Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility

St Helena believes that living a life that is free from harm and abuse is a fundamental right of every person. We have a statutory duty to promote the welfare of our service users and to protect vulnerable families from abuse, neglect, exploitation, radicalisation and risk of harm.

St Helena recognises safeguarding as a high priority. To achieve this, we ensure robust arrangements are in place to provide strong leadership, vision and direction for safeguarding, providing clear accessible policies and procedures in line with relevant legislation, statutory guidance, and best practice. We have clear lines of accountability for safeguarding our service users, such as clinical governance, monitoring, auditing and sharing learning and development from incidents.

To ensure our workforce is competent and our practice is current all our clinical and non-clinical staff, volunteers and trustees are trained at the appropriate level to their role and responsibility in line with the Healthcare Intercollegiate models.

We are regulated and held accountable to the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and under the Integrated Care System Inspection Framework, which comes into effect from 2023.

If you have concerns about an adult, child or young person

• If a child, young person or adult is in immediate danger, or a crime has been committed call the Police on 999
• If a life is at risk – someone has seriously injured themselves or has taken an overdose, call 999
• If there is a mental health crisis, call 111 and select ‘mental health option’
• If you would like to discuss a concern, please contact either:
  • Hospice Safeguard and Prevent Lead, Cherie Smith, on 01206 845566 or email cherie.smith1@nhs.net
  • Hospice Safeguard Deputies at the Hospice on 01206 845 566 or SinglePoint on 01206 8903 60 and ask to speak to a safeguard deputy

Alternatively, you can contact adult or children social care directly on:

• Adult Social Care on 0345 603 7630
• Children and Families Hub on 0345 603 7627
• Out of hours or bank holidays, call the emergency duty team for adults and children on 0345 606 1212

The Essex Safeguarding Children Boards and Essex Safeguarding Adult Boards

The Essex Safeguarding Children Boards and Essex Safeguarding Adult Boards are made up of representatives from social care, the police and health, and are responsible for ensuring safeguarding arrangements are in place. Each Board has a very useful website for information, such as categories and signs of abuse, up to date legislation, resources and training opportunities for both the public and professionals. For further information please click the below link which will take you directly to the website: 

• Essex Safeguarding Childrens Board - Home (escb.co.uk)
• Essex Safeguarding Adult Board - Home (essexsab.org.uk)

NHS England Safeguarding app

This is a free Safeguarding app that has been co-developed by the NHS England team and safeguarding forums in the East of England. The app provides an overview of necessary legislation and guidance covering both adult and children’s safeguarding and regional contact numbers. This is available for free on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store on Android.

NHS England » NHS England Safeguarding app 

Useful contact details