Our Approach to Child Safety

Child Safety Comes First – Always 

At Guardian, nothing is more important than the safety and wellbeing of every child in our care.

We want families to know that creating a safe, secure environment isn’t just something we talk about — it’s deeply embedded in our culture, policies, and what we do each day.

At Guardian, child safety is a continuous, organisation-wide commitment. We have zero tolerance for any behaviour that could compromise a child’s wellbeing, and we act swiftly and thoroughly whenever concerns are raised. 

What we do to help keep children safe 

Create Safe Spaces & Practices 

We embed safety into every part of our centres to ensure the wellbeing of children, families, and teams:

• Nappy change areas are designed to have visibility windows and are set up for maximum supervision
• Our policies also cater for team members being in sight or sound of another team member at all times. This ensures other team members can respond to situations and monitor each other
• Visibility is key – reflection mirrors in outdoor spaces, dedicated learning boards to keep windows usable and effective supervision in all learning areas
• Dedicated Safety Champions in centres– the ‘face of safety’ who leads and promotes ongoing safety enhancements
• Safety is embedded in daily programs – by conducting daily checklists, thorough or comprehensive risk assessments, monthly evacuation drills and maintaining comprehensive records of team members with children
• No phones in rooms – personal phones or devices are not allowed in learning spaces.

Be assured that we are constantly reviewing and updating to create as safe an environment as possible for all children in our care.

Have Safe People Who Follow Safe Policies

Safety is built into everything we do, from who we recruit to how our teams operate in every centre:

• Working With Children Checks for all team members. These are designed specifically to determine a person’s suitability to work with children, and very importantly includes ongoing monitoring. Our system automatically alerts us if a Working With Children Check is not valid / revoked and team members are not eligible for shifts
• Rigorous reference checks – All team members are required to provide previous line managers for their past roles. We also use a system with international standard fraud detect solutions in place, that highlights whether there are any doubts as to the validity of the referee, so we make sure they are genuine.  
• Casual employees go through the same process of recruitment, vetting and onboarding as permanent team members
• Annual compulsory Suitability Declarations for all team members to confirm ongoing fitness to work with children
• Mandatory reporting and speaking up – all team members must report concerns immediately and all concerns will be investigated fully
• We have clear, robust child protection policies and a Code of Conduct that all team members must follow.
• Ongoing mandatory training in child safety, including annual refreshers and leadership-specific modules
• Dedicated compliance and safety team who audit and improve practices across all centres

Controlling Access to our Centres

We take every measure to ensure those entering and exiting our centres are safe:

• Multiple levels of security in all centres – for example, double-gated entries
• Secure door access with unique codes that are updated regularly
• Security locks / PIN codes on all external doors
• All visitors must sign in and present photo ID before entry
• All tradespeople must provide a Working with Children Check, sign our policies and complete Guardian-specific induction before attending a Centre – except for emergency trades who are monitored at all times

We want you to feel confident that Guardian is a place where safety always comes first. We are deeply committed to creating environments where children feel safe, valued, and supported to grow.

We’d love to welcome you to one of our centres so you can see our approach firsthand. If you have any questions about our child safety measures, please get in touch with us.