PAIN CRB CAMPAIGN, AND LETTER BACK FROM BARONESS MORGAN.

[Alison J Stevens]

Home Office
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II/J11 NOV2009/!;
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Meg Hillier MP
PARLIAMENTARYUNDERSECRETARYOF STATE
2 Marsham Street, London SW1P 4DF
www.homeoffice.gov.uk
David Burrowes, MP
House of Commons
LONDON
SW1A OM
1 2 NOV2009
Thank you for your letter of 30 September to Baroness Morgan at the
Department for Children, Schools and Families, enclosing correspondence
from your constituent, Alison Stevens, who is the chairperson of Parents
Against Injustice (PAIN) regarding her concerns about the disclosure of
allegations on Enhanced Disclosures from the Criminal Records Bureau
(CRB). Your letter has been passed to me to reply.
I am grateful to you for raising this matter with me and I can fully appreciate
Mrs Stevens' concerns about the information released by the police. Although
I am unable to influence police decision making in this regard, I will try and
clarify the process behind the release of such information.
Firstly, I should explain that the role of the CRB is to act as the gateway to the
Police National Computer (PNC) and associated data sources, and to reveal
this information on the face of a Disclosure to Registered Bodies undertaking
employment vetting decisions for relevant positions or employment as defined
by the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act, 1974 (ROA) and associated
Regulations. These are positions for which an employer may ask to see
spent as well as unspent conviction information.
The CRB does not own criminal records information nor does it maintain a
separate criminal records database. The Bureau relies upon access to the
PNC for details of convictions, cautions, reprimands and final warnings for
recordable offences and on local police forces for other information held about
individuals.
As part of the Enhanced Disclosure process, the CRB must refer a person's
application details to any relevant police force for them to check against their
local intelligence records for non-conviction information that may be
considered relevant to the specific position for which the Disclosure is sought.
This sort of information is ref~rred to as "approved information" and is
released under Section 113B (4) of Part V of the Police Act 1997, which
states that: "Before issuing an enhanced criminal record certificate the
Secretary of State shall request the chief officer of every relevant police force
to provide any information which, in the chief officer's opinion (a) might be
relevant for the purpose described in the statement under subsection (2) [the
positions eligible for Enhanced Disclosure] and (b) ought to be included in the
certificate".
Therefore, the police have a duty to disclose information which they believe
may be relevant and should be disclosed. The decision as to what is
disclosed is taken by the chief officer of the relevant local police force or his
nominee.
Such decisions to release approved information are not taken lightly and chief
officers operate to strict guidelines on what factors should be considered
when considering such information. Factors that would be taken into
consideration would include, but not be restricted to, the position the individual
is currently applying for, the age of the information, whether the ~nformation
might be directly relevant to the assessment of the person's suitability to work
with children and whether it is reasonable to disclose the information, bearing
in mind the human rights of the individuals concerned.
Home Office guidance states that the main consideration must be the
protection of the vulnerable and this is the main priority of the Disclosure
Service.
The chief officer of each police force is Data Controller under the Data
Protection Act 1998 of all information placed by that force on the Police
National Computer (PNC) or retained in local force records. Only the chief
officer has the power to amend or delete these records and the CRB and
Home Office play no part in such decisions.
Saying that, the CRB has a procedure in place to allow recipients of such
material to dispute the accuracy of the information revealed in a Disclosure;
this is referred to as the Disputes procedure and details of how to commence
dispute proceedings may be found on the reverse of the Disclosure
document.
I appreciate that the inclusion of such information on a Disclosure may have a
bearing on the recruitment decisions of potential employers but it should be
remembered that the inclusion of approved information in accordance with the
Police Act 1997 does not in itself prevent an individual from taking up or
continuing employment.
Ultimately, it is for the employer to decide, after full pre-employment checks
including the taking up of references and the careful monitoring of all the
responses, whether an individual is suitable for a particular position.
As the applicant receives a copy of the same information that is released to
the employer this should provide an opportunity to explain the circumstances
surrounding any information released.
MEG HilLIER

[TWIGGIE]

Strange isnt it, most women get SS on their backs for being victims of Domestic Violence and end up with this on our CRB''s (and havnt committed a bloody crime) but the perpetrators who abuse, rape and hound us get away scott free without a single bloody thing sticking to them and their CRB AND THEY GET THE KIDS!!! My brain has trouble working that beauty out!!.

[Alison J Stevens]

As you can see the Right Honorable Lady has a total disregard for Parents, or individuals that have allegations of Child Abuse made against them,and the allegation has proved to be false.individuals have had their names vindicated, but the allegations will remain on file, on a enhanced CRB disclosure preventing that person ever working with Children or young people.
The likes of teachers,and other people that work with children have their lives and careers ruined,and the allegation is taken to the grave with them.
Baroness Morgan, stated that such allegations, where Teachers or Youth Workers who had their names vindicated the former would be removed from such a disclosure.
With this thought in mind, i thought the same should pertain,to any individual falsely accused, i asked for a meeting with her, to discus, PAIN,FASO,and FACTS concerns
A letter arrived, stating that she wasn't interested about such a meeting,and contradicted herself, stating that all allegations will remain on file, but a reference would be added,stating that allegations were unfounded.... Read More
Not good enough, these files should be completely deleted,and is a violation of Human Rights.
PAIN are dealing with a newly qualified Social Worker, that cannot work in her chosen field. because a allegation remains on a enhanced CRB disclosure.
I will carry on our campaign.
Lives ruined for ever, even though Parents have had their name vindicated by a acquittal in the Crown Court,and in some cases, Social Services have decided to take no action, by not instigating Care Proceedings, within the Family Unit.
Note People are dying over the stress of such injustices.