It is important that open-age adult clubs who have teams that contain 16 and 17-year-olds understand their responsibilities to safeguard those players.

This means that every open-age adult club with active players aged 16 or 17 should know that they are not exposed to a coach or manager who is ‘barred from working with children’.

To ensure this is the case we strongly recommend that our clubs check that those people in eligible roles within their club hold an in-date FA accepted Enhanced DBS Check with a check of the Children’s Barred list.

If a club has or is likely to have any 16 or 17-year-olds involved in open-aged football (e.g adult clubs with a youth section), we would suggest that they follow the best practice of ensuring that they have at least one member of the coaching staff working with their teams who holds a valid FA DBS Check.

If clubs with open-age teams do not have a Welfare Officer and have or are likely to have 16/17-year-olds then we strongly suggest that you train a Club Welfare Officer and adopt safeguarding policies and procedures to safeguard those young people who are under 18.

Please see below documents that can help with the process. Currently our education programme is on hold due to Covid-19 but we will work alongside clubs to ensure there are sufficient future courses arranged to allow new welfare officers to reach full compliance.

If you do need any help or advise please don't hesitate to contact the safeguarding team via email info@lancashirefa.com or 01772 644264.

RELATED DOCUMENTS

AFFILIATED FOOTBALL’S SAFEGUARDING POLICY & PROCEDURES

OBTAINING A DBS CHECK ONLINE

KNOW YOUR RIGHTS IN FOOTBALL

FOOTBALL CLUB SAFEGUARDING CHILDREN POLICY

SAFER RECRUITMENT OF VOLUNTEERS IN GRASSROOTS FOOTBALL

FA DBS FAQS

LANCASHIRE FA KEY SAFEGUARDING PERSONNEL