to think the NCT should CRB check its volunteers?

[leicestershiregirl]

Just wanted to sound some mums out about this. Until last year I was a volunteer for the NCT and something that always bothered me about it was the fact that they don't CRB check their volunteers or require them to do safeguarding children training. This is in spite of the fact that volunteers are often in close proximity to children e.g. at mother and baby groups.

Comparable organisations e.g. Homestart, La Leche League and the Breastfeeding Network all require CRBs. Everybody working in a school or hospital requires one even if they don't have direct contact with students/patients. For my job with the NHS I also had to have safeguarding children training and we were told we have a duty of care to any children we come across, even if they are just visitors to the hospital.

This seems good and right to me, but when I brought it up with the NCT, first with other volunteers then with the Board of Trustees I was told NCT volunteers do not require CRB checks by law because they are never alone with children, they would be too expensive and they're not effective anyway because they can't tell you if somebody is going to commit a crime.

Am I alone in thinking this is absolutely crazy? Teaching assistants or Sure Start workers are never alone with children but they have to get checked, and rightly so - a school is not an appropriate place to work for somebody convicted of child abuse (and neither is an NCT mother and baby group). As for the expense, what is more important than child protection? And as for the argument they're not effective, that's just dumb.

Please tell me what you think.

The NCT is not short of a bob or two. I volunteer for another chaity that operates on a shoestring and would love to have a fraction of the NCT's budget.

Sorry, that should have been charity.

Is it REALLY worth all of us giving away all of our civil liberties and responsibilties
"just to prevent one case"
YABVU
The CRB system is extracting MILLIONS of pounds out of the pockets of schools and charities and into the greasy paws of city fat cats
and the figures for abuse commited by a non family member are unchanged since the system was brought in over ten years ago.

Do not rely on a poxy piece of paper
rely on yourself and common sense

Well, I don't buy this, "If just one child can be saved then all the effort is worth making" etc. The fact is that children are also damaged by a society that is over-zealous in ensuring their protection by over-regulating their relationships with adults who are not their parents. There is a balance to be struck, and that balance will always allow some element of risk to remain. OF all the shit happening to children out there right now, the risk posed by unchecked NCT volunteers has to rank pretty low on the list, don't you think?

I think that the NCT are right in their general approach.

I used to volunteer at a NCT mother and toddler group - I was just another mum like all the others - only I had the fun job of getting the toys out and putting them away again. Oh, and I sometimes did the refreshments. The rest of the time I played with my baby/toddler. I was not caring for anyone's child, all children were accompanied by a parent or carer. I was not offering any counselling advice or support to vulnerable adults. What in that role requires me to have a CRB check?

I used to volunteer at Nearly New Sales. We advised parents not to bring their children as it is not an appropriate environment, especially as there was no buggy access. Again there was no contact with unaccompanied children or vulnerable adults. At best it was a bit like working in a shop - do all shop workers require CRB checks now?

IME there are large numbers of women who are happy to use the services provided by their local NCT branch. A vanishingly small number will ever actually be prepared to volunteer. Most branches are run by a tiny handful of dedicated volunteers, who spend most of their time trying to drum up enough 'casual' volunteers to enable events to run. If the 'casual' volunteers all needed CRB checks to help out, then I think most local branches would cease to function at all.

As a woman I find it very offensive that anyone suggests that a pregnant woman is, by default, vulnerable. Being pregnant, or a new mum, doesn't make me a vulnerable adult in the eyes of the law. I am just as capable as I was pre-babies. Fair enough some pregnant women may be vulnerable - but not enough to warrant having to CRB check every single person who comes into contact with any pregnant woman regardless of role or situation.

Now safe-guarding children training is another matter and could be provided very cost-effectively on-line to local branches.

BTW OP - I think you misunderstand the NCT funding. The local events run by your branch are 100% funded from within the branch. HO would expect local branches to pay for their own CRB checks, because they have to pay for everything themselves. In fact a percentage of the profit from all local events is returned to HO to be used in nationwide campaigning and to help fund training for teachers in areas too poor to fund the training of their own teachers.
The NCT may well be a large charity, but course fees and membership fees are used centrally - not by the local branches running Bumps and Babies groups etc.

Argh! Please read what I've actually written. I've already said that I'm not proposing casual volunteers should be CRB checked, or volunteers like Treasurers who have no contact with kids.

CRB checks are FREE for volunteers so the cost isn't an argument against

(although I do think CRBs are overkill in this situation)

Basic Safeguarding training would be a good idea though & could easily be offered online at minimal cost (my LA provide a basic course free online for anyone in any org who wants to do it)

piprabbit, I was Chair of my branch - I know how the NCT is funded.

I believe volunteers are not charged the full cost of a CRB but still have to pay an admin fee, though don't quote me on that.

The NCT is a charity. Think how much this would take out of their pocket.
Also, it's hard enough to find volunteers without wanting them to be CRB checked.
Thuird, really, how likely is it that a possible paedophile should be attending NCT bumps and babies meetings/playgroup/coffee mornings?? Have a .

