The Government has announced that it will halt registration with the Vetting and Barring Scheme (VBS) in response to criticism that the current scheme is disproportionate, overly burdensome, and unduly infringes on civil liberties. Voluntary registration with the VBS for new employees and job-movers working or volunteering with children and vulnerable adults was due to start on 26 July 2010, with compulsory registration due to follow in November 2010. The Home Office, the Department of Health and the Department for Education are reviewing the Scheme in order to scale registration back to ‘proportionate, common sense levels’.
The VBS is intended to protect children and vulnerable adults by stopping those who pose a known risk from working with them. Although the timing and scope of requirements on individuals to register with the Scheme now depend on the outcome of the review, the following requirements, which came into effect in October last year, remain in place:
· it is a criminal offence for barred individuals to apply to work with children or vulnerable adults in a wider range of posts than previously. Employers also face criminal sanctions for knowingly employing a barred individual across a wider range of work
· the three previous barring lists (POVA, POCA and List 99) are replaced by two new barred lists administered by the Independent Safeguarding Authority. These two lists can be checked as part of an Enhanced Criminal Records Bureau check· additional jobs and voluntary positions are covered by the barring arrangements
· employers, local authorities, professional regulators and inspection bodies have a duty to refer to the ISA any information on an individual working with the vulnerable where they consider them to have caused harm or pose a risk.
Further discussion of the VBS as previously proposed can be found in a feature in IDS Employment Law Brief 902.
Further information can be viewed here.
© Incomes Data Services Ltd, 2010