CREATING A SAFE SPORT CULTURE


A. Four steps to creating a safe sport environment

Step 1: Preventing those who have been identified as causing harm to children, with having contact with children in athletics

As part of developing a safe sport environment in your club, you should identify a way to assess if your volunteers are suitable and appropriate people to be involved in contact with children. These people could include, but is not limited to, committee members, coaches, team managers or event supervisors.

Athletics NZ have a variety of membership options to help with this recruitment and screening process.

Any person over the age of 16 who is having regular contact with children either alone or in a club setting should participate in the Community Volunteer or Community Coach programme. As part of these memberships, Athletics NZ will undertake police vetting on your behalf which will provide your club with a judgement by the Police as to the person’s suitability to work with children based on the information they hold. It will give us a ‘red flag’ rather than detailed information and form part of your screening process. Police vetting on its own does not constitute a complete response to keeping children safe.

People who are coaching regularly in squad based or individual settings should undertake the Accredited Coach programme. This has the safeguarding children work, police vetting, coach education and drugfree sport components.

Step 2: Removing and/or minimising any risks of, and opportunities for, harm to children

  • Risk assessment / club health check which identifies risks and how they will be managed is good practice. Risk in sport can take many forms including risk of:
    • Physical harm due to insufficient protective measures or procedures.
    • Adult to child harm through an abuse of position of trust
    • Child to child harm through physical or emotional bullying including via text and social media.
    • Self-harm such as eating disorders.

A club self-audit tool is available under the resource section.

  • Policy development. A safe sport for children policy will help you identify, assess and set up steps to minimise the risk of harm to children. There are plenty of policy templates available and we recommend you review the Sport NZ Child Protection policy template to help get you started.

In general your club policy should include:

    • The objectives and rationale of having the policy
    • The procedures to be followed in order to implement the policy
    • An outline of the roles and responsibilities of different parties
    • The policy review date.

Athletics NZ have not provided a standard club child protection policy, as the development of this policy as a club committee is an important part of the process and helps with the understanding and implementation of the policy at club level. However we are available to guide that process and offer some best practice examples of what a good policy might contain.

  • Promoting good practice. Clubs should be promoting the importance of keeping children safe. Not only is it good practise but it shows members of the public that you have policy in process in place to keep their child safe. This encourages parents to choose your sport when they are looking around for activities. Athletics NZ has some resources available to you to use as posters around your club room that promote safe practises when working with children.
  • Our clubs exist because volunteers give their time, energy and expertise to help children develop skills and enjoy the sporting experience. In addition to protecting children from harm, clubs should keep volunteers aware of education opportunities for them to learn how to:
    • Minimise the risk that their actions or inactions cause harm to any child; and
    • Limit their risk of being the target of allegations and complaints.
  • Children’s access to advice and support. The best way to support children and their families is to ensure there is a plan in place for keeping children safe and that clearly identified good practice procedures are communicated and followed. Providing children with information on where to go for help and advice is part of this. Athletics NZ has a designated Child Protection Officer (CPO) who is available to any participant in our sport, whether they are an adult or child experiencing issues of harm. Make sure your club members know how to contact the CPO without having to go through other channels.

Step 3: Identifying and stopping inappropriate behaviours

Keeping children safe from harmful behaviour is an ongoing process that doesn’t end with writing a policy and undertaking police vetting. Harmful behaviour can take many forms and can occur via:

  • Adults to children
  • Child to child eg bullying including text and social media
  • Child themselves eg self harm
  • Supporters and/or parents.

Clubs need a process for dealing quickly and appropriately with any unacceptable behaviour that poses a risk to children. Volunteers, coaches and team managers need to understand their responsibility in identifying and responding to children at risk of harm. There needs to be ongoing supervision, support and training for anyone who works with children. Children (and their parents) also need to be kept informed about expectations of them for appropriate behaviour.

Clubs should clearly identify what is appropriate behaviour within their own community and then publish that information so that all club members understand what is expected. Keep in mind cultural context and gender specific guidelines when deciding on these boundaries of behaviour.

  • Responding to breaches of Codes of Conduct or poor practice. Anyone who is a member of Athletics NZ is bound by our Code of Conduct which can be found on the Athletics NZ website. Misconduct occurs when the code of conduct is breached. Serious misconduct is when there is serious and/or repeated breaches of the code of conduct.
  • When dealing with breaches of the code of conduct there is an escalating scale of options ranging from bringing the breach to the attention of the person involved and agreeing on ways to avoid this happening again through to formal disciplinary action and dismissal, or involvement of the Police and/or Oranga Tamariki. The complaint and investigation process should be clearly set out in your child protection policy.
  • Physical or sexual abuse ia at the serious end of the spectrum and can require immediate response. In responding to this level of misconduct there are a few key principles that should be applied.
    • The welfare and interests of the child are the first considerations. Children should always be believed in the first instance.
    • Suspected and actual incidences of reported harm should be responded to and recorded accurately and appropriately and as soon as possible.
    • Notify the Athletics NZ Child Protection Officer as a soon as possible. If you think the child is at immediate risk, notify NZ Police.

 All clubs should understand the 5 R’s of child protection and know how to operate safely within these.

RECOGNISE       RESPOND           RECORD              REPORT              REVIEW

Step 4: Support the child and family should a child be harmed

When a child has been harmed in some way, there is a myriad of people and places that can provide support and it may help the child and the family if the club can provide some guidance and support on this.

Agencies/organisations that can provide support include:

  • Safeguarding Children is a registered charitable trust that provides training programmes, seminars and workshops on child harm, as well as advice and resources
  • ACC by providing financial support where a child has been physically harmed or approved counsellors for children who have been sexually abused.
  • Citizen’s Advice Bureau by providing details of local crisis counselling services.
  • Barnardos Family Services is a national organisation focused on the wellbeing of New Zealand children and their families.
  • 0800 What‘s Up is a Free Kids & Teens Counselling Helpline in New Zealand. A safe place for children to talk about anything. They operate 365 days. Call 0800 942 8787 or chat at whatsup.co.nz.
  • Iwi Social Services.

Where the harm or suspected harm is serious, Oranga Tamariki and the Police will be key agencies to contact. The agencies/organisations listed above are generally national organisations. There will be other groups that operate in your local area and may be more appropriate to contact and work with in cases of harm to children. One of the exercises that your club should go through is to make a list of agencies and note their contacts.

B. Policy development process

Once you have decided that your club needs to develop a policy then a suggested approach would be to:

  • Get a group together to work on the policy development process. This doesn’t have to be your club committee, now is a good time to see what other skills are amongst your parent group.
  • Conduct a self-audit to determine what is already in place and what needs to be developed. The self audit tool is available in the resource section.
  • Develop a plan that includes actions, timelines, consultation and sign off.
  • Sport NZ provides some excellent resources to help you develop your own policy including templates for wording and notes for guidance. The process for development is shown in the diagram below. The Athletics NZ Child Protection Officer is also available to help your club to workshop and develop your own policy.

SAFE SPORT POLICY FOR CHILDREN

  • POLICY STATEMENT - What we want to schieve through applying this policy
  • OBJECTIVES - Why we want a policy and what we believe is important
  • PROCEDURE - Screening, responsibilities, education and training
  • PRACTICES - Applying a child centred approach, creating a safe and open environment, dealing with allegations, responding with concerns
  • REVIEW - The process of review including when and by whom