mode with seventeen parish officers helping us spot any bugs and refine the system before it goes live to everyone, which we expect to be within the next few months.

“We are aiming to complete the whole seven stage project in early 2019.”

Heather Bland, Diocesan Safeguarding Advisor, said, “It is vital that the keeping of records related to safeguarding is done to the highest possible standards. Some of the criticism of the Church’s actions in the past has related to poor record keeping.

“At the same time, we need to ensure that people don’t spend more time on record-keeping than is necessary. This new system will free up capacity to allow people to spend more time raising awareness of how to spot potential issues among fellow parishioners, and keeping their own eyes and ears open.”