The Government has published the findings from the review of the Vetting and Barring Scheme.
Posted: 02/11/2011
The new bill calls for a merging of the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) and Independent Safeguarding Authority and will cover people who work “closely and regularly” with children or vulnerable adults; teachers will continue to be vetted – but those who do occasional, supervised volunteer work will not.
Children’s minister Tim Loughton said “Protecting children and keeping them safe remains our top priority, but it’s also important that well meaning adults are not put off working or volunteering with children.”
Children’s charity Barnardo’s Chief executive Anne Marie Carrie said the move was “a victory for common sense” and that “There is already enough safeguarding in place for people who have unsupervised, substantial access to children”.
However, former police detective and child protection expert Mark Williams Thomas told the BBC “This is simply about saving money, it’s about scrapping any ideas that Labour had previously. Whoever is advising the government on this position has got it completely wrong… Offenders are very deviant, they’re very calculated and they will seek out opportunities and they will go to where those checks don’t exist.”