Zero Tolerance Policy
Purpose of Policy
To explain the Company’s policy and procedure with respect to incidents where our staff, students and third parties are subject to violent, threatening or abusive behaviour.
Policy Content
1. Purpose
1.1 No member of staff should be subjected to violent, threatening or abusive behaviour. Edge Group employees have the right to work and carry out their duties in an environment free from violence, threatening or abusive behaviour.
1.2 This policy supports our Health and Safety Policy and Lone Working Policy to help managers and employees in managing and minimising risk for any event where they may face unacceptable behaviours, including violence, aggression or abuse. This includes situations working in the community or with colleagues. All employees have the right to be treated with consideration, dignity and respect, and all employees should be aware of their responsibilities for health and safety.
1.3 The purpose of this policy is to inform our staff of the measures in place to manage incidents of violent, threatening or abusive behaviour. It seeks to ensure risks associated with violent, threatening and abusive behaviour are managed through:
risk assessment, and the identification and implementation of suitable controls;
training for all relevant employees;
procedures to reduce the likelihood of our employees being in a vulnerable position.
1.4 The strategy and principles of this policy are to:
identify potential risks;
control and manage those risks, where possible;
inform and involve employees on the risks and the controls in place;
hold to account those who behave in a violent, threatening or abusive way towards our staff.
2. Scope
2.1 This policy and procedure applies to all Edge Group employees and volunteers.
3. Guiding principles
3.1 We have a duty of care for all our employees, including employees who are working alone or outwith an office.
3.2 We value our employees and volunteers and we will not tolerate any form of violent, threatening or aggressive behaviour towards them.
3.3 We believe that our staff, students, suppliers, partners, correspondents and complainants have the right to be heard, understood and respected.
3.4 All employees are required to treat each other, and our students, with dignity and respect. We expect our students and all third parties with whom we work to afford the same dignity and respect towards our staff.
3.5 We require all staff to report accidents, incidents and safeguarding concerns.
3.6 We will address all incidents reported internally, and where there is a serious threat or action, we will report the incident to the appropriate authorities. This means that we will contact the police in situations where any member of staff, student or other third party behaves in a manner which results in our staff, students or property being threatened or abused.
3.7 All employees have a primary legal responsibility for their own health and safety. If they are threatened or harmed by a student, they have the right to report the matter to the police, or to ask the Company to report to the police on their behalf.
3.8 We will deal with incidents between Edge Group employees through our internal procedures, for example Disciplinary Policy.
4. Definitions
4.1 The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) defines a violent or aggressive incident as: ‘Any incident, in which a person is abused, threatened or assaulted in circumstances relating to their work. This can include verbal abuse or threats as well as physical attacks.’
4.2 They define an incident as: ‘An unwanted, unplanned event that has the potential to cause harm/injury.’
4.3 Examples of unacceptable behaviour are summarised below:
Violence can be physical, or non-physical including threats, abusive behaviour and language (verbal and written), escalating agitation, and intimidating body language.
Unreasonable demands: a demand becomes unreasonable when it impacts substantially on our work. Examples of this may include, repeatedly demanding responses within an unreasonable timescale or insisting on seeing or speaking to a particular member of staff when that is not possible or appropriate.
Unreasonable levels of contact: volume and duration of contact with Edge Group by an individual that causes problems for the employee or the Company. This can occur over a short period, for example, a number of calls in one day or one hour.
Unreasonable use of processes: for example, where someone uses the complaints procedure to challenge the professional judgement of our staff or where they use it repeatedly to raise the same issues that we have already investigated (vexatious complaints).
5. Monitoring and review
5.1 The Operations Manager is responsible for monitoring and implementing this policy. He will review this policy every three years and make amendments as appropriate in consultation with the Managing Director.
5.2 We will review and update this policy to accommodate any changes in legislation that may affect how we manage incidents at work. We will also review our risk assessment or lone working procedures as and when required, or when our methodologies change.
6. When to use this procedure
6.1 The policy reflects the legal obligations placed upon Edge Group by the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 and our requirements to report under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013.
6.2 You should report all accidents or incidents following our accident and incident policy. The Operations Manager has responsibility for ensuring reportable incidents are reported in accordance with the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR).
