Freedom to speak up
All NHS Trusts are required to have a freedom to speak up guardian. In our Trust we currently have four guardians, based across different Trust services and locations.
What is a freedom to speak up guardian?
The freedom to speak up guardians’ role is to support the Trust to continually build a healthy culture, where all staff feel safe and confident to raise concerns at work. Guardians also provide confidential advice and support to staff in how to raise their concerns about patient/service user safety and/or the way concerns are handled.
Guardians have an important role in helping to identify broad areas of concern and raising them with people who can take action or help to resolve the issue raised, including with the chief executive and our executive management team.
Who can raise concerns with freedom to speak up guardians?
Anyone who works for (or has worked) in the NHS, or for an independent organisation that provides NHS services can raise concerns. This includes agency workers, temporary workers, students, volunteers and governors. They can raise concerns by emailing guardian@swyt.nhs.uk.
Freedom to speak up guardians do not get involved directly in investigations or complaints and cannot support anyone not employed by the Trust. Instead members of the public should raise concerns by emailing customerservices@swyt.nhs.uk.
More information
You can find out more about the role of the guardians on the NHS Employers website and the National Guardian’s Office website.
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