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League Welfare Guidance
November 2024

1. To be clear about the leagues responsibilities when running activities for children and young people. This involves ...

1. ensuring these responsibilities are well-understood by others
2. working with your County FA Welfare Officer
3. working with the Club Welfare Officers registered with your league
4. promoting The FA's Respect Programme and helping to develop best practice processes.

2. To help league and club personnel understand what their 'duty of care' towards children and young people actually means and entails on a day-to-day basis, working closely with the Club Welfare Officers to achieve this. In order to carry out your responsibilities you need to follow these two simple steps:

a) Promote and Support by:

1. knowing who your CFA Welfare Officer is and how to contact them
2. knowing who every Club Welfare Officer is and how to contact them
3. ensuring all Club Welfare Officers complete The FA's Safeguarding Children and Welfare Officer Workshops
4. knowing why certain roles require an FA CRB check and how The FA CRB process works
5. knowing what The FA's Respect Programme requires of everyone
6. highlighting the benefits of the Safeguarding Children education programme for club officials and parents

b) Monitoring:

1. your clubs to ensure they have a Safeguarding Children Policy, Anti-Bullying Policy and Equality Policy
2. buy-in to the Respect Programme (especially the distribution of codes of conduct and adherence to these)
3. repeated incidents of poor behaviour and liaising with your CFA Welfare Officer about these
4. individual clubs use of The FA's Safeguarding Children best practice guidelines (e.g. Responsible Recruitment, Travel, Trips and Tournaments, Anti-bullying policy and Safeguarding Children Policy template)
5. that all Club Welfare Officers are assisting those in their clubs who require a CRB check to do so via The FA CRB Unit

The FA Respect Policy Document can be found on the Leagues Document page