Child welfare site

Every young person attending, with guardians, contact numbers, dietary and medical needs, plus the whole team’s working-with-children position, lives on the confidential welfare site: welfare.christianarts.team. Access is tighter than this site — staff, the Child Welfare Officer and the board only. It is the register to work from on the night.

Child safety contacts

Role	Who	On the night
Child Safety Officer	Ryan Gilpin	Overall responsibility. Not a rostered supervisor; as CEO his contact with youth is managed at his own discretion as need arises (Ryan, 18 Aug)
Reporting Officer	Elizabeth Boughton	Receives any child safety concern, allegation or disclosure by a child, immediately
If the concern involves the Reporting Officer	A designated alternative Board member	Per child safety policy clause 30.2

Youth Orchestra and Youth Choir members are performing, so under-18s are present. Any concern goes to the Reporting Officer immediately, not at the end of the night.

Supervision model on the day (Liz’s plan, 18 Aug)

Liz’s draft Supervision Plan and her 18 Aug edits to the runsheet’s Child Safety tab set the structure: Child Welfare Officer (Liz — an adult performer on violin 2, so mobile rather than zone-fixed) and three named youth-focussed roles — Youth Stage Manager, Youth Green Room Supervisor and a Floating Supervisor who doubles as Deputy CWO whenever Liz is performing or unavailable (plus a possible backup). Supervisor roles are confirmed at check-in.

• Supervisor call 12.40pm, mandatory briefing 12.45pm — supervisors are briefed, sweep for hazards and take their posts before any youth enter the building (per the full youth movement table on the runsheet’s Child Safety tab).
• The Youth Green Room is locked during rehearsal segments while the youth are on stage, and unlocked at breaks.
• Lifts: one supervisor may ride with a group of young people, but a second supervisor must be waiting to meet them at the landing.
• Youth Green Room is locked whenever all youth have departed (key arrangement to confirm with the venue).
• Phones (Ryan’s call, 18 Aug): young people’s phones are put away and silent — not collected. Ryan wants them able to contact their families; supervisors do not confiscate.
• Code of conduct: a stack of the general Code of Conduct sits at the registration desk and every backstage adult signs on arrival.
• Prayer call location: set with Kay once the floor plan lands — it cannot be the adult green room (Liz). The 7.15pm youth regroup point after prayer also needs naming (open question on the Child Safety tab).

NSW Child Safe Standards (OCG) — the rule set behind this plan

On 20 August the full NSW Office of the Children’s Guardian child safe document set was loaded to the welfare-safeguarding SharePoint (Child Safety Resources › OCG templates): the ten Child Safe Standards, plus templates AChA is adopting for its Statement of Commitment, Child Safe Policy, Code of Conduct, Reporting Policy, Recruitment Policy and Risk Management Plan. The rules that bind every adult on the day:

• Never alone with a child without supervision or risk management in place; no out-of-hours or private online contact with young people, and any direct correspondence includes the parent or carer.
• No photos or videos of children on personal devices without permission, and nothing on social media without consent — the legal baseline behind our no-photography-backstage rule.
• No personal gifts to a child without direct parental permission; declare any relationship with a child that exists outside AChA.
• Report immediately, never at the end of the night: immediate danger 000; criminal allegations to NSW Police first (131 444) before any internal step; risk of significant harm to DCJ 132 111 (24 hours). Failing to report a child abuse offence to police can itself be a criminal offence (s316A Crimes Act).
• WWCC is a legal requirement, not a preference, for child-related work, paid or volunteer: verified on the OCG register (never self-verified), renewed five-yearly, and anyone barred or expired comes off child-related work immediately.
• Concerning behaviours are reportable too: favouritism, babysitting AChA children without organisational consent, or seeking time alone with children — on their own not always breaches, together a grooming pattern.

The full welfare rule set, reporting detail and document-adoption status live on the welfare site’s Policies and Gaps tabs. A parent-facing summary is published at members.christianarts.global/events/child-safety.

Working With Children Checks — who needs one (board policy)

Required: the youth supervisors, stage management and production crew who interact with young people backstage, section leaders, the Home Team and the leadership committee — all of whose checks AChA holds. Not required: performing adult members. That is a standing board decision, previously communicated to members — do not chase performers for checks.

