A common sense revolution

Elaine Day

An excellent article. I am for the rebellion!

Paul Danon

The alternative is just to have the check done.

Helen

Excellent article! If the recession is forcing the UK to reduce the number of civil servants, this would be a good place to start.

Laura Tipler

We planned a half day event based around Norwich Cathedral's labyrinth, to take place on a Saturday morning in the new Hostry. We couldn't use the corridor linking the Community Room with the Refectory because the Choristers were rehearsing, and we might encounter them on the way to their loo, unless we had CRB checks for us and every person coming to the seminar. Funnily enough, the Cathedral Close is full of choristers and other children moving around from one school building to another, and yet we are allowed to walk and even live there without having a CRB check. So is it to do with confined spaces? Or is it just crazy?

donpatrico

Bravo, Paul Danon; straight out of the blocks with the pat answer. How about the other one so beloved of quislings everywhere 'If you are innocent you have nothing to fear'?
Reading the article I wondered if the revolt is confined to the CofE. Many clubs and associations are similarly beset by this sort of regulation - which goes well beyond child safety.

Fulcra1537

What is depressing is the apparently universely supine capitulation by the CoE diocesan hierarchy to this bureaucratic intimidation.It is the flower arranging ladies,the cleaning ladies,the churchwardens,parochial church council members and all the other lay volunteers who,unpaid, day in and day out keep the show on the road.Once that goodwill is sacrificed the CoE will simply cease to function as a visible national institution in many areas of the country.

rwb

Excellent article, as far as I know there has never been an incident of pedophillia with any of the churches!!!

Florence Heath

Excellent article- this is never going to stop the real paedophiles. Perhaps it's time for people to watch the classic South Park episode on this exact topic!

Peter Lloyd

The solution will come from ordinary people - us. Without mass pressure the authorities are unlikely to change. Why? Because they are fearful of being blamed if anything does go wrong and they are afraid of the media. Local government and many central authorities are also fond of petty rules that make them feel important - it's in their DNA. They often couldn't get away with them in the past because they knew people wouldn't put up with it. Now, worryingly, we do. There is no longer such a thing as a crime or even the possibility of a crime that public authorities do not feel responsible for in some way. We need to change this attitude and accept that life will always carry some risks. The ones dealt with in this article are miniscule but it makes no difference to the attitude of the authorities who are desperate for rules which are designed to protect them far more than they are to protect so called "vulnerable" people.

Jan Cosgrove (Mr)

Josie and I often will disagree on CRB and ISA, but we can on the issue of 'Rules invented by organisations'. These are often myth-based and also apt to be pointless. Maybe also unlawful.

The issue of photography and video for example. Paedophiles collect 'cute' pics from catalogues etc and their Grade 1-5 images nestle amongst the ordinary. The BBC always shows kids feet in playgrounds - haven't they heard of the foot-fetishist paedophile!!!

CRB's are intended to be for employers use to enable safer recruitment decisions. No one can advance any proof that volunteers per se are likely to be safer or have nobler motives than paid employees. But CRBs are for quite specific circumstances and mis-application of such checks to situations not meant to be be covered is indeed unlawful.

Before demanding checks, managements must ensure they comply with the CRB Code of Practice and get advice, from CRB, if unsure.

Josie, however, is unwise to pursue a campaign which wants to see the abolition of ISA and of the new barring procedures. These are most certainly fairer than the old List 99 barring scheme which was run by politicians and their advisers, because ISA contains the necessary Article 6.1 compliant machinery and is independent of government. A recent High Court judgment has strengthened that position so that appeals are fully in line with the requirements of independent adjudication.

Had ISA and CRB been 2 ideas considered at the same time, the betting would have been on ISA because the aim of that scheme, unlike CRB, is to screen out known risk people and to ensure employers check the barred list. That is common sense, it also helps enforce a long established law (at least as far back as 1933) that it is an offence for a barred person to enter e.g. a school for ANY reason, a law I am sure all parents and grandparents see the sense of, at least, and would not want diluted.

The ISA scheme also answers the rechecking nonsense of the CRB system because it is updated continuously.

At Fair Play for Children we have seen what happens when the right checks and systems are NOT in place when and where they should be. We also believe that a barring-based system offers the common sense objective of removing known risk, and our experience is that CRB checks tend to deliver irrelevant and sometimes embarrassing information which does not enhance child protection.

We think a more proportionate and yet more rigorous system is achievable, our Report, 'Out with the Bathwater?' suggests changes, and we dispense with myths that e.g. people are banned on the basis of rumour, that frequency of activity is a sound basis for checking etc.

Rather our long experience in the field is that trust is the basis of relationships between children and workers, paid and unpaid, that there are those who seek to abuse that trust, and that being a volunteer is no guarantee that a person will not be such an abuser.

Arguments about the prevalence of domestic-based abuse don't wash - the institutional abuser may have 10-200 victims over a period, a US study suggesting that 24,500 children were abused by 150 abusers, or a victim count of 150 each. Not a few were volunteers.

Nor arguments that it is rare in the population. Child road deaths and serious injuries constitute just 0.034% of the child population annually. No one suggests abolishing residential speed limits etc.

We cannot return to the days when everyone assumed everyone else was OK, we do need to ensure that the system is not mis-applied and above all, that those who are known to be a danger are prevented from accessing via new routes. This is a part, but a necessary one, of sound child protection good practice, and relying on 'gut instinct' etc is no substitute for a facility that says someone is not safe.

