Residentials and mixed sex accommodation

It is disturbing when Safeguarding authorities don't really understand the purpose and nature of safeguarding frameworks which is partly to attempt to STOP BAD THINGS FROM HAPPENING IN THE FIRST PLACE because we already understand what the risks are, rather than just trying to pick up the pieces once the bad thing has happened

Yes. I totally agree. I work with people who teach about safeguarding. I have colleagues who work with girls and women who have been assaulted and they still think that it would be fine to allow a young male to sleep in the same dorm as a young woman.

I think an LA can be reported to Ofsted.

Yet nowhere on the NCS application form did they ask about Sex - just Gender - so they failed from the outset in their duty to set up a Safeguarding structure to keep girls safe. There were no 3rd spaces provided. So a clear case of discrimination/indirect discrimination etc.

I asked to see a copy of their Safeguarding Team's risk assessment for this scenario but they had not done one nor did they have any plans to do so. 😱

Unsurprisingly, they also have a policy for their leaders which restricts girls accommodation at night to women and self-id transwomen...

The LA's Children's Safeguarding Board response was to ask if "anything inappropriate had happened" and batted it back to 'mum to take up with NCS'.

Yes, something inappropriate happened - a Safeguarding board and a national organisation like NCS handwaved away the boundaries and consent of teenage girls.

This is indicative of systemic Safeguarding framework failure. The LA Safeguarding Board is not functioning as it is required to.

That's very worrying ANewCreation
Depressingly it appears that girls will have to be harmed followed by the accompanying Serious Case Review and much hand wringing from the guilty agencies before people will realise the risks.

Speaking very carefully as this is potentially outing, the problem is that even those responsible for Safeguarding on organisations for children and on LA's Children's Safeguarding boards - those whom we rely on to flag up the red flags - have been seemingly captured by gender ideology, whereby they believe a male teenager with a feminine gender identity is, in material reality, no different to a female teenager.

Moreover, they believe the feelings and comfort of the male person with the cross sex identity take primacy over natal female girls' boundaries and consent.

Gender does literally mean mixed sex accommodation when it comes to those on NCS, in case that is the organisation in question. The application form only asks for gender so NCS is structurally unable to provide single sex accommodation.

In y11, one of my daughter's male friends began to identify as a girl. Due to their gender identity, this 16 year old teenage male (attracted to girls) was the only legal boy allowed to share a tent/dormitory/facilities for a fortnight with girls on NCS, even though the girls had signed explicit consent to single sex (sic) spaces once on residential and my daughter had specifically requested female only sleeping/changing accommodation.

I took this up with the National Citizens Scheme (NCS) and the local authority's Children's Safeguarding Board; they both showed a worrying lack of understanding of Safeguarding and Equality law.

NCS felt that because this particular teen 'identified as a girl' that he was one and that the girls - some of whom had only just met him - had given their informed consent to sharing a room with "her". I did ask if they knew how pregnancy happened...

Yet nowhere on the NCS application form did they ask about Sex - just Gender - so they failed from the outset in their duty to set up a Safeguarding structure to keep girls safe. There were no 3rd spaces provided. So a clear case of discrimination/indirect discrimination etc.

I asked to see a copy of their Safeguarding Team's risk assessment for this scenario but they had not done one nor did they have any plans to do so. 😱

Unsurprisingly, they also have a policy for their leaders which restricts girls accommodation at night to women and self-id transwomen...

The LA's Children's Safeguarding Board response was to ask if "anything inappropriate had happened" and batted it back to 'mum to take up with NCS'.

Yes, something inappropriate happened - a Safeguarding board and a national organisation like NCS handwaved away the boundaries and consent of teenage girls.

It is disturbing when Safeguarding authorities don't really understand the purpose and nature of safeguarding frameworks which is partly to attempt to STOP BAD THINGS FROM HAPPENING IN THE FIRST PLACE because we already understand what the risks are, rather than just trying to pick up the pieces once the bad thing has happened.

This is where I believe the law on Safeguarding is being misinterpreted.

The case by case basis is not supposed to be about 'how nice does this particular individual seem?' 'Did anything inappropriate happen?'

This is not Safeguarding.

Rather, that the principle of, say, a single sex space for the safety, privacy and dignity of girls means that, in overnight sleeping accommodation for teenage strangers, only people of the female sex should be in there.

And that all males, the lovely ones, the gay ones, the vulnerable and the confused ones, the trans ones together with the occasional downright awful ones should not.

No exceptions.

If they insist on same gender, ask what comeback you have if your DD comes home from her holiday pregnant (assuming that she's old enough)?

