To think that CRB checking requirements have gone too far

[ReallyTired]

It seems that if you want to do any kind of volentary work you need a CRB check. Ie. If I listen to kids read at my son's school, help out with the children's centre, take a sunday school session all these organisations need a seperate CRB check. At £60 a time for a CRB check it is a big drain on charity/ schools/ church resources. Its a money spinner for SERCO.

I appreciate the need for CRB checks, but it seems silly that I am filling in two seperate CRB check forms for the church and the children's centre in the same week. Surely one CRB check in a period of a month should be enough.

I would like the system of CRB checks to be streamlined. Ie. If the children's centre paid for me to have a CRB check then it should be possible to give a reference to the church. The church could check that the CRB had been done and not pay full cost.

I have just had this conversation with my (Scout leader) husband. He explained that basically the certificate is out of date as soon as you get it, as the checks are done to it being issued. But within the organisation who you got it from another person should be able to vouch for you as you are actively involved with them. However if you wanted to work with children elsewhere then there would be no one who could do so, so you need to be checked again.

I had six at one point. The most ridiculous was to be on a pre school committee, I need an enhanced CRB check even though this role involved absolutely no contact with any child, with or without parents present.

I work for my local council and have an enhanced CRB check, because I have access to the names and addresses of all the families in the borough, and come into contact with them daily. Fair enough. But I also recently had to have a volunteers CRB check with my son's school, to be able to go with him on a school trip. Not look after other children - just my own! Even though it's the same council, and it was the same person in HR doing the checks for my work one and the school one. And when it came back it was an enhanced one as well. Madness!

I can appreciate why they need to be done though, and the need for a paper trail for each individual employer. Just ranting about me having to have 2 done with the same employer! I do worry about private tutors etc advertising on the NetHuns local noticeboard waving their CRB check around like it makes them more credible.

On a slightly different note, we got someone in on a work placement. Basically an unemployed adult getting some work experience to put on their CV. When her CRB came through, she'd been arrested for stalking ex boyfriends, previously. We worried about what would have happened if we'd let her loose on our database, finding the new addresses of her victims and families.