Approved: 2nd April 2022
Version: 1.0
Content owner: Safe practice

Sew Ready strongly believes that no form of bullying or harassment is ever justified.

This policy sets out Sew Ready’s zero tolerance approach to bullying and harassment. It applies to all Sew Ready members, volunteers and staff.

It explains what we mean by bullying and harassment, how we expect our members, volunteers and staff to act and behave, and how we’ll manage breaches of this policy.

For details of how to report bullying and harassment read our Anti-bullying and harassment procedures.

What is bullying?
Bullying is deliberate behaviour that causes physical or emotional harm to another person or people. It happens repeatedly, even when asked to stop. It’s often based on an imbalance of power, or perceived imbalance of power, between the bully and the bullied. And it can be ongoing and subtle.

Bullying can have a long-lasting effect on the bullied person’s physical and emotional wellbeing.

What is harassment?
Harassment is unwanted behaviour which someone finds offensive, makes them feel intimidated or humiliated, or creates a hostile or degrading environment.

Any harassment directed at someone because of a protected characteristic as explained in the Equality Act 2010, is considered unlawful discrimination. This includes sexual harassment. Not only is this against the law, it goes against our commitment to valuing and celebrating differences. It’s both a breach of this policy and our Equality and diversity policy.

You can find more information on how to recognise bullying and harassment, as well as relational conflict in our Anti-bullying and harassment procedure.

Policy statement
This policy applies to all Sew Ready activities such as meetings, events and workplaces.
It applies to all Sew Ready communications and behaviours, online and offline.

We expect all Sew Ready volunteers, members and staff (including employees, officers, consultants and interns) to:

• Treat everyone with dignity and respect, following our Equality and diversity policy, so Sew Ready is a place where everyone is welcome and free to be themselves

• Promote positive, inclusive behaviour by setting a good example and challenging those who don’t

• Follow effective safeguarding behaviours

• Be aware of behaviour that suggests possible bullying or harassment

• Report possible bullying and harassment to our Safe Practice department as soon as you can. See our Anti-bullying and harassment procedures for more information

• Respond to incidents of bullying, harassment or relational conflict between young members locally. 

• Deal with incidents in a timely and transparent way

Sew Ready has a duty of care to its volunteers. If any volunteer experiences bullying, harassment or other inappropriate behaviour from the parent or carer of a young member, this could lead to the young member having their membership withdrawn. This is explained in our Young members policy.

Managing breaches of this policy
We manage breaches of this policy by volunteers in line with our Managing concerns about adult volunteers policy and where appropriate, our Safeguarding policy
If members of Sew Ready or staff breach this policy, we’ll follow our Staff disciplinary procedure.

Whistleblowing as a volunteer or member of staff
We encourage our volunteers and staff to report concerns about possible bullying and harassment. But we know that you may find this difficult or uncomfortable. In that case, we encourage you to make a report by following our Whistleblowing policy and procedures.
You can find more information about how to apply this policy in our Anti-bullying and harassment procedures.
 

Sew Ready policies and procedures are reviewed and updated from time to time as part of a review cycle.