Safer recruitment principles

Safer recruitment is a term used when recruiting volunteers and staff to help you discourage people with a potential to cause harm. It means you must take all reasonable steps to make sure that those you recruit into your organisation are suitable and appropriate.

The term refers to a set of practices set out in government guidance that you need to use for all roles if you are delivering activity for children or adults at risk. The principles are useful for everyone.

• If your organisation regularly takes responsibility for children, use NSPCC Learning's set of safer recruitment pages.
• If you want to check that you are taking a safeguarding approach to finding volunteers no matter who you work with, you should combine the following pages with our general guide to recruiting and managing volunteers.
• If your organisation works with young people, you may find the National Youth Agency's safe people guidance on the Safeguarding and Risk Management Hub useful.