Register position (updated 18 Aug): ten team members’ checks are on Liz’s WWCC register with numbers, dates of birth and expiries now in the CRM. Alisa Moore’s expiry was recorded wrongly as 2026 — it is 23 August 2028, so nothing lapses before the concert, and her check has a register result (valid for paid and unpaid work). Verification of the rest against the NSW register is with Liz and starts the moment she is added to the AChA employer profile (with Ryan). Two dates of birth are still being collected (Liz has messaged both).

Risk assessment and approvals (split per Liz, 18 Aug)

The performance risk assessment is being updated by Liz and Kay to include the child-safety aspects (high-risk activities: stage blackout, youth dismissal, transitions; medical, injury and venue-specific hazards). The CEO approves the risk assessment and safety plan — they are operational documents and do not need board approval. The board’s part is appointing the CWO, establishing the Child Welfare Committee, and approving the role descriptions and the general Adult Code of Conduct (board pack in preparation, Ryan + Liz). The signed copy will live in the shared drive with the concert documents, and Kay carries a printed copy in the show book on the day.

Youth sign-in register (DRAFT v1 built 19 Aug — Liz to approve format)

The register every promise hangs on. It captures, per young person: name and ensemble · parent/carer names and mobiles · the named adults authorised to collect · medical conditions, allergies and medication with written doses (self-carried EpiPen/inhaler noted) · photo/publication consent · sign-in time and signature · sign-out time, collector name and signature. Ari prints it (two copies: desk + Liz’s muster copy).

Status 19 Aug: DRAFT v2 is built from the live CRM and the roster (17 under-18s with parent/carer + mobile pre-filled — the restored cellist included as of 19 Aug — and 7 over-18 youth members on a roll-count section) and is with Ryan and Liz. Still blank, by design, until parents update by Wed 26 Aug: authorised-to-collect, medical detail, and photo consent (never recorded in the CRM, so it is collected on this sheet). Reprint after 26 Aug with the parent updates in.

Lost child (FoH side)

For a lost audience child or sibling (not a performer): the finder stays with the child at the program table (the reunification point), the desk records a description and radios Kay, ushers sweep foyer → house → toilets in that order, and any house announcement is made only by the duty manager or Kay. Agree this with the duty manager at the 1.00pm walk-through. A missing PERFORMER is a child-safety escalation to Liz immediately.

First aid

A named AChA first aider (TBC from the roster, current certificate) sits house-left near the door; the venue’s duty staff and first aid kit are the backup, and the venue induction at 8am confirms the kit location and nearest hospital. Every incident, however small, goes on an incident form (printed by Ari, kept at the youth sign-in desk) and to Kay’s show log.

Emergency and evacuation

Venue procedure governs; our crew learn the exits and muster point at the 8am induction and the company hears it at the 1.30 call. The youth block exits as one counted group with its supervisors before anything else, and Liz takes the roll against the sign-in register at the muster point. The duty manager or Kay speaks to the audience; nobody else makes announcements.

Drop-off and pick-up

Drop-off at the stage door (1.00pm choir, 1.30pm orchestra; percussion arrives separately by individual arrangement, see the percussion note). Pick-up 9.40pm at DOOR 1, opposite the box office — the venue builds a signed, bollarded Youth Pickup Point there during the interval and the sign-out register moves to it; the youth exit via Door 1 as one supervised group. Youth are signed in and out against the register by a parent or a named adult — never released to anyone else. If a parent is late, the young person waits inside with two supervisors and Liz until collected; supervisors never leave until the last young person is signed out. The show finishes ~9.37 — protect the clock all night; the 9.40 pick-up never moves. Kay's lever if late: trim the interval to 15 minutes.

Doors map: arrival vs pick-up (schematic, not to scale)

Insurance and compliance

AChA public liability cover is current and the certificate of currency goes to Century with the rider paperwork. All backstage adults sign the code of conduct before entry (checked at the 1.30 call); WWCC coverage per the table above is the outstanding compliance item.