Play Safe Archives - Shildon AFC

Shildon AFC is lending its full support to Play Safe – an ongoing national campaign led by The FA to raise awareness of the importance of safeguarding in football.

Although it runs throughout the year, Play Safe really comes to the fore over football’s National Safeguarding Weekend, which this year is 1st & 2nd October 2022. The main focus this year is on parents and carers, with two key messages to convey:

– Awareness of the vital safeguarding role parents/carers play in football; and

– Encouragement to take the short, new and free online safeguarding course that’s been created specifically for parents/carers. You can access the course here.

Importantly, encouragement to take the new course has come from FASSSAG – The FA’s Survivor Support and Safeguarding Advisory Group:

“We have inputted into the course and helped frame its key messages from our collective experiences. It’s vitally important to us that every parent/carer understands they role they need to play in football. Taking this course can make a real difference – we are asking every parent/carer to commit to help ensure football is ever-safer.”

The support of FASSSAG has been welcomed by FA Chief Executive Mark Bullingham, himself a parent and youth football coach. “The FASSSAG has been important in helping us create our new strategy moving forwards and we really appreciate their input into the new course. I have taken the new course and encourage all parents/carers across football to take it too.

“Ultimately, safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility. We all need to ensure that everyone involved in football – particularly children and young people – has a consistently safe and positive experience of our great game. Play Safe reminds everyone of that responsibility and keeps safeguarding front of mind, which is exactly where it should be.”

Play Safe is being run in partnership with the NSPCC and has the full backing of the Premier League, EFL, Barclays Women’s Super League and Barclays Women’s Championship. It’s also supported and being run across every other level of the game.

Play Safe is being run in partnership with the NSPCC and has the full backing of the Premier League, EFL, Barclays FA Women’s Super League and the FA Women’s Championship. It’s also supported and being run across every other level of the game.

The main element of Play Safe is a series of short films which emphasise the importance of clubs such as ours having safeguarding as an everyday reality. The films also explain to parents/carers and children themselves what to do if they feel unsafe or worried, because nothing matters more than making sure football is safe for everyone, especially children and young people. You can see these films on the front page of our club website.

“As a youth team coach, I will be working with my club to ensure we support the Play Safe messaging,” says FA Chief Executive Mark Bullingham. “I am also pleased that the campaign has the support of the former footballers with lived experience of abuse in football, who are on our Survivor Support and Safeguarding Advisory Group. The Group has collectively said:

“Learning from the past is crucial, so that we can prevent the horrific experiences that happened to us and so many others in football, from happening again.

“As a group of survivors, we fully support the ethos and important messages that Play Safe conveys – whether to club officials, parents/carers and or vitally, children and young people themselves. Equally important is that Play Safe is not a one-off campaign – it will be used at key points in the football calendar to remind everyone in football, that children’s welfare and keeping them safe, should be at the heart of all that we do.”

As the Survivor Group points out, you’ll see Play Safe appearing at various points throughout the season to keep safeguarding front of mind in football. Together, we want to do everything we can so everyone – particularly children and young people – has a consistently positive experience of our great game.