National Child Protection Week runs from September 1st to 7th and focuses on promoting “Conversations that Matter” in Australia. For New Zealand, Child Safeguarding Week will take place from September 2nd to 8th, 2024.

The Safety Team at Belgravia Leisure are always collaborating with our venues on what we do well and what we can improve on to make positive changes and outcomes for children in our venues. We continue to work hard with venues to provide a space where children feel heard, safe and have conversations that matter to create enjoyable experiences for them, each and every time they visit.

The Safety Team have lots of helpful policies and standards that will improve the way we view child safety. We are putting together several documents to help teams continue to think about child safety in everything we do. Please read on for important updates on these helpful resources, and be sure to let us know how you plan on acknowledging National Child Safety Protection Week and Child Safeguarding Week at your venue.

• Learn more about National Child Protection week in Australia here: https://www.napcan.org.au/ncpw/
• Learn more about Child Safeguarding Week in New Zealand here: https://www.childsafeguardingweek.org.nz/

Below are four posters for your use during National Child Protection Week and Child Safeguarding Week. The darker versions are for digital use, while the lighter ones are for print. Please use the orange versions for recreation and the blue ones for aquatics.

Digital Posters

Posters for Print

Kids Helpline Colouring Sheet

Additionally, one of our venues has come up with a super creative idea to raise awareness of the Kids Helpline by incorporating it into a colouring sheet, which you can download below.

Policy Updates 

We have been revising our Child Safety and Wellbeing Policy to ensure it serves as an overarching guide, with clear and easy-to-follow standards for all team members. 

This includes clear procedures for team members on reporting suspected child abuse, how to respond to a disclosure by a child and how to identify if a child is at risk of harm.  

National Principles document 

We are also working on an extensive step by step document related to the National Principles, which links to Child Safe Standards (state by state legislative requirements) and informs teams of how at Belgravia Leisure we meet each national principle. 

The document provides links and resources we have available for staff to read and implement at their venues. This document provides a consistent approach to promoting a culture of child safety and wellbeing. It is an easy-to-read document for all team members to read and follow and will allow our venues to not only know what the national principles are but embed this into their practices. 

Safe touch techniques

Also in the works is a standard for aquatics on safe touch techniques, including videos and photos that will offer our swimming teachers invaluable information and training on child-safe practices when teaching. It will also ensure that children feel safe and supported when in a swimming lesson and our swimming teachers learn safe lifts, touches and holds when teaching. Our vision is to put this into a Lenny Training Module, so our swimming teachers and water safety team members get a clear understanding of the requirements of safe touch techniques.  

Child Care Facilities Channel 

We have started a Child Care Facilities Channel, which will offer a support network for all our venues with childcare facilities or creche. This will be led by the Child Safety Coordinator and will promote discussions around child safety. 

We hope to use this channel to build staff confidence when caring for children in their facility. This channel will network our services together for support and for sharing great ideas in the child safety space.  

Additional training 

The rollout of our Level 1 training for all teams throughout Belgravia Leisure is due to commence soon. To create the content for this training, we collaborated with Child Safe who have a wealth of knowledge and information around Child Safety for our team members to put into practice.  

Watch this space, because there is lots coming to support you.

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