Safeguarding
One of the most important protections for children and young people, against the risk of abuse or neglect, is to ensure that anyone working with young people is subject to a Criminal Records Bureau(CRB) check. For full details please visit the CRB site from which the advice below on CRB checks is obtained.
COALITION GOVERNMENT
The Government conducted a review of the Independent Safeguarding Authority. See: http://www.isa.homeoffice.gov.uk/ However, CRB checks are still required. For more see below:
CRB Checks
In simple terms there are two types of check that you might wish to obtain:
Standard CRB Check
Also referred to as a Standard Disclosure. These are primarily for posts that involve working with children or vulnerable adults. Standard checks may also be issued for people entering certain professions, such as members of the legal and accountancy professions. The Standard check contains details of all convictions held on the PNC including current and 'spent' convictions as well as details of any cautions, reprimands or final warnings. If a position involves working with children, the CRB check will indicate whether information is held on three government lists of those who are banned from working with children or the vulnerable.
Enhanced CRB Check
Also referred to as an Enhanced Disclosure. These are for posts that involve a far greater degree of contact with children or vulnerable adults. In general the type of work will involve regularly caring for, supervising, training or being in sole charge of such people. Examples include a Teacher, Scout or Guide leader. Enhanced checks are also issued for certain statutory purposes such as gaming and lottery licences.
This level of check involves an additional level of check to those carried out for the Standard CRB check - a check on local police records. Where local police records contain additional information that may be relevant to the post the applicant is being considered for, the Chief Officer of police may release information for inclusion in an Enhanced check. Exceptionally, and in a very small number of circumstances (typically to protect the integrity of current police investigations), additional information may be sent under separate cover to the Countersignatory and should not be revealed to the applicant.
Umbrella Bodies
It is quicker to conduct a check through an umbrella body that can handle the CRB process for you. Surrey Youth Focus is NOT an agency through which you can do this, but those who are include:
The Lifetrain Trust
Surrey Community Action
GAVS
RAVS
WAVS
The application process is as follows:
• As an Umbrella Body you would act as an intermediate between the CRB and the employing organisation. An overview of the interaction between the three parties is as follows:
Frequency of checks
A CRB check is simply a check at a point in time, paying no account to what might have occurred since the exact date of the check. Moreover many people will have had multiple checks because of their different roles as paid employees, and volunteers each of which could generate the need for a CRB.
An employer will need to decide on the frequency of repeating the check. Many employers whose staff work with children or young people will require checks of their staff every two or three years.
Independent Safeguarding Authority
The ISA website is http://www.isa.homeoffice.gov.uk/
On February 11 2011 the Coalition Government published the findings of its Review into the Vetting and Barring Scheme. You can read the report at www.homeoffice.gov.uk/crime/vetting-barring-scheme/
Further Advice
NCVYS have an excellent toolkit on Safeguarding called “Keeping it safe” and also a wider accreditation system called “Sound Systems” to quality assure an organisations’s approach to safeguarding an child protection.
Safe Network run online courses on child protection and some regional workshops. For more on their Are they Safe? pack see here. For the step by step guide see here.
Surrey Community Action run safeguarding awareness sessions for smaller organisations in association with Surrey Safeguarding Board, and for example there is an ISA Awareness session on 1 April 2009 from 10-12. For details contact Allison Enenche at SCA on 01483- 459292 Ext 228.
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