Duty of Care

Overview

Duty of care means taking reasonable steps to keep participants safe and prevent harm. It is both a legal and professional responsibility for everyone involved in educational visits.

Staff must plan carefully, supervise effectively, act responsibly and be prepared to respond if something goes wrong.

Under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, risks must be reduced so far as reasonably practicable. This means taking sensible precautions while balancing the time, effort and cost of control measures against the level of risk.

Key Principles

Several important principles guide duty of care during educational visits:

• Reasonable Care You are not expected to eliminate all risk, but to take reasonable care given the same circumstances.
• Standard of Care Non-specialist staff are expected to act as a “responsible person.” Teachers and specialists are expected to meet the higher standard of a “responsible professional.”
• Non-delegable Duty Even if supervision or activities are delivered by a third party provider, the school remains responsible for ensuring reasonable care is taken.

Visit Leader Responsibilities

To fulfil your duty of care, you should ensure that key arrangements are in place:

Working with External Providers

External providers may deliver activities during a visit. However, the school must still ensure that:

• The provider is competent and suitable
• Roles and responsibilities are clearly agreed
• Appropriate supervision is maintained
• Safety standards are monitored during the visit

Even when activities are led by others, the school/setting retains overall responsibility for the safety and welfare of participants.

Parent helpers

Parent helpers’ responsibility is practical and limited: they must act safely and responsibly within their role, follow the school staff’s instructions, and help supervise. Teachers remain legally and professionally accountable for the overall safety and well-being of the group.

Whilst parents accompanying visits can help to boost ratios, there can be an issue if, for example, there is incident or emergency situation, when they could naturally focus their attention on their own child rather than the whole group. This risk can be reduced by appropriate vetting, briefing, monitoring and placing them with another group or giving them an ‘accompanying’ role rather than a leadership one.

See section on DBS.

Links to further reading:

OEAP National Guidance available at https://oeapng.info