Policy paper

Strategy for dealing with safeguarding issues in charities

Updated 6 December 2017

Applies to England and Wales

• Publication for Northern Ireland
• Publication for Scotland

The Charity Commission’s role

The Charity Commission’s role and approach regarding safeguarding has multiple elements.

We have a strategic aim to ensure that trustees carry out their duties as required by law. We achieve this by looking at the conduct of trustees and the steps they take to protect beneficiaries, staff, volunteers, and any other persons who come into contact with their charity from undue harm and abuse.

We are not a safeguarding authority and so cannot enforce safeguarding legislation. We do not investigate individual safeguarding concerns, determine whether any allegations are true or bring prosecutions. However, we can check that trustees comply with their legal duties, including complying with safeguarding legislation.

We do not have direct regulatory remit over charities’ overseas partners or not-for-profit organisations that are not registered with us. However, where a registered charity supports, or works closely with overseas partners, we will hold the registered charity to account over the suitability and management of that relationship, including its supervision of safeguarding risks.

The Charity Commission’s approach

If something goes wrong in a charity, the Charity Commission will check that the trustees followed the law, statutory guidance and good practice guidance, and and expect them to take responsibility for putting things right.

The Commission’s approach to safeguarding in charities is to:

• seek to prevent safeguarding concerns from arising by ensuring trustees are aware of their responsibilities and best practice around safeguarding through providing information and guidance for the sector
• have oversight of safeguarding concerns within the sector through receiving and monitoring reports of any concerns
• co-operate with safeguarding agencies and other relevant bodies
• intervene when it falls within our role and risk framework to check that trustees have followed the law

Prevention

Prevention is primarily the responsibility of trustees, and the Charity Commission expects all trustees and in particular those who provide services for or come into contact with children or adults at risk, to have the expertise, knowledge and skills to do so effectively and responsibly.

We have published guidance to help trustees carry out their legal duties. This includes:

• Safeguarding and protecting people for charities and trustees
• the Commission’s 5-minute guide on this topic
• The Essential Trustee (CC3)
• Finding new trustees (CC30) in particular, the section on vetting and DBS checks

We publish the outcomes of our statutory inquiries and of some regulatory casework. Through these reports we highlight common problems that have arisen in charities, and wider lessons about how to avoid similar situations.

We can also issue regulatory alerts and themed reports to warn charities of risks. These are based on information gathered from:

• developments within the sector
• concerns raised with us, including serious incidents and whistleblowing
• casework we conduct on safeguarding
• information from other agencies

Oversight

Our serious incident reporting regime requires trustees to report serious incidents to the Commission. By reporting serious incidents trustees can help demonstrate that they:

• have identified serious risks to their charity
• are taking appropriate action to deal with incidents
• are protecting the charity from further harm

We have a dedicated whistleblowing email address for charity employees and volunteers to report concerns about certain categories of serious wrongdoing (which may include safeguarding issues) at their charity. Further information can be found in the whistleblowing guidance for charity employees.

We assess the risk to the sector by: 

• assessing the volume and impact of safeguarding incidents reported to us
• identifying trends

This insight informs our approach as regulator, including when to intervene by issuing advice, guidance or alerts to warn other charities of identified risks and how to manage these.

Co-operation

We co-operate effectively with safeguarding agencies and partner organisations by:

• sharing information, on a reciprocal basis, with the police, local authorities, and other agencies
• working closely with other agencies to make sure that we are kept up to date about changes to legislative requirements

This helps ensure that:

• partners clearly understand our role and know when they should alert us about safeguarding risks involving a charity
• we are clear when another agency is better placed to lead on and deal with safeguarding issues
• the wider safeguarding issues in a charity are addressed when another agency is investigating abuse connected with it

Intervention

The Commission will assess safeguarding concerns raised with it using the Regulatory and Risk Framework. This enables the Commission to decide the most effective and proportionate response.

We will consider whether:

• there is an immediate risk to the charity’s beneficiaries, employees, volunteers, or others who, through its work, come into contact with the charity requiring the Commission to take prompt regulatory action
• the trustees have handled the suspicions, allegations or actual instances of abuse or mistreatment responsibly and appropriately
• there are adequate safeguarding measures in place and these are properly implemented

Where the trustees have acted honestly and reasonably and are taking appropriate steps to identify and manage the risk, the Commission’s engagement is likely to be limited.

We may provide regulatory advice or guidance, or use our statutory powers, if our risk framework deems this a proportionate response. Where we issue regulatory advice, we may then monitor trustees’ compliance with this.

We expect trustees to:

• act responsibly
• follow our advice and guidance
• deal with the consequences of any breach of duties without further regulatory intervention

Further information about statutory inquiries and the use of the Commission’s powers is available in our guidance Statutory inquiries into charities: guidance for charities (CC46).