It's only a starting point but even the NSPCC thinks that children over the age of 10 should be separated by sex for sleeping arrangements at home.
www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/in-the-home/sharing-a-bedroom/

The British Council appear to regulate PGL, the major kids holiday company
www.britishcouncil.org/sites/default/files/pgl_travel_full_2017_reviewed.pdf

I haven't got more than that I'm afraid - I'm sure one of our knowledgeable members will know who is supposed to regulate the children's holiday companies

PGL (the only big org I know of) say they segregate accommodation by sex and that it is against the rules to enter the accommodation of the opposite sex. There isn't an entry for 'gender' on the website which gives some hope that they haven't got a secret policy somewhere that overrides the single sex accommodation policy (like they do in the NHS)

Ofsted might regulate some children's holiday organisations?

This is a large government funded charity that takes teenagers from all over the country, that tells parents the accommodation will be single sex whilst not operating in that manner at all, and having all their policy docs written in ways mrmaids and the like would be proud of.*

Useful article by ExcelPope (a school governor) identifying how Safeguarding should work. Its a good one to send to those with ultimate responsibility for the organisation.
They are on very shaky ground.

(extract)
"I spend a lot of time designing policies and procedures, and what I tell people is this:- Imagine a worst-case scenario occurs. There is an official investigation, where you’re asked “What did you do to prevent this happening?”. Now imagine what answer you’d like to be able to give to that question in that scenario – that’s the starting point for writing your policies.

In that vein, here’s a scenario.

You are the head-teacher of a secondary school, with pupils aged 11-18. A police officer arrives at the school and asks to speak to you. They have found a video on a porn site which shows the changing-rooms at your school, including a number of girls, who appear to be aged 13-15, in various states of undress. It has clearly been filmed with a concealed camera-phone.

The video has been taken down, but not before it had tens of thousands of views. The account that posted it has been traced to a student at the school who identifies themselves as trans and was, in accordance with the guidance, allowed to use the female changing rooms.

The police need a female member of staff to view the video with them, to identify the 20 or 30 teenage girls who appear in it, so that they and their parents can be informed that they have been victims of voyeurism.

What did you do to prevent this happening?" (continues)

There are around 2.2 million males aged 13-18 in the UK, no matter how much experience you have with children, with trans people, with trans-children, you cannot absolutely assert that none of them will abuse, or attempt to abuse, the guidance given in a manner that infringes of the rights of other students.

This isn’t about demonising all trans people, or suggesting that any given one of them would act in such a manner. This is about the risk presented by the guidance itself, whether that risk can be mitigated in a manner which is proportional to the potential seriousness of the outcome and whether the risk is, in part or in whole, outweighed by the risks of not implementing the guidance." (continues)

excelpope.wordpress.com/2019/02/28/the-unaskable-question/

Essentially safeguarding rules should still apply and any educational establishment should be following the Keeping children safer in education guidelines. SSAUK does have a letter about residential trips in schools, the guidelines really should be the same: safeschoolsallianceuk.net/resources-2/letter-templates/#Single-sex_facilities_on_school_trips_letter

@novina I think I saw your email. Can you email us again? don't worry about nudging us we get so many emails sometimes they get overlooked.

OP, I think the poster 2falls is in contact with them so have linked her as she was posting on the NSPCC / Childline thread:

@2fallsagain - can you help?

Contact Baroness Nicholson via Twitter. She may have advice . This is a significant safeguarding issue, especially if it's a large government funded charity.

Novina
If Safe Schools Alliance UK haven't covered this yet, I bet they would help if you contact them. They cover most aspects of education but I suspect most of the residential organisations / boarding schools are keeping very quiet about this fearing either a twitter pile on from the lobby groups or loss of business from parents horrified at the safeguarding implications.
Here's a link to their resources about single sex changing etc:

safeschoolsallianceuk.net/resources-2/factsheets/#Single_Sex_Toilets_and_Changing_Facilities_factsheet

Their website is very informative.

It may be that the way it's arranged us fine. But I would want to be sure.
Any kind of response in saying problems would be dealt with isn't really good enough. You want to entrust your child to a place where the problems have been pre-empted and ameliorated.

I would ask what measures they have in place for privacy and dignity for all children.
I'd also ask if they have done a risk assessment for mixed sex/single gender facilities. Given that the expectations of most parents for children above 8 would be single sex.

X-post, sorry!

Sorry, cross posted. In that case, they don't understand fairly basic safeguarding and I wouldn't let DC go.

Its this one: was national youth BB

It's here OP www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4224547-National-Youth-Childrens-Brass-Band-yes-I-am-in-the-right-section

Speak to the organisations. If they don't see the safeguarding implications of mixed sex accommodation / toileting facilities I wouldn't trust their judgement at all tbh. It is entirely possible, though, that they are using the word gender the way most people do - as a straight forward replacement for the word "sex" because they don't like the other connotations of the word sex.

As for legislation, I don't think there is much tbh. There is for schools though (building regulations), and I'd expect those running residentials for school aged children should be following the same.