Management Responsibilities
6.3 While the Operations Manager has primary responsibility for the policy, all managers have a responsibility to implement and monitor this policy and ensure employees are aware of and follow it. Managers should also:
Undertake local risk assessments for their team to identify the risks to staff from violent, threatening or abusive behaviour, with particular regard to staff working in the community or on respite activities with students. Develop control measures and local action plans to control those risks identified within the risk assessment and review the risk assessments regularly.
Ensure that all employees are aware of the incident reporting procedure and follow it. Report any incident internally or to the police on behalf of the employee if requested to do so.
Set a positive example by reporting all incidents of violence and abuse and not tolerating abusive behaviour from students, fellow professionals, and/or members of the public.
Respond to and, where possible, resolve incidents before they escalate.
Ensure you make the Operations Manager aware of any incident as soon as reasonably practicable, within a maximum of 24 hours of any reportable or non-reportable incident.
Investigate incident reports with the individual employee to decide appropriate actions.
Seek advice from our Health and Safety consultant where necessary. Ensure the incident is reported to the Care Inspectorate where it falls within our statutory obligations to do so, and a student’s social worker where appropriate.
Monitor incidences of violent, threatening or abusive behaviour and make sure appropriate action is taken.
Direct employees to appropriate advice and support if needed after an incident. In the first instance, this would be to invite the employee to attend a debriefing meeting with the Operations Manager within 48 hours of the incident.
Incidents may affect people differently. Support affected employees where possible, e.g. increased supervision, referral for coaching and mentoring, additional training, a stress risk assessment, or referral to external sources of help.
Ensure that the incident reporting and investigation continues until its conclusion or resolution.
Employee Responsibilities
6.4 All employees have personal responsibility for their own behaviour and ensuring that they comply with this policy. To help staff report work related violent, threatening or abusive behaviour they must:
Be aware of, and comply with, this policy and further guidance in relation to lone working or other risks identified in risk assessments.
Recognise the potential for work related violence, threats or abuse and take action to resolve it early on where possible.
Report any instances of violent, threatening or abusive behaviour using the accident/incident reporting procedure as soon as possible after the incident (including details about when it happened, who was involved and any relevant circumstances that may have contributed to the incident), by telephone to Management.
Send the incident report straight away to the Operations Manager, within a maximum of 24 hours. They will then report the incident as appropriate to the Care Inspectorate, social services, the police, and/or the Health and Safety Executive (if reportable under RIDDOR).
Attend any training provided regarding health and safety, lone working, and de-escalation techniques (see Appendix 1 for some general advice on this).
Be aware of, and comply with, this policy and further guidance in relation to lone working or other risks identified in risk assessments.
Recognise the potential for work related violence, threats or abuse and take action to resolve it early on where possible.
If staff have been affected by an incident at work, they should seek someone for support from a manager or colleague.
Staff should be supportive of colleagues who are victims or have witnessed work related violence, abuse or threats.
Operations Manager Responsibilities
6.5 The Operations Manager is responsible for the internal accident, incident and major concern reporting procedure and will:
collate the incident reports and analyse trends and patterns;
advise managers of patterns and any action required;
offer support to managers and employees;
report on annual trends for violent, threatening or abusive incidents.
7. Risk assessments
7.1 New students are assessed by the Community Manager and Community Coordinator. Risk factors are included as part of the assessment, and these are used to generate an initial risk assessment for the student prior to their joining the service. These are subject to regular review at six month intervals, with additional review and update in the light of any incidents, increase in existing or incidence of new risk.
7.2 Managers should complete team risk assessments and review them at least annually and include a section for violent, threatening or aggressive behaviour. If there is an increase in violent, abusive or threatening incidents then managers should review the risk assessment to ensure all controls are being implemented and all employees are aware of them. Managers should discuss risks with employees. If they need further prevention measures, then record and report them to the Corporate Facilities, Health and Safety Adviser who will ensure suitable controls are put in place where possible.
7.3 Local risk assessments should take into account where employees may be at higher risk, for example, if there has been a previous incident.
7.4 The risk assessment and lone working procedures will be reviewed when required.
8. Process
If an incident occurs
8.1 If a member of staff feels they have been involved in an aggressive or violent incident they must follow the following procedure (or any specific steps outlined in a student’s risk assessment) and complete an internal incident report:
Staff should ensure that they have a charged and working mobile phone on their person at all times, and have their belongings in easy reach.
