The website “Everyone’s Invited” is a movement which is “committed to eradicating rape culture” and describes “rape culture” as “all the ways that different forms of aggressive and violent sexual behaviour are normalised, encouraged and even admired by society”. Find out more.
The website “Everyone’s Invited” is a movement which is “committed to eradicating rape culture” and describes “rape culture” as “all the ways that different forms of aggressive and violent sexual behaviour are normalised, encouraged and even admired by society”. The site has now amassed nearly 40,000 members and over 10,000 testimonials describing anonymised experiences.
Originally founded in June 2020, the website was set up by founder Soma Sara as a platform where victims of peer-on-peer sexual abuse can anonymously share their stories. With the number of allegations made on the website now surpassing 10,000, the issue has attracted the attention of the Metropolitan police and the focus appears to be on allegations made of abuse experienced within the education sector.
Robert Halfon, chairman of the House of Commons education select committee, has called for a full independent inquiry, while Chief Constable Simon Bailey, the lead officer for the national task force for child sexual abuse investigations, has announced a hotline for abuse reports will be set up.
The impact will be felt by many education providers who will need to respond accordingly. Indeed, England’s children commissioner, Dame de Souza, has highlighted that schools must report serious claims of sexual violence and harassment to the police. Moreover, the Met Police has been reviewing the content on Everyone’s Invited and contacting schools it can identify.
Some have raised the issue that anonymous posts do not enable them to take specific action and that many testimonies relate to incidents outside of school. Nonetheless, all educational providers will need to seriously consider how they will react and respond to any allegations and, in particular, should seek specialist legal advice in relation to conducting internal enquiries and responding to any potential police investigations to ensure processes are properly managed from the outset.
As the reports in the media and testimonies on the website show, these allegations encompass schools across the independent and state sector as well as universities. All education providers should be aware of the potential for allegations to be made and a police investigation but, regardless, for many a need still exists to conduct internal investigations and ensure that all is being done to address these issues.
Education providers will want to adopt a proactive approach to addressing the potential for allegations internally as soon as is practicable, but in any event without delay.
Furthermore, it is highly likely that going forward there will be much greater emphasis on schools, colleges and universities providing effective routes for such issues to be reported as well as specific policies to address inappropriate behaviour of this nature. Getting ahead of the curve and conducting a full review of existing policies and updating as necessary at the earliest opportunity is advisable.
Browne Jacobson has a highly experienced team of lawyers who can advise and assist in setting up and conducting internal investigations of this type and reviewing policies and procedures. We also have much experience of representing organisations throughout police investigations. We would be very happy to provide help and advice in this regard, please do get in touch if you wish to discuss matters in more detail.
There’s been little evidence of interventions or financial management reviews this year and it appears the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) has re-focussed on financial delivery. It’s also telling that there were no discernible changes to the reporting of financial irregularities in the Academies Trust Handbook 2022.
The Children’s Commissioner, Rachel De Souza, has recently published a report “Beyond the labels: a SEND system which works for every child, every time”, which she intends to sit alongside the DfE’s SEND Review (2019) and SEND Green Paper (2022) and which she hopes will put children’s voices at the heart of the government’s review of SEND system.
As well as providing day-to-day support to help you focus on managing your settings, we also provide training and professional development on a range of topics to keep you and your staff up-to-date.
There’s greater opportunity than ever for parents, carers and guardians to voice any concerns they have relating to their child’s education and for their concerns to be heard and to be taken seriously. While most staff in schools and academies are conscious of their legal duties relating to complaints management, many are struggling to cope with such a significant increase in the volume of complaints they must manage.
We’re pleased to collaborate with Lloyds Bank, who recently asked us and audit and risk specialists Crowe UK to offer guidance that academy trusts would find helpful when considering setting up a trading subsidiary.
The DfE has published new guidance and opened the application process for window two of the Trust Capacity Fund (TCaF) for 2022/2023, with a fund of £86m in trust capacity funding focused particularly on education investment areas.
The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse was established in March 2015. We now have its report. As you would expect with such a broad scope, the report is long and makes a number of far-reaching recommendations. In this article, Dai Durbridge highlights seven of the 20 recommendations, sets out how they could impact on schools and suggests what steps to take now.
Browne Jacobson’s education team has been named as winner of the ‘Legal Advisors to Education Institutions’ category at the Education Investor Awards 2022 for a record sixth time.
Since the new Suspensions and Exclusions Statutory Guidance was published, we have received a lot of questions about the use of managed moves. For the first time, the Statutory Guidance does explain what a managed move is, but in relatively broad terms and does not cover the mechanics of how a managed move should operate.
Over 3000 young people from across the UK and Ireland took part in a virtual legal careers insight event, aimed at making the legal profession more diverse.
Holly Quirk, an associate barrister in Browne Jacobson’s Manchester office, was awarded the Legal Professional of the Year Award at this year’s Manchester Young Talent Awards.
The risk of assault against staff is, sadly, something that all schools need to consider carefully. Here one legal expert explains what they can do to protect staff and ensure they fulfil their duty of care.
Two directors of a construction company were fined after failing to ensure the safe removal of asbestos from a plot of land. On 14 and 15 November 2021, Directors Anthony Sumner and Neil Brown, of Waterbarn Limited were involved in the uncontrolled removal of asbestos material from a plot of land in Grasscroft, Oldham.
An engineering company in Tyne and Wear was fined £20,000 after a worker fractured his pelvis and suffered internal injuries after falling through a petrol station forecourt canopy, whilst he was replacing the guttering.
Browne Jacobson’s education team has again been confirmed as a national powerhouse after securing five Tier 1 rankings relating to Education in the latest edition of Legal 500 and maintaining a Band 1 UK-wide ranking for Education in Chambers & Partners UK 2023.
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