Safeguarding Round-Up: Charity Governance, Foster Care, Online Safety and Adult Safeguarding
RLB Safeguarding Ltd | 15 October 2026
This week's safeguarding developments highlight the importance of strong leadership, effective oversight and the ability of organisations to respond to emerging risks.
From proposed changes to charity trustee disqualification powers and a national campaign to increase foster care capacity, to online safety regulation, adult social care workforce pressures and sensitive information security, there are important lessons for safeguarding professionals across sectors.
Although these developments concern very different environments, they raise a shared question:
How do we ensure safeguarding arrangements are not only in place, but genuinely effective in protecting people?
Here are five developments and what they mean for practice.
1. Government consults on stronger powers to protect charities from extremist abuse
Published: 14 October 2026 | England and Wales
The government has launched a consultation on proposals to strengthen the Charity Commission's powers to prevent individuals involved in extremist activity and certain serious offences from holding leadership positions within charities.
The proposals include:
Automatically disqualifying individuals convicted of specified hate-related offences from acting as charity trustees or senior managers.
Extending the existing automatic disqualification framework to certain additional offences.
Introducing wider discretionary powers where there is evidence that individuals have promoted violence or racial or religious hatred.
Strengthening regulatory arrangements to protect charities from individuals whose conduct presents serious risks.
The proposals aim to address circumstances where the Charity Commission's existing powers may not allow sufficiently timely or effective intervention.
The consultation also considers how these powers can operate fairly while protecting legitimate charitable campaigning and freedom of expression.
The consultation closes on 23 December 2026. These are proposals, not new statutory requirements already in force.
Why this matters for safeguarding
Safeguarding is not simply a frontline responsibility.
Trustees and senior leaders play a fundamental role in establishing organisational culture, managing risk and ensuring that safeguarding concerns receive appropriate attention.
For charities, the proposals provide an opportunity to consider whether governance arrangements include appropriate checks on trustee suitability, clear expectations of conduct and effective processes for responding to concerns about those in positions of authority.
It is also important to distinguish between trustee eligibility checks and DBS checks, which operate under different legal frameworks.
The safeguarding question is not simply whether trustees meet the minimum eligibility requirements, but whether the organisation has effective arrangements for assessing suitability, maintaining accountability and challenging inappropriate conduct.
Source: GOV.UK — Consultation on powers to protect charities from extremist abuse
2. National campaign launched to recruit more foster carers
Published: 14 October 2026 | England
The Department for Education has launched a national recruitment campaign encouraging more people to consider becoming foster carers.
The campaign supports the government's ambition to create 10,000 additional foster care places by the end of this Parliament.
The announcement follows concerns about declining fostering capacity, with the number of approved foster carers falling by approximately 12% since 2019.
The government has committed £88 million towards fostering reform, including £12.4 million for a Fostering Innovation Fund.
Eleven programmes will explore new approaches, including:
Weekend and respite fostering.
Greater support for foster carers facing allegations.
Therapeutic training and support.
Parent-and-child fostering.
Increasing diversity among foster carers.
Supporting appropriate transitions from residential care into foster families.
The campaign also aims to challenge assumptions about who can become a foster carer and address practical barriers that may discourage suitable applicants.
Why this matters for safeguarding
The availability of appropriate, stable and supportive placements is fundamental to safeguarding children in care.
A shortage of foster carers can contribute to placement instability, unsuitable matching and children being placed further away from their families, schools and support networks.
However, increasing fostering capacity must be accompanied by effective safeguarding arrangements.
Recruitment, assessment, safer recruitment checks, training, supervision and ongoing support remain essential.
The innovation programmes also raise important questions about how flexible fostering arrangements can maintain consistency, stability and appropriate oversight.
For safeguarding leaders and children's services, the announcement is an opportunity to consider:
Are foster carers appropriately supported to recognise and respond to safeguarding concerns?
Are allegations managed fairly, consistently and with appropriate consideration for children's safety?
Are children's individual needs informing placement decisions?
And how do we measure whether new fostering approaches genuinely improve children's experiences and outcomes?
Increasing the number of placements matters. Ensuring those placements are safe, suitable and stable matters just as much.
Source: GOV.UK — National call to recruit more foster carers launched at Number 10
3. Ofcom provides further update on X and Grok online safety investigation
Published: 14 October 2026 | UK-wide
Ofcom has published an update on its ongoing investigation into X and concerns involving the Grok AI service.
The regulator has been examining compliance with duties under the Online Safety Act 2023, including arrangements for responding to illegal content and protecting children from harmful material.
Ofcom reports improvements in the speed at which X reviews suspected illegal hate and terrorist content.
However, concerns remain about the effectiveness of content removal.
The regulator also identified circumstances where pornographic content remained accessible to accounts that had not completed appropriate age assurance.
Following Ofcom's intervention, changes were implemented to strengthen restrictions.
Ofcom's investigation remains ongoing, with its continuing focus on illegal-content duties and reporting arrangements.
Why this matters for safeguarding
The development highlights an important distinction between introducing safeguarding controls and demonstrating that they work.
