Safeguarding: What Should a Trustee Know? - Charity Trustees' Week 2024
As part of Charity Trustees’ Week 2024, Dóchas with the Safeguarding Working Group, are hosted an online event titled “Safeguarding: What should a Trustee know?”
This event focused on how trustees can help ensure that safeguarding is a key organisational priority, and explain their role in building and maintaining a strong safeguarding culture. It is becoming more common for organisations in the sector to appoint a focal point at Board level, with responsibility for ensuring safeguarding is given sufficient focus.
Panelists
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Moira Leydon
Member of the ActionAid Board with responsibility for Safeguarding & Assistant General Secretary of ASTI -
Valerie Philpott
Safeguarding Advisor at Misean Cara & Chair of the Dóchas Safeguarding Working Group -
Feargal O'Connell
CEO of Self Help Africa -
Moderator: Jane-Ann McKenna
CEO of Dóchas
Moira Leydon
Member of the ActionAid Board with responsibility for Safeguarding & Assistant General Secretary of ASTI
Moira Leydon joined the ActionAid Board in February 2021. She is the Assistant General Secretary at the Association of Secondary Teachers in Ireland (ASTI). Her role at the ASTI is focused on education and research, including curriculum and assessment, education policy, education for sustainable development, teacher professionalism and global education issues. She was a co-founder of the Irish Forum for Global Education, which is affiliated with the Global Campaign for Education which with ActionAid International is actively engaged. Moira represents the ASTI on the Research Network and the Solidarity and Co-operation Committee of Education International. She also represents ASTI on the Trade Union Advisory Committee to the OECD’s Education and Skills Working Group. Moira was on the Board of Aontas, supporting adult learners from 2017 to 2022.
Valerie Philpott
Safeguarding Advisor at Misean Cara & Chair of the Dóchas Safeguarding Working Group
Valerie is a qualified Social Worker and holds membership with the Social Work Registration Board of Ireland (CORU). She has extensive experience working with many marginalised groups within the non-profit and statutory sectors. Valerie is passionate about child welfare and children’s rights. Prior to taking up the position of Safeguarding Advisor here at Misean Cara, she spent 6 years in Australia working in Child Protection. She has also worked as a Social Worker in Ireland in the area of fostering. Valerie has qualifications in Anthropology and Social Policy and she holds a Master’s Degree in Social Work from University College Cork.
Feargal O’Connell
CEO of Self Help Africa
Feargal O’Connell is Chief Executive of Self Help Africa. Feargal has over 20 years of experience working in senior roles at non-governmental organisations including Concern Worldwide, the International Rescue Committee and Sightsavers Ireland, where he was CEO. He has worked in Cambodia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Chad, South Sudan and Nigeria. He also worked for periods in New York and in Ireland. Feargal has developed expertise in risk, crisis and change management through leading programmes on health systems strengthening, climate change and resilience initiatives, as well as front-line emergency response in fragile and conflict settings. Feargal holds a Bachelor of Arts from University College Dublin and a Masters in Conflict, Security and Development from the University of Leeds.
Moderator: Jane-Ann McKenna
CEO of Dóchas
Jane-Ann joined Dóchas as Chief Executive Officer in November 2021. She left a career in banking in 2007 to join Medicines Sans Frontier (MSF) where she worked for 12 years, including postings in Sri Lanka, Kyrgyzstan, Central African Republic and Afghanistan. She served as Director of MSF Ireland from 2011-2016. Most recently, she returned to Ireland in 2020 to support Ireland’s Covid-19 response, working with the HSE in the National Social Inclusion Office.
Safeguarding Sessions 2022: Beyond Compliance To Implementation
The Dóchas Safeguarding Working Group hosted a four part-series of online learning conversations in November 2022. You can view the recordings, presentations and resources shared here.
In November 2022, the Dóchas Safeguarding Group hosted a four-part series of online learning conversations which will explore questions such as: ‘What is needed to lead a culture of safeguarding in the Irish humanitarian and development sector?’ and ‘How can we move beyond compliance to implementation?’.
Read on to view the video recordings and presentations from each Session, as well as resources that were highlighted by our speakers and attendees.
Section 1
Integrating Safeguarding throughout the organisation
This session was chaired by Emily Lyons, Plan International Ireland. Our speakers, and their presentations:
- Margaret Rooney, Trócaire: “Importance of good governance”. View presentation.
Margaret covered topics such as the role of the Board, and senior management with regards to safeguarding; as well as systems for oversight and response to organisational safeguarding requirements - Mandy Yamanis, GOAL: ‘Why Safeguarding in the Supply Chain?’. View presentation.
This presentation began with an introduction to why safeguarding matters in the supply chain. An overview was also provided of integrating safeguarding in procedures, GOAL’s supplier code of conduct and their learnings on safeguarding in the supply chain. - Sara Barnes, Concern: “Let the right ones in…”: Safe hiring practices. View presentation.
Safe hiring practices are an integral part of safeguarding and this session discussed some practical measures to consider.
Section 2
Working in Partnership: A local approach to Strengthening Safeguarding Systems
This session was chaired by Matthew Banks, Children in Crossfire. Margaret was joined by colleagues & partners to share Trócaire’s learning review paper ‘Working in Partnership’, including experiences from Zimbabwe. They shared their experience on working together to ensure that safeguarding policies and systems work for specific context, programme type and partner structures. Topics that were covered include: i) partnerships; ii) localisation of safeguarding strengthening; iii) what works well; and iv) lessons learnt and recommendations for further strengthening.
Our speakers, and their presentations:
- Emma Newbury, Consultant: View presentation.
- Yvonne Muto, Trócaire: View presentation.
- Bekezela Mapanda, Consultant: View presentation.
- Denis Mudede, Ennet Matanda, Winnet Manyadza, CONNECT: View presentation.
Section 3
What does Safeguarding Training mean to you and your organisation?
This session was chaired by Matthew Banks, Children in Crossfire. This interactive conversation focused on the issue of training for Safeguarding within the humanitarian, development and international volunteering sectors. The session had a focus on topics including: the importance and effectiveness of training for safeguarding; approaches, modalities and methodologies; and policy implementation.
Our speakers, and their presentations:
- Chris O’Connell, Comhlámh. View presentation.
- Aileen McNulty, World Vision Ireland. View presentation.
- View interactive jamboard here.
Section 4
Caring for Survivors: A Principled Approach to Safeguarding
This session was chaired by Matthew Banks, Children in Crossfire. Valerie preseneted on key concepts of the survivor centred approach, strengthening organisational culture and reporting and incorporating a survivor centred approach to case management.
Our speaker, and their presentation:
- Valerie Philpott, Misean Cara: View presentation.