Date updated: Friday 1st November 2024
New sexual harassment laws
New requirements on employers, including charities relating to how they protect their staff from sexual harassment, have come into force. One significant change is that organisations will need to put in place measures to protect staff from sexual harassment by customers, suppliers, contractors and other third parties. Organisations will need to take steps to comply with the new law, including updating policies and procedures and ensuring appropriate training is provided.
Stone King recently ran a webinar on the changes; watch the webinar.
Learning points from the NSPCC
The NSPCC has published a briefing containing learning points from case reviews on safeguarding in the voluntary sector. The briefing identifies a lack of clarity around organisations’ safeguarding roles and responsibilities. The learnings highlight that organisations in the voluntary sector need to have clear child protection policies and procedures in place that are fit for purpose and tailored to the activities of the organisation. Issues identified included the following:
Staff and volunteers sometimes lacked the confidence, knowledge, skills or experience to recognise and respond to child protection concerns, and sometimes people felt loyalty to local voluntary groups and this therefore led people to be more reticent in raising concerns or complaints about safeguarding.
There was sometimes confusion between voluntary and statutory agencies about their respective roles and responsibilities, and communication was sometimes limited and relevant information not shared, leading to reduced effectiveness in relation to safeguarding.
For more information on the above, visit Voluntary agencies: learning from case reviews on the NSPCC’s website.
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