Age assurance, content reporting, moderation and escalation procedures must be effective in practice.
For organisations operating regulated online services, safeguarding governance should consider:
Whether users can easily report harmful or illegal content.
Whether reports are responded to promptly and appropriately.
Whether age assurance measures effectively restrict access to unsuitable content.
How emerging risks involving AI-generated content are assessed.
Whether safeguarding controls are regularly evaluated and improved.
A safeguarding measure that exists on paper but does not operate effectively provides limited protection.
This is particularly important as artificial intelligence creates new challenges involving intimate image abuse, harmful content and online exploitation.
Source: Ofcom — X and Grok investigation update
4. Adult social care workforce report highlights ongoing pressures
Published: 14 October 2026 | England
Skills for Care has published its latest State of the Adult Social Care Sector and Workforce in England report.
The findings provide a national picture of the workforce, including:
Approximately 1.59 million filled posts.
Around 96,000 vacancies.
Staff turnover estimated at 22.1%.
Approximately 55% of the direct care workforce without a relevant social care qualification.
A projected need for approximately 410,000 additional posts by 2040, based on population growth.
Although some workforce indicators have improved, the findings highlight continuing challenges involving recruitment, retention, training and workforce capacity.
Why this matters for safeguarding
Workforce stability is an important part of safeguarding assurance.
High turnover can affect continuity of care and relationships.
Inadequate training may reduce staff confidence in recognising and responding to abuse, neglect or deteriorating circumstances.
Limited supervision can restrict opportunities for professional reflection, challenge and escalation.
And staffing pressures can affect the consistency of person-centred care.
However, workforce challenges should not automatically be equated with safeguarding failures.
The important question is how organisations identify, manage and mitigate the risks associated with those pressures.
For safeguarding leaders, providers and commissioners, the report provides useful evidence for reviewing workforce development, supervision, training needs and organisational oversight.
Effective safeguarding depends not only on having enough staff, but on ensuring that staff are appropriately skilled, supported and supervised.
Source: Skills for Care — State of the Adult Social Care Sector and Workforce
5. Legal Aid Agency reveals further findings following major data breach
Published: 14 October 2026 | England and Wales
The Legal Aid Agency has released further information concerning the cyberattack identified in April 2025.
Continued investigation has identified approximately 250,000 compromised records predating 2007, alongside some probation-related information.
Depending on the individual record, affected information may include personal details, financial circumstances and sensitive legal case information.
The agency states that it has no indication that the stolen information has been published or shared.
Why this matters for safeguarding
Although primarily a cybersecurity and information governance issue, the incident highlights the potential safeguarding consequences of compromised sensitive information.
Organisations working with people experiencing domestic abuse, exploitation, homelessness, criminal justice involvement or other vulnerabilities may hold information that could create serious risks if disclosed inappropriately.
This could include confidential addresses, safeguarding disclosures, details of alleged perpetrators, financial information or information relating to legal proceedings.
Safeguarding leaders should therefore consider information security as part of wider organisational risk management.
Important areas include:
Appropriate access controls.
Secure storage and information sharing.
Staff awareness of confidentiality responsibilities.
Data retention arrangements.
Incident response procedures.
Assessing potential risks to individuals following a breach.
When information could expose someone to abuse, exploitation or other harm, protecting that information becomes an important safeguarding consideration.
Source: GOV.UK — Legal Aid Agency cyber security incident
RLB Reflection: Safeguarding Leadership Is About More Than Compliance
This week's developments span charity governance, fostering, online platforms, adult social care and information security but there is a common theme.
Effective safeguarding depends on leadership, accountability and evidence that arrangements are working in practice.
A charity may have appropriate policies but insufficient scrutiny of those holding positions of authority.
A fostering service may increase recruitment without adequately considering the support needed to sustain safe and stable placements.
An online platform may introduce safety controls without sufficiently demonstrating their effectiveness.
A care provider may deliver mandatory training but struggle to ensure staff have the confidence, capacity and supervision required to respond to concerns.
And an organisation may have information governance procedures while remaining exposed to serious data security risks.
For safeguarding leaders, trustees, managers and frontline professionals, the questions are therefore:
Do we understand the risks within our organisation?
Are our safeguarding arrangements appropriate to those risks?
Are people confident that they can raise concerns?
Do leaders have meaningful oversight?
And can we demonstrate that our arrangements are making a positive difference?
Safeguarding effectiveness should never be measured solely by the number of policies, procedures or training sessions an organisation has in place.
It should be measured by how those arrangements operate and the outcomes they help achieve.
How RLB Safeguarding can help
At RLB, we support organisations across education, charities, health and social care, workplaces, housing, sport and other sectors to strengthen safeguarding practice, leadership and accountability.
Our services include independent safeguarding audits, consultancy, policy development, safer recruitment, accredited training, safeguarding supervision and governance assurance.
We help organisations move beyond compliance to develop safeguarding arrangements that are practical, proportionate and effective.
Safeguarding people of all ages, in all places. Beyond compliance.