Beds SRA Safeguarding guidance to coaches and clubs

Bedfordshire Squash Rackets Association (Beds SRA) is committed to providing a safe environment for adults and juniors to play squash and racketball in.

Any officially sanctioned events by Beds SRA will, therefore, follow the safeguarding guidance mandated by England Squash.

Any coaching that takes place under the name of Beds SRA will only use a fully licensed England Squash Coach that has undertaken the necessary safeguarding courses. In addition to this Beds SRA strongly recommends that any activity taking place in your own organisation or clubs name still follows the same guidance and ensures that all coaches are fully licensed.
In a recent change to the policy at England Squash all coaches are now required to attend a face to face safeguarding course in order to retain your license. ES are proposing a grace period up to 1st Feb 2020 to attend a face to face course for coaches that hold an existing license. An online version is no longer deemed adequate.

England Squash Latest Statement:

England Squash is audited annually by the Child Protection in Sport Unit (CPSU) to ensure our safeguarding processes and policies meet the required standard. The CPSU have advised that going forward, it is compulsory that all coaches have attended the latest face-to-face training. We have maintained a ‘green’ RAG rating for several years, and in order to keep the equivalent positive rating we must now mandate face-to-face training.
Coaches must renew their safeguarding qualification every three years in order to maintain their valid Coaches Club status. Previously, coaches could both attain and renew their safeguarding qualification via online training, there is now a need for England Squash to ensure that all coaches have attended the latest face-to-face training.
CPSU have highlighted the advantages of face-to-face training including; access to the very latest advice and guidance, the forum to share experiences, ask questions and to discuss this important topic with colleagues from other sports and backgrounds. 
We are currently discussing with the CPSU how best we can meet their criteria, whilst also being fair to existing coaches and mitigating the disruption and any risks involved in introducing this change e.g. a coach losing access to their insurance benefit.
Over recent weeks, we have introduced the requirement for mandatory face-to-face safeguarding training for all newly qualified coaches (i.e. those undertaking their first coaching qualification).

Ongoing work

We are proposing the following steps and are awaiting approval from the CPSU:
All coaches must undertake face-to-face safeguarding training when their existing safeguarding qualification lapses.
Once a coach has attended the latest face-to-face training, we are proposing that future courses they attend could either be online or face-to-face. 
For coaches whose safeguarding qualification expires soon, we are proposing a ’grace period’ between now and 1 February 2020 during which time their Coach Membership (including insurance) will still be valid regardless of whether their safeguarding qualification has expired. This should allow enough time for all coaches to complete face-to-face training. 
Coach Member validity will be subject to the coach having evidenced that they are booked on to a course before the end of the grace period (e.g. emailing evidence of their booking to England Squash), alongside holding a current Coach Membership, up to date DBS certificate, and First Aid certificate (Level 2 and above).

Any coaches that are struggling to fulfil the requirements for any reason are encouraged to come and discuss this with the Beds SRA committee. As a county we want to support our coaches and ensure this process is as smooth as possible and that we keep people licenced and actively coaching in our clubs.