Ensuring child safety

Safety is of the upmost important to us, and we have a number of policies and procedures to ensure safety measures are upheld through regular risk assessments and monitoring. In this section there are a few of the common questions we get asked but if you can’t find the answers, please speak to our setting manager who can share are full suite of policies.
Our health and safety statement is displayed within every setting, along with our insurance certificate.
Yes. The welfare of children is paramount to us and forms the basis of all of our policies. Our entire team attend regular safeguarding training and our setting designated safeguarding officer is available at all times should anyone have concerns for a child’s safety. All colleagues can inform you of who the designated safeguarding officer is at each setting.
Our Operations Director is the company DSL Designated Safeguarding Lead.
Usually, any referrals would be discussed with you prior to being made, unless we felt we could be putting a child at greater risk.
All of our colleagues are subject to a rigorous recruitment process and full recruitment and background checks are conducted.
Our full policy is available on request.
We run regular practices with the children to ensure your child and our team are always prepared. If the alarm sounds, we ask that you meet us at the fire point, ensuring both yours, your child’s and our teams safety. We will only release children back to you and outside of the setting if the fire marshal deems the building unsafe to re-enter.
Regular maintenance and checks are carried out on all equipment to minimise the risk of fire.
Each setting varies; however, we like to take children outside and on trips as often as we can to help children learn about the natural world and cultural capital. Of course we take safety seriously, and all trips are risked assessed in advance and we seek your consent in advance of taking your child away from our settings.
Your child will be cared for and assessed by one of our first aiders. Depending on the severity, and in most cases you will be notified on collection; if however we felt further medical attention was required we would contact you immediately.
In both cases you will be provided with a full record on how the accident occurred, injury and treatment received. We take all accidents very seriously and review our processes and the environment to avoid re-occurrence where possible.
If your child has had an accident within 48 hours of attending care, or has an injury from a previous incident, we ask that you inform us on signing your child in so that we can record the details and closely monitor them.
We operate several different systems, based on the type of care your child is attending and our location. We ask that you comply with our procedure to safeguard your child. Please ask at your chosen setting for their specific procedure followed.
Our team have the right to refuse collection of your child if they are unsatisfied with the identification of the person collecting. The child will remain in our care until contact has been made with the known carer.

Photography and CCTV policies:

Yes, we do as we like to take photos of the children and share their experiences with you through our nursery software and in some cases social media channels.
We ask your permission during the registration process and of course you can change your preferences at any time.
We will not use image on any channel where permission has not be sought and if your child is in a group picture, we will blur their image.
We respect your privacy and treat your data with the greatest care. Should you have any questions about how data is collected and stored please refer to our Privacy and Data Protection Policy on our website.
Some of our settings have CCTV and our setting managers can notify you where this is the case. We also advertise that CCTV is in operation (where applicable) at the front door. In compliance with ICO guidance and our policy, the footage is only viewed and retained for 31 days and only in cases where an incident has occurred and requires further investigation is it held longer.

Nursery & staff regulatory policy:

We work to the following ratios, 1 adult to 3 babies (3 months to 2 years) 1 adult to 4 toddlers (2 – 3 years) and 1 adult to 8 pre-schoolers (3 – 5 years).
Yes, all of our nursery settings are on the Ofsted Compulsory Register and all have been rated as Good, Good with Outstanding features, or Outstanding.
Our English crèches are on the Voluntary Register, meaning they get compliance visits but are not graded.
Our Wales crèche is registered with The Care Inspectorate Wales
Our Scottish crèches are registered with The Scottish Care Inspectorate
Our Irish crèches are registered with The Belfast Trust and Tusla
Whether on the compulsory or voluntary register makes no difference to us as we set the bar high and work to the same standards in all of our settings; whether your child is with us full time care or for one hour; they are extremely important and we feel privileged to be trusted to care and provide for your child. We don’t wait for inspections, we frequently inspect and audit our settings and ensure our policies are not only compliant but more importantly are implemented and work in practice for our colleagues.
At least 50% of our teams at each setting are qualified to Level 2 or above. Those who are not qualified all have previous experience of caring for children either in a setting our looking after their own, or are studying towards their qualification.
Yes, depending on where our colleagues work depend on the checks.
In England and Wales, all colleagues hold a full DBS check and are required to join the update service allowing us to check their records regularly.
In Scotland, all colleagues hold a full PVG and are members of the SSSC
In Northern Ireland, all colleagues hold a full Access NI Check
In Southern Ireland, all colleagues hold a full Gards check

Safeguarding