Child Safeguarding Statement & Risk Assessment
Children’s Health Foundation is the fundraising organisation working on behalf of sick children and their families in Children’s Health Ireland hospitals and urgent care centres across Ireland. Although we do not provide a relevant service under the Children First Act 2015, we have committed to creating this Statement, and maintaining it on an annual basis, to ensure Child Safeguarding practices are embedded in our organisation.
We expect that the Fundraising and Communications teams may interact with potentially sick children up to the age of 18, while in the presence of their parents/guardians/hospital staff. We always receive parental/guardian consent before engaging in any activities which involve contact with a child.
These activities can include attendance at a cheque presentation, a photo call in a hospital (Children’s Health Ireland at Crumlin, Temple Street, Tallaght, or Connolly) or at a third-party location, or research for a patient story as part of a Fundraising Campaign.
We have a Child Safeguarding Procedure in place which is applicable to all team members, as well as to third-party individuals and volunteers. Team members receive mandatory safeguarding training through TUSLA Children First E-Learning Programme. Team members will be required to carry out refresher training on this learning module every 3 years in line with legislation.
An additional training course must be undertaken by staff acting as the Designated Liaison Person, and this will be subject to refresher training in line with the 3-year renewal of the Children First Certificate. Our procedure and training requirements will be reviewed regularly to ensure compliance with the Children First Act, and all regulatory guidance for safeguarding best practice.
We have completed a risk assessment of our activities which may involve contact with children and have processes in place to mitigate these risks.
The Children’s Health Foundation appointed Designated Liaison Person who is tasked with reporting harm to Tusla or the Garda Síochana as per the legislation is Patrick Sweeney (People & Culture Lead): psweeney@childrenshealth.ie.
The Children’s Health Foundation appointed Deputy Designated Liaison Person is Niamh Keogh (Governance & Compliance Lead): nkeogh@childrenshealth.ie.
In the event that the Children’s Health Foundation Designated Liaison Person is not contactable or in an emergency situation, a safeguarding concern can be reported directly to TUSLA (045839300) or An Garda Siochana (999).
Children’s Health Foundation is committed to the implementation of the Child Safeguarding statement and the procedures that support keeping children safe from harm while participating in Children’s Health Foundation events. Our Statement has been developed in line with requirements under the Children First Act 2015, the Children First: National Guidance, and Tusla’s Child safeguarding: A Guide for Policy, Procedure and Practice and will be reviewed annually.
