National Safeguarding Conference 2025 Safeguarding our Railway

Pictured- Jacqui Turner, workforce safeguarding coordinator at SWR, Mark Sutton, safeguarding manager at Southeastern, Dan O’Riordan, head of security and safety assurance at SWR and Grant Robey, crime and security manager at SWR. All are standing on a station platform in front of a train

Kent Community Rail Partnership were honoured to be invited to the National Safeguarding Conference 2025 on Thursday, 29th May where leading figures from policing, transport and youth services will gathered to address some of the most urgent challenges facing passengers and staff across Britain’s rail network.

 

Hosted by publicly-owned, DFTO rail operators, Southeastern Railway and South Western Railway (SWR) at Birmingham Conference and Events Centre, this event brought together voices from across the country to discuss the issues of youth vulnerability, violence against women and girls (VAWG), mental health, missing persons and the growing role of technology in public safety.

 

This year’s theme; ‘Safeguarding our Railway – Stronger Together’, reflects a shared determination to ensure the railway remains a safe and welcoming environment for all — particularly for women, young people, and those in crisis.

 

Opening remarks were delivered by Steve White, Managing Director of Southeastern, and Stuart Meek, Chief Operating Officer of SWR, alongside an address from Robin Gisby, Chief Executive of DfT Operator.

 

Other key speakers included:

  • Tina Wallace, Thames Valley Police – How Police Deal with Sexual Offenders
  • Paul Furnell, Mitie – Addressing Violence and Intimidation Against Women and Girls
  • Emma Kay, WalkSafe – Using Tech to Improve Personal Safety
  • James Houghton, British Transport Police – County Lines and Youth Risk
  • Rebecca Hayes and Roy Smith, Medway Youth Outreach – Youth Engagement and Anti Social Behaviour reduction 
  • Southampton City Council – Safeguarding and Missing Persons
  • TransPennine Express, The Hub in Hull – An award-winning model of community-based safeguarding
  • Speakers from the College of Policing, NPCC, and Greenscreen London will also tackle myths and misuse around Body Worn Video.
Steve White, managing Director of Southeastern

Steve White, Managing Director at Southeastern, said:

“I am pleased to co-host this year’s conference alongside South Western Railway. The safety and security of everyone travelling on our network is our top priority, and we take this responsibility very seriously.

“This conference is an opportunity to share knowledge and best practice, learn from each other and ensure that together, we are doing everything we can to protect our passengers and colleagues.

“By fostering collaboration and openness, we are determined to create a railway that is, and feels, safe and secure for everyone.”

 

Stuart Meek, Chief Operating Officer at South Western Railway, said:

“Keeping our customers and colleagues safe is always our number one priority. It isn’t the responsibility of just one person, one team, or one business — it’s something our industry must deliver together.

“Southeastern and SWR share a link at London Waterloo; our networks face similar challenges and opportunities, so it’s a pleasure to co-host the second National Safeguarding Conference this year.

“By learning from each other, we’ll build on the progress we have made to ensure everyone feels safe on the railway.”

 

As publicly owned operators, Southeastern and South Western Railway are determined to work more closely than ever to share their expertise on keeping our railways safe.

 

Southeastern is actively building a safer railway as part of its five-year Joint Safeguarding Strategy, developed with British Transport Police (BTP) and Network Rail. This includes the UK’s first dedicated rail safeguarding team, with more than 1,200 interactions with passengers and staff, and the creation of a co-produced Domestic Abuse Policy in partnership with experts such as Dads Unlimited.

 

As part of its efforts to bring track and train together to improve safety, the operator also leads with a Network Rail–funded Suicide Prevention Manager and has recognised 110 colleagues with Life Saver Awards for timely interventions. In the next few weeks, Southeastern will launch its customer and colleague communications campaign ‘No Abuse. No Excuse’ which shows everyone that abuse and assaults will not be tolerated and the operator will prosecute those who go too far.

 

For two years in a row, SWR has achieved 100% for its Safeguarding on Rail Scheme accreditation, awarded by BTP. Following its first accreditation, SWR hosted the inaugural National Safeguarding Conference for the railway last year. The operator’s recent safeguarding initiatives have included the introduction of 89 safeguarding champions as well as a dedicated Safety and Security reporting app. Alongside the continued rollout of body-worn video cameras to protect frontline colleagues, SWR has launched ‘safe spaces’ at key locations like Waterloo and Richmond and partnered with organisations like Missing People.

 

We heard some key statistics around the importance Southeastern places on safeguarding, last year Southeastern:

  • Supported projects which engaged with 20,000 young people
  • Delivered safeguarding training to 2,400 staff
  • The Safeguarding Team engaged directly with 1,200 individuals
  • Made 120 Life Saver awards 
  • Created 11 bespoke suicide and trespass reduction plans

Safeguarding is “A million piece jigsaw where we help one life at a time” and “We do it out of love.”

 

The session from DI Tina Wallace was especially hard hitting, examining sexual offenders’ behaviours, methods and patterns; with a view to empowering police services to better target and disrupt their activities to keep people safe.

 

James Houghton, British Transport Police explained the need to view young and vulnerable people caught up in county lines activities as victims in need of safeguarding. County lines involves criminal exploitation, modern slavery and human trafficking. Its victims do not have free will in their actions and are rarely seeking help.

 

Partnership working raises awareness and helps to coordinate multi-agency responses that can protect young people from harm. Speaking of a young person BTP had referred to other agencies, James said, “He now feels he has hope. If he had not been engaged with that day he would have ended up in a trap house or still be transporting criminal items.”

Roy Smith and Rebecca Hayes of Medway Youth Services spoke of their work with Southeastern to pilot a scheme to reduce youth anti-social behaviour at stations and on trains.

 

The Medway Towns have a high proportion of grammar schools, attracting significant numbers of students from outside the area who travel by train. Assisted by Southeastern’s own Safeguarding Team, they took their Safer Streets approach onto the trains, engaging with students while they travelled to understand the root causes of poor behaviours, discovering more about their home lives, social lives and their travel experience.

 

Through 21 on train sessions between September and March, Medway Youth Services engaged with 775 young people. 102 surveys were completed providing the following key insights into their key concerns:

  • Knife Crime 23%
  • Healthy Relationships 14%
  • Gangs 21%
  • Bullying 14%
  • Radicalisation 9%
  • Criminal Exploitation 19%

Young people described the interactions as “Fun, caring and instructive”. Rail staff said they had “Reduced delays and disruption, and delivered calmer trains”.

 

Medway Youth Services are looking to continue this collaboration with Southeastern and Govia Thameslink Railway, and aim to see it become an example of best practice in the National Youth Strategy.

A selection of brochures, flyers and business cards from Future Tracks, Dads Unlimited, Dame Kelly Holmes Trust, Medway Council Youth Team Services

There were many other insights through the day including:

  • The Walk Safe App that can help people to find safe spaces and send an SOS to friends and contacts
  • The success of the Youth Unity Future Tracks programme in the Southeastern Metro area
  • The benefits of training staff to know the signs of heart attacks and cardiac arrest, and giving them First Aid skills and knowledge of how to use defibrillators
  • Installing confidence in railway staff to use body worn video cameras to defuse situations, reduce unfounded complaints and secure vital evidence
  • The role of video games and AI in engaging and effective operational and safeguarding training

We would like to thank our hosts, Southeastern and Southwestern Railway for inviting us to this thoroughly engaging and informative event.

 

Safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility.

 

We are Stronger Together.

 

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