English Chess Forum

The following question arose at a club committee meeting last night. Obviously any individual working with children (ie running a junior chess club) would need CRB clearance but where do we stand as a primarily adult club that is willing to admit junior members? Someone suggested that every club member might need to be CRB checked which can't be right. Obviously we would need to be careful in certain situations; ie a junior travelling to a match in a car with adult members but would we be compromising ourselves legally? Presumably the same rules would apply to the club's sole seventeen year old (who is on the committee).

The question came up so as secretary I said I'd try to find out.

Andrew,

As best practise it would be wise to agree a Child Protection Policy and to appoint a Child Protection Officer. The CPP will dictate policy and the CPO will be the point of contact to see that the CPP is implemented and enforced. You can then decide who should be CRB cleared.

Both of my two clubs (Camberley and Crowthorne) have done both of these things.

My two pennyworth...

_________________
Chess Images: http://johnupham.smugmug.com/Chess
IT Manager for the British Chess Magazine: http://www.britishchessmagazine.co.uk
Twitter: @jeupham
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/john.upham

Andrew,
Under 'normal' circumstances I don't think there would be any requirement to have anybody CRB cleared. However, it is probably a good idea to have some guidelines in place for the dealing with junior players. For example,

1. You should try to avoid situations where you are alone with junior players

Hence when you are travelling to matches think about how you can arrange pick ups/drop offs to avoid the situation where a junior player is dropped off first/last

2. Parents of junior players should provide a contact number and any relevant medical information and whether it is OK to give the player common medications (paracetamol/strepsils)

This really isn't meant to be onerous and please don't stop having junior players in the team. Half an hour of getting some good practice guidelines in place will suffice. Have a review after 3 months, just to check that there isn't something you've forgotten.