Welfare Training Requirements

Latest update 21st May 2025

This page provides you with information about the welfare training that current members of British Fencing who appear on the BF Workforce register (coaches, welfare officers, and team managers) need to undertake .

The schedule of upcoming BF courses is available and additional courses will be run on-demand, so please contact us if you can’t find a suitable course. Some of the required courses are delivered by external providers, we have provided links to these providers.

Don’t forget that in order for us to review and recognise your qualifications you will need to upload your own certificates to the Sport80 membership platform.

1. Club Welfare Officers
2. Event Welfare Officers
3. Coaches
4. Team Managers
5. Validity of certificates 
6. Uploading certificates to the Sport80 membership platform

1 Club Welfare Officers

All parts of the UK excluding Scotland and Northern Ireland

• Safeguard Core workshop or Core Refresh (coming soon) and BF Welfare Officer Training  with annual CPD

Scotland

For anyone in Scotland who is renewing their CWPS training you may be entitled to do the CPWS Renewal Certificate which is online training rather than the full course. Check the Child Protection Training page on Scottish Fencing’s website for further details.

• sportscotland Child Wellbeing and Protection in Sport Training and sportscotland Child Wellbeing and Protection Officer Training (CWPO)

Northern Ireland

• Sport NI Safeguarding Children & Young People Workshop  (Fencing Specific) and Sport NI Designated Safeguarding Officer Training

Additional Welfare Officer training

Welfare Officers are encouraged to continuously seek additional learning opportunities and CPD training. BF run regular WO briefing sessions.

Organisations such as the CPSU have online resources and events that Welfare Officers should explore to supplement their mandatory training described above.

2  Event Welfare Officers

• Safeguard Core workshop or Core Refresh (coming soon) and BF  Event Welfare Officer Training with specialist CPD.

For more information please contact [email protected]

3  Coaches

All parts of the UK excluding Scotland and Northern Ireland

• Safeguard Core workshop and annual CPD (modules coming soon)

Scotland

For anyone in Scotland who is renewing their CWPS training you may be entitled to do the CPWS Renewal Certificate which is online training rather than the full course. Check the Child Protection Training page on Scottish Fencing’s website for further details.

• sportscotland Child Wellbeing and Protection in Sport Training

Northern Ireland

• Sport NI Safeguarding Children & Young People

Other Coaching training requirements: There are other minimum requirements for coaches to become or remain registered (such as First Aid, coaching qualification, etc).

4 Team Managers

All parts of the UK excluding Scotland and Northern Ireland

• Safeguard Core Workshop
• BF Welfare Officer Training
• TM Domestic or TM International

Scotland

For anyone in Scotland who is renewing their CWPS training you may be entitled to do the CPWS Renewal Certificate which is online training rather than the full course. Check the Child Protection Training page on Scottish Fencing’s website for further details.

• sportscotland Child Wellbeing and Protection in Sport Training
•  sportscotland Child Wellbeing and Protection Officer Training (CWPO)
• BF Welfare Officer Training if working for BF.
• TM Domestic or TM International

Northern Ireland

• Sport NI Safeguarding Children & Young People Workshop
• BF Welfare Officer Training if working for BF.
• Sport NI Designated Safeguarding Officer Training
• TM Domestic or TM International

5 Validity of Certificates

All the certificates are valid for 3 years after the date of issue, meaning the training needs to be renewed before that period.

Core Safeguarding will have a validity of 6 years, as long as the required CPD is attended on an annual basis.

6 Uploading Certificates to Sport 80

Once you have your certificates, it is crucial that you upload them to your Sport80 membership profile, as this is the information that we rely on to update the workforce registers. Currently, many welfare officers on the published register are shown as non-compliant because there is no evidence in the system of attending any welfare courses.

Having your certificates on the platform ensures you will receive reminders that you need to update your training when the expiry date is near (from 1 month before).

After you upload a certificate, the Development team will be notified by Sport80 and will review the document. If it is valid, your certificate will be approved. If your certificate hasn’t been approved within 14 days, for support or if you have an urgent request, please contact the BF Development Team.

A short tutorial on how to upload certificates on the Sport80 membership platform is available. You will need to follow these steps:

• Login to Sport80 and go to your profile page.
• Click on ‘Safeguarding’ in the vertical menu.
• Click on the button ‘Add Safeguarding’
• For non-mandatory training, select ‘Other Safeguarding Qualification’
• For mandatory training, select ‘Safeguarding Qualification’ and then choose the qualification type from the dropdown as follows:

• Event Welfare Officer Training
• NI SYPC Workshop
• SafeGuard Core
• SafeGuard Core CPD
• SafeGuard Core Refresher
• SafeGuard Core Welfare Officer
• Scotland CWPO
• Scotland CWPS