Safeguarding

[Kevin Thurlow]

ECF has issued a statement on "safeguarding". https://www.englishchess.org.uk/safegua ... d-the-ecf/

This starts, "As the national body for chess in England, the ECF is committed to welcoming and safeguarding everyone involved in chess.

We aim to make the chess environment a safe, inclusive, and supported activity for all. "

Good news!

[Thomas Rendle]

Excellent news.

[Carl Portman]

It's a minefield Kevin. Too much governance paperwork (though necessary!) can put good people off working with and developing juniors at chess. We want people to know that the governance is there to protect everyone but that folks should not fear working together to further junior/women's chess.

[John Upham]

Feedback has been provided from the Berkshire Chess Association Safeguarding Lead as follows:

The problem with the ECF suggested policy for clubs is that individuals can not apply for an enhanced DBS. Only employers or organisations registered with the DBS can apply on behalf of an individual. Since clubs are not employers or registered I don't see how you can appoint somebody with an enhanced DBS. If the individual has a DBS certificate, unsless it is on-line, it is only relevant to the organisation that applied for it.

Safeguarding vulnerable adults is the responsibility of everybody not just the safeguarding lead.

Anybody appointed as Safeguarding lead / officer has a responsibility to undertake regular training and is responsible for training others in the organisation.

[Roger Lancaster]

Feedback has been provided from the Berkshire Chess Association Safeguarding Lead as follows:

The problem with the ECF suggested policy for clubs is that individuals can not apply for an enhanced DBS. Only employers or organisations registered with the DBS can apply on behalf of an individual. Since clubs are not employers or registered I don't see how you can appoint somebody with an enhanced DBS. If the individual has a DBS certificate, unsless it is on-line, it is only relevant to the organisation that applied for it.

Safeguarding vulnerable adults is the responsibility of everybody not just the safeguarding lead.

Anybody appointed as Safeguarding lead / officer has a responsibility to undertake regular training and is responsible for training others in the organisation.

Watford Chess Club includes several ECF-registered coaches (although, for the purpose of this answer, ECF registration probably isn't particularly relevant) and, given that they coach at the club, there's no problem applying for Enhanced DBS certificates. In our case, the club applies for them as volunteers although I can't for the life of me see why a similar approach wouldn't be used for paid coaches.

[Roger Lancaster]

It's a minefield Kevin. Too much governance paperwork (though necessary!) can put good people off working with and developing juniors at chess. We want people to know that the governance is there to protect everyone but that folks should not fear working together to further junior/women's chess.

I've a lot of sympathy with Carl as, for the vast majority who have only good intentions, the safeguarding provisions are a pain in the neck. Other side of the coin is, if in the face of special pleadings the safeguarding rules were relaxed and more children (and possibly vulnerable adults) suffered abuse as a result, how would the special pleaders feel about this?

There have been some spectacular cases of abuse in the past, despite which there's a natural tendency to downplay the disagreeable possibility that abuse may still be alive and kicking in the chess world. But the closest parallel, the reported treatment of some women and girl players, suggests that this certainly can't be taken for granted. It's also perhaps worth remembering that other sports where bullying etc has been proved to be a serious concern initially went to great lengths to deny anything of the sort. Far from me to give advice but the ECF needs to be careful it's not next.

[Ernie Lazenby]

This topic caught my eye. I retired as a Police Inspector who had some involvement in the seedy side of life and thus when I became President of the CCA back in 2006 I was shocked to find we had no policy on the subject of safeguarding. I wrote the associations policy which was looked at by a Lawyer friend of mine and it was introduced and published on the association web site in 2006. The old CCA web site has gone and been replaced with one that has no mention of the safeguarding policy if it still exists. I would have thought recent history has shown safeguarding is a serious issue and needs to be treated as such. Sadly there are some people who just hate rules and don't want them but those folk are generally those who have no responsibilities and thus can say 'nothing to do with me guv' when the wheel falls off and it will. There are some very evil people in this world and chess as a micro cosym of society is not immun. Any sensible organisation must protect itself and those running it no matter how irksome the work involved in doing so. I have much sympathy for the volunteers in chess who do very good work keeping the game running in an increasingly disturbed world.

[Ernie Lazenby]

This story may shock you but its true and demonstrates why the ECF must do whats right. In another one of my interests I was very friendly with a chap whose entire world collapsed when he found out his adult son had been sexual abusing young girls under 15 and raping his sister. My friend could not handle it and died not long after his son was charged. The son was convicted and is now in prison for 13 years. The point is I had known the lad since his early teen years and never suspected in anyway he was perverted. The point is one never really knows someone and vigilance is paramount to prevent another Eley saga and others. Children/young persons and the vunerable can be so trusting and its the duty of all of us to do what's right. Had those who knew what Eley was up to done what's right sooner perhaps justice would have been done. BTW In the same hobby we had someone tried to join the club but he became unstuck when I recognised him as a recent release from prison having served time for sexual assualts on children. We had a significant number of children as members therefore I had his application blocked.
BTW I miss playing. Cannot play anymore. Health issues and old age have caught up with me. Take care.

[Roger Lancaster]

Ernie gives some straightforward examples but the hard fact is that, more often than not, situations are much more ambiguous. During my time coaching juniors I was occasionally approached by others interested in coaching. I explained to one persistent enquirer that the first step was to obtain an Enhanced DBS. "What's that?". So I explained. "But that's an intrusion on my private life," and he flounced off. There were one or two other disquieting features but solely circumstantial so I rationalised that, most likely, anything he might not want disclosed had no relevance to safeguarding. (Many minor crimes fall into that category). Since the man had done nothing wrong, merely exercised his unquestionable right not to apply for a DBS, there was no tangible "concern" to report to Social Services - just a lingering worry lest events later take a turn for the worse. All I could do was mentally upgrade him from "low risk" to "medium risk" and keep a watchful eye whenever he came into contact with juniors. It's hard to believe that no-one else has had a similar experience. Finally, before readers start contacting their defamation lawyers, I wish to make it absolutely clear that the man in question no longer has (and, in future, never will have) any ongoing involvement of any type in the world of chess.

[Chris Goodall]

I don't suppose anyone in the chess world thinks any longer that an unsafe situation can be justified by the kids' ECF ratings increasing at a healthy pace. That feels like the culture moving in a good direction.

Still, in some ways the waters feel muddier than 10 years ago. Both doing a thing and not doing it may get you into trouble. Conducting your own investigation may be covering up the problem; asking an outside body like the police to investigate may be washing your hands of it. Not being aware of an as-yet-unsubstantiated allegation may be a failure on your part; informing you of it when you didn't need to know may be a failure on someone else's. If you're leading an organisation (say, the Church of England) then you must put in place safeguarding procedures in which you yourself have no power to intervene; you must then circumvent those procedures and take personal ownership of every high-profile case.

Can't remember who told me that the first 10% of safeguarding is visibility, and you know you're visible enough when the kids can tell what colour your shoelaces are.