To think that, wrt child abuse, we are all now guilty until proven innocent now?

[FlamingoBingo]

Rather than the way it has always been - innocent until proven guilty?

It looks like home educators will have to prove they're not abusing their children in order to be allowed not to send them to school.

Friends have to prove they will not abuse your children before they can look after them while you work/get a haircut/buy them a box of chocolates (unless they're looking after them in your house - what's the rationale behind that then? ).

People who regularly give lifts to children to places will have to prove they won't abuse them soon.

What is this country coming to? How long until they cook up some system whereby we all have to have CRB checks before we concieve in the first place!?

I don't know. The people I know who were abused as children were abused by either family or friends/ people close to the family.

I know, malfoy. But do children belong to the state? Or to their parents? Who is responsible for them? Because it's looking more and more like the state doesn't trust parents at all.

I do understand that it's about protecting children, but will these measures really protect them?

I mean, a clean CRB check just means you haven't been caught. And it doesn't mean you won't abuse in the future. And what's with all the ofstedding of people caring for their friend's children?

Does it apply to having other children to stay for the night so their parents can go to a wedding, for instance?

I know what you are saying and I agree that getting people CRB checked does not prove anything. Certainly the people I am thinking of would not have been caught that way.

I do agree with you that it is up to the parents rather than the state.

Its completely out of control, Flamingo.

Its one thing to investigate if abuse is suspected. I was investigated when my son fell out of my arms at 3 weeks. I totally understood that and the case was completely dismissed, since it was an accident.

Its another thing entirely to assume that everyone is an abuser until proven otherwise. And as you say, a clean record may just mean the person has not been caught yet. It doesn't mean they aren't an abuser.

And yes, malfoy, most people who are abused are abused by members of their own families.

If the system even worked it might not be so bad. But the CRB never sent a copy of my clearance letter to the school (or the school has lost it) - and I've lost my copy (I know, I know ) - and the letter of confirmation I had from the LEA is apparently not good enough...so I feel as if I'm 'under suspicion' until the CRB can print off another copy for the school, and I hate it!

I'm tempted to just shrug my shoulders and say, well, it's no skin off my nose if I don't come in and help in dd's class. I work from home & I'll earn more money if I have Monday morning to myself.

I won't be the only one having this hassle, I'm sure.

Unfortunately, common sense has gone out the window and box ticking and red tape have taken its place ...

Soon I doubt whether family members will be able to volunteer care unless they have been adequately vetted!

And it's so expensive, epithet! What a huge amount of administration hours, and for what? A meaningless piece of paper that expires the minute it's issued (not officially expires, obviously, but from a practical point of view).

It makes me so angry

It must cost the schools etc. a fortune! They have to be renewed annually, don't they?

It wouldn't bother me much, but I've been a teacher and supply teacher in this LEA before having the dds, and was cleared 5 times in the last 10 years.

I thought every 6m, epithet.

I think they're dangerous actually. As in they put us all in a false sense of security - 's/he's safe, s/he's been CRB checked'...

yanbu - its OTT and the huge amount of paperwork and reliance on computer systems will mean that very soon it'll all be messed up. Like when the first person deemed safe to work with children by the vetting and barring scheme abuses a child and the papers pick it up - and the government respond by letting another government department investigate the case and the press release says 'lessons shall be learned' from it but nothing actually changes.

flamigobingo
I agree.
Having a CRB doesn't mean that somebody will never abuse children, it just means that they haven't been caught yet.

YA SO NBU.
Nanny State at its worst.

Only 2-3 years ago CRBs were supposed to be renewed every 3 years per Ofsted 'Best Practice' Guidance, but I am perhaps out of date, it's up to indiv. LEAs what they do, ultimately.

This paranoia all comes out of Soham (and later Baby P) murders, but those cases got so much publicity precisely because they were so unusual in how badly the safety checking and abuse monitoring systems worked in those individual cases.

Now, decent people are getting traumatised by unfair accusations and insuations because ppl are paranoid that the system must ALWAYS work as badly as it did for Soham/Baby P. (SIGH)

A CRB check only proves a person has not been caught doing anything. not that they don't or won't! It creates a false sense of security. "Oh, X is a good person, their CRB check came back clear."

It is meaningless. How many times do you read about someone who has abused children for 20, 30, 40 years before being caught?

Common sense. That's what we need. An awareness of risks, watchfulness and common sense.

MN consensus that IANBU?????

I just think this whole thing of 'people are not responsible for themselves or their children' is so counter-productive. We're going to create a state in a couple of generations where we just can't survive unless we're told exactly what to do and when and how to do it.