Privacy and consent
SAFEGUARDING / WHAKAHAUMARUTIA
Ensuring your privacy
Your safeguarding agency understands the importance of maintaining privacy – both during and after the safeguarding response. Privacy and respect are essential for the disabled person.
Your safeguarding agency will have policies and procedures in place to respect and maintain the privacy of the disabled person. Ask to see their privacy policy for more information.
Ensuring your consent
Safeguarding organisations try to get informed consent from the people they support whenever they can.
This means, when there’s a safeguarding response, they want to make sure you understand what’s happening and that you can make your own choices during the process.
Sometimes they may ask another person, such as an independent advocate, to help you work out what you want.
Getting consent is important — but your safety comes first. Safeguarding agencies must always consider the level of risk and make a plan to keep you safe. This is required by law.
Safeguarding agencies also work with a range of professionals and organisations. They make sure everyone follows the right safeguarding processes and the principles of Enabling Good Lives (EGL).
When it’s safe, they will try to get consent from you at the beginning.
What happens when it’s not a safe time for the person to give consent?
Sometimes it’s hard for a SAFA Co-ordinator to get consent, such as when:
They can’t safely contact you, given your situation of risk.
You need help from others to make decisions.
You don’t fully understand what’s happening.
Someone is pressuring or controlling you – and you’re not free or safe to speak your mind or share your own choices (your own will and preferences).
A family member or welfare guardian is the person causing harm.
The disabled person themselves is the person causing self-harm or neglect.
When requesting safeguarding support for yourself or for another person, please say whether consent has been given.
If you’re not sure, you can talk to your SAFA Co-ordinator about it.
If consent can’t be given at first, the SAFA Co-ordinator will keep checking in with you and/or your safeguarding team and will decide when it will be safe to obtain your consent, as things move forward.
Personal stories/ He kōrero whaiaro
Eva’s story provides an example of where safeguarding had to get underway immediately, even though it wasn’t possible to obtain Eva’s personal consent at the outset.
Eva’s consent was obtained later, when it was safe for her to consider and provide her consent to ongoing safeguarding support.