to not do Safeguarding training?

[Sausagenbacon]

I belong to a church, and occasionally serve coffee at the end of the service. I am being asked to take Safeguarding training, which I think is utterly pointless.
I have expressed this and been told that it's policy, and I have to do it.
AIBU to just stop doing coffee?

Haha you're not "sticking it to the man" by refusing to slightly increase your ability to look out for people, you know!

Maybe it will be helpful, maybe it won't be anything you don't know - but it's not going to make you less likely to spot signs that something might be wrong, is it? I think more people would benefit from safeguarding/MH wellbeing training in general, it just means there's more people who can potentially stop a borderline situation becoming an outright bad one.

Why would anyone need a training course to spot that?

Try to see safeguarding less as a bureaucratic tickbox exercise imposed from above and more as a deepening of your discipleship and being more fully equipped to care for God’s people.

@Felicia19 what would you do if you spotted those signs? Remember that you want to spot them early not when there has been a massive change

The most worrying people are the ones who don't know what they don't know.

The training is not pointless, and is a requirement in any church role that involves interacting with congregants. It shows you how to recognise signs of possible abuse in adults as well as children, how to respond to that or to someone else who may be suffering abuse. The elderly can be subject to abuse of one sort or another, as much as anyone. It is important that someone you come across as a volunteer, feels able to talk to you, and that you know the appropriate way to respond. Finally it tells you exactly who to refer issues on to. There is always now a designated safeguarding person for each parish. Just do it, it takes about half an hour online.

It’s not just about what to look for. It’s about what to do if you notice it and why it’s important to do those things.

So many threads on MN have people explaining away things that could be signs of abuse and discouraging people from reporting them.

Often the signs are not blindingly obvious like they are on TV. They’re tiny, subtle things that just seem very slightly off - so it’s tempting to reason them away instead of reporting.

And maybe nothing initially happens with that report, because it is just that one tiny thing. But then some other people report a few little things that seem tiny on their own, and because they’ve been reported someone notices what picture the jigsaw pieces are making.

You’re thinking about one jigsaw piece as being worthless, because it’s not a picture on its own. But once you have a few jigsaw pieces, they can more clearly hint at the whole picture.

If everyone throws the pieces away, you never build the jigsaw.

I'd refer it to the safeguarding lead.

@Felicia19 if you had a concern about an elderly person using your organisation , do you know who to go to, where and how to record it, who you can and cannot tell? What do you do if there is a potential safeguarding issue with the safeguarding officer who do you go to, how to record it, who else you can tell?

How condescending

Do you know where you can access your organisation's safeguarding policy, do you understand it?

I attended a presentation by the Breck Foundation charity, run by the mother of Breck Bednar who was murdered by an online groomer. Devastatingly sad and horrifying.

She tried to seek help from different sources but no one recognised or could believe that he was being groomed. They were let down very badly by services, especially the police.

He was a regular church goer with his family and one of the signs that the grooming was escalating was that he withdrew from going to church.

So it’s entirely possible that a serious disclosure could be made by a child or young person in a church environment, or someone at a church could spot that something is wrong.

https://www.breckfoundation.org

Safeguarding training is supposed to be updated regularly.

All volunteers in contact with vulnerable people should be undertaking it.

@ScierraDoll it isn't condescending. As I said in a previous post I attended a training session at a school for potential volunteers. One of the people attending the session said it wasn't necessary as nothing like that happened in this lovely village school. Well of course things like that happened on a regular basis, and we didn't want volunteers who couldn't believe safeguarding was necessary.

Safeguarding training has nothing to do with your role. It doesn't matter if you are just handing out cups of coffee. Even if you think it's pointless, can't you just do it anyway?

Just do the safeguarding training. It will be a legal requirement, it's not the churches fault.

I don't see the objection really. Elderly people can be vulnerable and presumably the may confide in you about some sort of abusive issues with family, carers etc. Even if they didn't, if you noticed a person has some kind of unusual bruises or injury, if their character suddenly got very withdrawn? They said money was going missing? It's appropriate to know what protocol to follow if these things were to arise. They will give you papers/pdfs from the training and then you can just refer to those if you need to. They are not testing your competence or anything. It might a legal requirement.

Do it. Safeguarding is everyone's responsibility. Just because you don't work with kids or vulnerable adults doesn't mean you don't need education around this area.

I’d go and do it, but sometimes these courses are OTT.

I had to go on a full days course a few years back as I had a role where I stood at a door, and held it open whilst school DC got out the car and walked the 2 metres in the door.

According to my one day training I should be looking out for all kinds of abuse during that 2 second interaction and it was my legal duty to report anything dodgy.

Of course I would’ve but it also did make me feel like I’d been given the added responsibility of everyone’s DC on top of my own just by volunteering 1/2 hour of my day, once a week.

I think it’s a good idea, but for someone interacting like the OP, or my role it should be limited to “if you see anything off, tell the person running the organisation”.

Because you are being unreasonable. Do everyone a favour and stop serving coffee. It won't be missed, as someone else will do it.

what???
do you think OP that being cool and rebellious somehow trumps the safety of vulnerable people
let me guess, you think DBS is a waste of time too, because everyone knows YOU are OK.

you say you already know to report concerns to the DSL, but how do you know what is a concern

your attitude is what makes me suspicious of churches offering services to the community

just don't serve the coffee if you feel like this

Those saying just do the half hour online course are not recognising that for some people their literacy levels would make this impossible or very difficult to complete.

you're questioning authority by refusing safeguarding training. 🤣🤣 Safeguarding training protects the vulnerable and also the volunteers. What a small minded approach.

Are you trying to suggest that the OP is illiterate?

Churches have to be really (like REALLY) hot on safeguarding now, to the extent that it looks/feels like overkill, but if you look at the historical cases you can absolutely see why they need to be. Is it really worth quitting a volunteer role you (presumably) enjoy in a fit of pique over this?