Why?

It is important that all church volunteers and staff have a basic understanding of safeguarding, and know how to respond to any safeguarding concerns.  This includes people in church roles who are not working with children or vulnerable adults.

Mandatory Requirements

The Basic Awareness Pathway is mandatory for anyone appointed or elected to a role within the church.

It must be completed before a person undertakes any other Safeguarding Pathway.

The Basic Awareness Pathway (or a higher Core Pathway) must be repeated every three years.

Notes of clarification

The Core Pathways, in ascending order, are:

• Basic Awareness
• Foundation
• Leadership
• Senior Leadership

For new appointments, the Basic Awareness Pathway must be completed as part of the Induction process (unless the person has already completed any Core Pathway within the past three years).

Based on a person's current church roles, the highest required Core Pathway must be repeated every three years (but see the 'Good practice' section below).

Please note that:

• Bellringers are required to complete the Basic Awareness Pathway.
• This training is specific to the Church of England and it must still be completed by those who have undertaken safeguarding training in a different context (e.g. at work).
• The role of school governor is deemed to be a school role (rather than a church role) and the school is responsible for safeguarding training.  Therefore, a school governor is not required to undertake the Basic Awareness Pathway if they have no other church role.
• It is the responsibility of the diocese (rather than a parish) to ensure that clergy and Readers complete the required safeguarding training.

Good practice

As mentioned above, the highest required Core Pathway must be repeated every three years.  Nevertheless, if a person is required to complete a higher Core Pathway, best practice is for the Basic Awareness Pathway to be also repeated too.  Some dioceses have chosen to make this a mandatory requirement.

The Basic Awareness Pathway is recommended for anyone else in the church who wants or needs a basic awareness of safeguarding.

Links to useful resources

The latest version of the Safeguarding Learning and Development Framework  was approved by General Synod in July 2024.  It came into force on 1 January 2025.

The latest version of the Basic Awareness Pathway can be found at the Safeguarding Training Portal  and can be completed in under 90 minutes.

What's changed?

Section 3.1 of the new Framework includes the clarification that bellringers must complete the Basic Awareness Pathway.

Related pages

• Foundation Training
• Leadership Training
• PSO Induction Training
• Domestic Abuse Training
• Safer Recruitment and People Management Training