Staff should have a quick escape route available to them at all times, or know where in a student’s home they can go to as a place of safety.
If they find themselves in an aggressive or abusive situation, staff must remain calm and assertive. Attempt to de-escalate the individual if possible, particularly if it is a student.
If de-escalation is not successful and they have to close a support session or telephone call, they should advise the individual displaying this unacceptable behaviour, where possible, the reason for their actions.
Staff must not attempt any kind of restraint or ‘hands on’ except as a proportionate response if self-defence is necessary. If they have been trained, staff may utilise breakaway techniques.
If they feel intimidated, they can remove themselves from the situation immediately to eliminate the risk of the incident escalating.
Should they consider that their personal safety has been or is threatened they should contact the police and the office immediately.
All employees have the legal right to report any incident in which they have been involved to the police. They have the right to expect Management to support them in this decision and to, if requested to do so, report the incident on behalf of the employee.
8.2 Staff must complete an incident report and send it to the Operations Manager as soon as possible after the incident.
8.3 When a manager is informed that there has been a situation that has caused an employee some concern there may be some immediate actions that should be taken:
Provide time for the employee to talk at a debriefing meeting within 48 hours of the incident.
Provide ongoing supervision to the staff member if necessary.
Consider the reallocation of work.
Consider a 2:1 staff to student ratio.
Following an incident report
8.4 When the Operations Manager receives an incident report, they should investigate the incident with the affected employee. The line manager should advise their senior manager of the incident report when it involves physical or verbal aggression, to make them aware of the seriousness of the incident.
8.5 The investigation could undertake a range of activities depending on the situation. These activities may include for example:
Reporting the incident to the police on behalf of the employee (if appropriate). At any point during the investigation the alleged incident can be reported to the police by the employee or the company at their request.
Discussing with the employee the events they identified as unacceptable, their perception of future perceived risks and assessing the level of risk.
Interviewing the employee and any other Edge Group witnesses.
Offering the individual involved a meeting to discuss the situation.
Interviewing any other witnesses.
8.6 Following the investigation the manager must complete the relevant part of the incident form, including the actions to be taken and any review dates. The manager should agree the contents with the employee and send it to the Corporate Facilities, Health and Safety Advisor.
9. Actions we will take following an incident
9.1 The Management Team will act on all incidents of abusive behaviour. There will be an escalating scale of actions depending on the findings of the manager’s investigation. Each situation may result in one or more of the following actions:
a) Support the staff member to access additional training such as de-escalation skills or resilience training if appropriate. The manager should speak to the employee to find out if there is anything else that the employee needs in terms of support after the incident (for example, the Operations Manager in his role as supervisor, or working with a buddy).
b) All instances of violent, threatening or abusive behaviour will be logged in our incident reporting system, and escalated onwards to the Care Inspectorate, social services, the Health and Safety Executive, as necessary. It may be necessary to raise a Safeguarding concern with the relevant local authority and/or for the police to raise an IRD.
c) If the person responsible for the incident was a student, we will seek to meet with them to resolve the situation in order that we can continue working with them. We consider it important that our students are able to see the consequences of their actions and have the opportunity to both be accountable for and learn from them. See Appendix 2 for sample letters.
d) If the person responsible was a staff member, advise the SSSC under the Code of Conduct for registered workers, which notes that registered workers should not behave in a way, in work or outside work, which would call into question their suitability to work in social services.
e) Similarly, advise any other professional body, as may be appropriate such as the NMC or BPS, under their own code of practice or professional standards.
10. Learning from incidents
10.1 Management must keep affected employees fully informed of the progress and outcome of any investigation. The staff involved in any incident will have an input to identifying any potential areas of improved practice. Any lessons learned should be taken forward to minimise similar causes and explore more effective levels of support.
11. Sources of support
11.1 A number of sources of support are available to employees reporting incidents under this policy. These include:
day to day support from your line manager;
advice and support from the staff supervisor (Operations Manager);
relevant training;
signposting to external sources of help.
12. Legislation
Health and Safety at Work Act 1974
Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999
Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013 (RIDDOR).