If a parent is always there with a child then I thing CRB checks are a nonsense. Only people left alone with other people's children need CRB checking if you don't know them. People don't CRB check their babysitters usually (mine tended to be teenage children of friends so their history was known). Wanting everyone who comes into contact with your child when you are present and the child is a breastfed baby that doesn't leave your side is mad.
I went to NCT coffee mornings when mine were babies, I never just dropped my children off at them for another adult to look after, I was always there. How can someone abuse a baby if the parent is there? Some people go totally OTT about CRB checks.

A CRB check won't tell you if someone is likely to snatch a child.

Maybe all volunteers should be seen by a psychiatrist before having access to babies and pregnant women/mothers.

And of course TA's and Sure Start workers are at times alone with children!

now I'd say Treasurer IS a role that should be CRB checked. Why? Fraud someone with a conviction for fraud may not be a good choice for treasurer....

CRB check throws up all sorts of convictions- shop lifting, fraud, violence, drug dealing....

This is in spite of the fact that volunteers are often in close proximity to children e.g. at mother and baby groups.

You've just answered your own question. The mother is present thus no CRB check is needed. It would be pretty hard for a volunteer to molest a baby in full view of a mum and baby group.

I had to be CRB checked upon admission to the roll of solicitors. It is £42 each person for a standard check and more for enhanced. Who do you think will pay these fees? Yourselves if you want it?

YABVVU

And may I be the first to say - 'IT'S POLITICAL CORRECTNESS GORN MAD!'

[hefts bosom and fans herself vigorously with copy of daily wail]

Stop whining about the vanishingly minute risk that some 32 year old marketing manager of previous unblemished character, on maternity leave and doing a bit of volunteering with the NCT is going to start fiddling with people's babies.

Really - haven't we got enough to worry about these days what with catastrophic midwife shortages putting mothers and babies lives at risks? Let the NCT get on with campaigning for more midwives without the distraction of rubbish like this to worry about and spend money on.

YABVVVU and a bit weird. Let's take some of your points one by one and I have paraphrased for ease.

The risk of a baby being snatched Erm almost zero. I mean are you seriously suggesting someone might snatch it from the arms of it's mother??

The risk of a child abuser running a Bumps & Babies group About the same as someone who would fail a CRB running a group. Less in fact because the people running these groups are parents. And last time I checked abused children where the abuse is known about are not left in the care of that person.

There should be child protection training for people running these groups There is a guide and a reporting process. As a former branch chair I'm surprised you don't know that.

I'm wondering if you're one of those people that would have everyone who hosts a play date or birthday party CRB checked. You sound the type.

Arf at spudulika "Stop whining about the vanishingly minute risk that some 32 year old marketing manager of previous unblemished character, on maternity leave and doing a bit of volunteering with the NCT is going to start fiddling with people's babies". Quite

I am positive that there are people who would like someone to have a CRB certificate before their DC goes to their house for tea!! It is false security and meaningless-you need your own judgement.
Good post LovelyCuppa.

At what stage do we reach the tipping point where absolutely everybody should be CRB-checked, all the time?

Because if one child could be saved, it would be worth it...

A dangerous stage hester-as people then think they are safe -rather than it meaning they haven't been caught as yet.

When the DCs were younger they did a lot of activities requiring adult volunteers. Many people were totally put off by the whole CRB thing and refused to become involved.

Be careful what you wish for.

And the people I know who know about these things tell me the more hurdles you put up, its only the most motivated people who go for it - and guess which groups are included in the "most motivated...".

I know someone who works with DCs in a club situation. She utterly refuses to get a CRB check-she says it is ridiculous, she has lived in the village 40 years, brought up her DC there, is a grandmother, knows most of the parents etc. So far she has won.

^At what stage do we reach the tipping point where absolutely everybody should be CRB-checked, all the time?

Because if one child could be saved, it would be worth it...^

Or no cars on the roads, or no stepfathers in the house, or no swimming, or no young men on the streets....

I used to run one of these NCT groups. What this meant was that out of a group of otherwise equal mothers accompanied by our babies/toddlers, I was the one in charge of remembering in whose house the next coffee morning would be held. Hardly a position of power or authority, and certainly not one that made me more of a risk than any other mum in the room. Volunteering for the NCT is not a career choice: it's a way of meeting other mums.

Should anyone who turns up at a mother and baby morning be CRB checked?

Don't people make friends any longer? How do you manage that if you can't trust your own judgment? And if you cannot be in the same room as someone who has not been CRB checked, for fear they snatch your baby and run, how do you manage shopping trips? Trips to the library? Waiting at the doctor's surgery?

I totally agree with hester: the (very small) risk of baby-snatching has to be weighed against the risk that the same babies will be damaged by being brought up by mothers who live in constant fear and do not trust their own judgment.

exoticfruits, generally I'm a great one for following the rules, but I briefly helped out in a creche (voluntary) where the creche leader was insistent we couldn't touch the children - weeping tots wanting their parents back. I refused to comply, and generally spent the sessions with 5 kids squirming all over me.

They stopped inviting me back.