Everyone involved in football has a part to play to ensure children can play in a safe and enjoyable environment.

Kent FA, club committees, designated safeguarding officers, coaches, referees and parents/carers – all are key to ensuring football has effective safeguards in place.

What can parents expect?

All affiliated clubs must have a Safeguarding Children Policy and a Club Welfare Officer (CWO) who has been DBS-checked and safeguarding-trained. The Chairperson, Secretary, Treasurer and CWO must have completed our free ‘Safeguarding for Committee Members’ course. All coaches must be named against the team they're involved with on our system, must be DBS-checked and safeguarding-trained.  

What can parents do?

Firstly, it’s important to know who’s helping your child play football, understanding what’s expected of your child and how you and their coaches are expected to behave.  A well-run club will be happy to share how they organise things, so go ahead and ask, check out the club’s website and social media pages (if they have them) as these will also give you some insights to the club.

As a guide, here are the questions you should ask before you register your child with a club