Let me ask volunteers - you have a system based on Josie's 'common sense'. It allows people to work with you and kids and then it comes out that person is a convicted paeodophile and a known re-offender. Sure, your common sense system may have deterred that person within your activity, but what of the outside and the relationships s/he made with kids within your activity? What of the fact that s/he worked with you in contravention of the law barring him/her from such work, paid or not, and that s/he worked with kids for whom you have a responsibility? And what do you say to parents when they find out?

Use your common sense ...

Jan Cosgrove
National Secretary
Fair Play for Children

Dixon

Well, I agree absolutely with the core message of this piece, but isn't it interesting that it should focus on the church. After all, they among all institutions surely have more grounds for anxiety about conduct within their ranks than any other. History tells against them and perhaps this insitutional neuroticism reflects their sense of guilt and shame.

That said, I wonder how many CRB checks are being required of the staff at our mosques?

Yam Yam

Jan Cosgrave - so instead you have a system based on comprehensive and all-encompassing CRB checks. Then it turns out that children have been abused by a person who has never come to the attention of the police before (ie: he has a clean CRB bill of health) or whose dodgy previous life may have been wiped clean by a mistake in the CRB filing system. What do you say to parents when they find out?

No system is perfect because human beings and their 'systems' aren't perfect. Meanwhile, how about you asking whether we really want a society where a lost child alone crying on a street corner is ignored by adult passers-by because they are all terrified of intervening and being branded a paedophile.

Common sense, I believe you call it.

St.John

@ Dixon. Um, do try not to make foolish ignorant assumptions. Please remember that the law applies to everybody and does not exclude Mosques. If it is mis-applied that is a local issue.

@ Yam Yam. Yes every human system will have a human flaw, like for instance if I am volunteering at a hypothetical Christmas school nativity play and have to much mulled wine and end up decking the kid who has been bullying my little Johnny and leave him hospitalised. I know that it is pretty unlikely seen as COMMONLY I am quite languid and charming friendly responsible adult and common sense usually says that I am okay. But it also says that peoples judgement gets pretty messed up when on the drink (drinking starts early at Christmas), but I am human and unpredictable so who knows. Hmmm, maybe it would be slightly better to allow the Teachers and Chaperones do the work around the kids. After all that it what they are paid to do and I am responsible for the safty only for my own Children.

Now if I was a regular volunteer in the arm ringing district of laissez-faire-child protection-ville-Secondary as a, lets say, part time care-taker-number-three, who had a secret drinking habit which had led to several violent convictions against minors but the common sense number-one-care-taker (or head of the flower guild perhaps in a certain Cathedral full of choir boys) who has taken a shine to me and let me in the building out of school hours but not considering occasional late night cross overs (Ooops); don't you think that you would be justifiably going a little bit spare that a violent drinker was let anywhere near a school/cathedral/park/youth hostel/ymca etc full of vulnerable young children at ANY TIME?

The point about CRB Checks is to provide a clear and relatively transparent way of making employment decisions appropriate to the working environment. Its kinda like a CV in that way.

Also in regards to Gloucester Cathedral yes they share a toilet space perhaps very infrequently, but that is a private staff/chorister toilet (apparently) not open to the public therefore subject to privileged information. The probability that non CRB adults will be around non-chaperoned school kids on school time is then probably a lot higher. The volunteers might then have some privileged information about the kids movements. Fair enough it would not take a genius on a mission of child abuse to figure that out but don't you think it IS the responsibility of the building owners (in this case the dean and chapter of Gloucester) to take every possible precaution to protect young children on their premises from all the people that work on their premises and under their jurisdiction and supervision (Including other children (Bullies etc).

You can not have it both ways, either they are busy body Vicars doing the evil business of the monstrous government or they are lazy pastors who are kidy fiddler enablers and that is what "Gone wrong with Britain"!

Don't forget that a CRB check can be a two way streak in a court of law.

If the head of the flower guild has got some bees flying around after the sweet sweet pollan of 10 seconds of print fame in their bonnet about CRB checks then fine, registrar your protest in the proper way but please I do not want my child when not in my own personal care around any staff paid or otherwise that I can say, in a balance of probability, have not vetted for suitability of behaviour around minors.

People lets get some prospective here about CRB checks, its about protecting children from KNOWN criminals. Some people look shifty but that does not make them rapists even if a Daily-Mail-come-Spectator common sense opine says so.

Andrew Perrott

I could weep for the state of my poor country: go for the jugular, ladies, and show those who drive Gloucester Cathedral up for the mouth-breathers that they so obviously are!

The Travelling Toper

St. John rhetoric seems to have addled his/her mind. how can he equate a CRB check with a 'properly vetted' person around his/her children?
The easiest way to deal with these small minded officials is to tell them that a CRB check will infringe your 'human rights'. With that being the case you will sue them personally, not the organisation they represent, for preventing your right to enjoyment of whatever hobby or activity you are enganged in.

Derek

I hate your multiple page articles. I wanted to read this but will now just leave your site rather than flipping through 6!! pages to read a single piece.

Warwickshire guy

I agree with the rebellion. I have worked with kids for years as a youth worker and in the old days we had police checks. Professionals such as youth workers were more concerned with the quality of the work the were doing but now it is all about 'safeguarding'. It is an obsessions and a destructive one at that. On top of this people classed as vulnerable tend to be youg people up to age 25 and the elderly. So now they need 'safeguarding' and all who come into contact must be checked.

As a consultant I have had on occassion had to enter a school. Most times there is no problem, I expect the teacher to be present to control the group if I work with the kids for any reason (to control them not protect them). On the last occassion a numpty who worked in the school on a Children's Society funded project said I would need to be escorted around the school by a CRB checked person and this included being taken to the toilet. FFS!!!

I didnt't bother going in the end.

J Tucker

'Making a mountain out of a molehill' comes to mind...