Do you have a CRB to help out at your DCs school, and did you have to pay for it?

[eleusis]

I was at a PTA meeting last night and it was mentioned that the PTA board members need a CRB check. And that it costs the school £50 for each one. But, I thought if you needed it in order to volunteer (asopposed to paid work) it was free.

Don't need one at our school - no volunteers without one would ever be left alone with children. And to be honest, virtually all activities where volunteers would be helping out are in full view of the teacher anyway. They do ask if you have one, several of us do anyway from involvement in other activities.

Portonovo, the same is true of our school in that most volunteers are in full view of the teachers, and up to this year we only asked volunteers who would be alone with the children to get CRB clearance. But the school has decided to make assurance doubly sure by checking every volunteer.

You know what

I WANT people who might be on their own with my dd to be CRB checked!

Well I am going to be heling with reading from next week and CRB has not been mentioned.I have an enhanced check from being on pta of preschool but I understand you can't transfer from one location to another.

I agree they should be done.

My gripe here is that the LEA is insisting they send the checks in through them and then charging the schools an above market rate for doing so. Fine, CRB checks all round. But why not let parents and schools submit them for free?

yes (for class reading) and no , it should n't cost the school for volunteers

of c ourse, but it's a bit silly if a teacher in a neighbouring borough - a working teacher with up to date CRB - needs a second CRB done because it's a different LEA

DS's school are just introducing these and a similar price has been quoted. I needed CRB check to help out at DS's Woodcraft Folk group. They paid for it although it was volunteer work.

cat64, church volunteers are not rrequired to pay. I'm sure of this. Our church gets them without paying and the guy I talked to at CRB confirmed this. If you volunteer, they should be free, according to the CRB guy.

I also read on the CRB site that it is up to the organisation whether or not they want to accept an existing CRB check. I'll see if I can find it and provide a link...

It's on the link I pasted below ():

"I already have a Disclosure, can I use it again?

If you are asked to apply for a Disclosure and you already have one for a previous role; ask if the organisation is willing to accept it. When making this decision the organisation will take into account the length of time that has elapsed since that Disclosure was issued; the level of Disclosure; the nature of the position for which the Disclosure was issued; and the nature of the position for which you are now applying. Ultimately, it will be the organisation?s decision whether to accept it or not."

Hmmm... the link vanished. Try again.

www.crb.gov.uk/Default.aspx?page=1871

Schools cannot administer their own CRB's because they would all have to separately become registered bodies which is expensive, time consuming and unworkable.

It makes far more sense for the LA to be the registered body and actually make the application for a CRB check and if they charge £15 a time then it probably about covers the cost of the Admin doing the actual work.

For me the stupid thing is having to have so many people CRB'd in the first place and having such a compensation culture that CRB's from other organisations are no longer accepted.

Recently I had 6 different CRB clearances running at the same time for various jobs which I find ridiculous because when I started my career all you got was a police check which is just as safe.
CRB doesn't remove the need for vigilance, it only shows a conviction not an intent.

Oh, perhaps that explains it. But can you elaborate? What do you mean by schools would have to become registered bodies?

I still think £15 is a bit steep for the LEA to do it. They are surely profiting. And I still think it is wrong to take the money from schools who need it elsewhere (books, playgroud equipment, computers, etc.)

In order to have a CRB check done the form needs to be signed by someone who is a "countersignatory from a registered body or umbrella organisation".

This means that the person who counter signs the form works for a vetted organisation who has read and signed up to the codes of practice for CRB checks and will only use the information received back from CRB in the way it was intended to be used.

Lots of small charities don't have the time or resources to become registered bodies so they would use an umbrella organisation to do the check on their behalf.
It's to make sure that things are done properly and it's also why people can't just apply for a CRB on spec. It has to be for a particular purpose.

Eleuis: it's very easy to get the CRB applications wrong -- they have to be in black ink, all capitals, no tippex, certain fields filled in exactly so. It's quality control that the "registred" or "umbrella" bodies do to make sure that the CRB application is filled in correctly, before it's forwarded to actual CRB. CRB wouldbe (was) bogged down with botched applications b4 the present umbrella/registered body system was introduced.

ALSO,anyone receiving CRB information/disclosures must abide by the CRB code of Conduct -- this is all about mis-use of iformation. It's the jobof the umbrella body to make sure that end users are informed what the CRB Code of Conduct says.

So they aren't profitterring, I think it's reasonable for LEA to charge up to £15 -- £33 sounds ott, though.

ALSO, I imagine LEA does the identity checks as part of its processing, which may bewhy they charge £15 each rather than the more usual £8 that some other umbrella groups charge to preschools (but preschool committee is delegated the task of the identity checks).

I suppose our PTA will have to decide as part5 of its child protection policy if we accept CRB checks from other settings if < 3 yrs old. This is becoming increasingly recognised as ok, but always at our risk == could be added to evidence of negligence if something goes wrong.
*Keyboard acting up, hence typos!

I still think £15 is a bit steep for the LEA to do it. They are surely profiting. And I still think it is wrong to take the money from schools who need it elsewhere (books, playgroud equipment, computers, etc.)

(sorry don't know how to do quotes on here)

I don't think they will be profiting from it - An Admin officer on £7 or so an hour will be spending at least 2 hours per application by the time they've checked each one and then done the return work afterwards.

The school also can decide on who it wants to check - the LA pays to do the staff itself not the school - It's only volunteers that the school has to pay for and IMO paying to check all members of the PTA is a waste of money.
As a parent I have far more unsupervised access to children in my home than I ever would have at the school.

Okay, I'm coming round to think it's not THAT unreasonable. It just seems an awful lot of bureaucracy and money spent from already overstreched school budgets.

And, we don't need them for the whole PTA, just the officers of the PTA (Secretary, treasurer, chair, etc.)

Changing tack slightly, I don't need a CRB check to help out at the dcs school. I'm not left in sole charge of the pupils, but for example I am involved in getting reception class undressed and dressed for swimming.

Ah, but Mrspnut - if you had harmed childen previously they probably wouldn't be allowd in your care, or only with lots of supervision (you'd have some official mark against your name to this effect). Whereas, if you "only" committed another criminal offense, say shoplifting, assault, etc., you would still (as a rule) be entitled to keep custody of your children. Should these other types of crime bar you from being on PTA?

Part of the CRB Code of practice is end users of the info using it appropriately, including understanding what is and isn't relevant to the role & setting. So if as a PTA we get to see CRB disclosures & info (info is not the same as the disclosure itself), we have to HAVE a policy about document and record storage and interpretaton, and the policy must say (in waffle-speak) that we will carefully consider whether the info or disclosure are actually relvant or a true bar to the proposed role....

Good point about how the registered body makes sure the request for CRB info is valid and justified...Not just anybody can ask for a disclosure.

Depends on school policy, Ladymuck. I used to help out listening to children read, sometimes in a little library where no other adults were consistently present, I didn't get CRB'd for that, either.

There are all kinds of people who have committed offences that would bar them from working with children but they still have their own kids and have access to other children.

I would be far more worried about someone having a conviction for theft or fraud wanting to be on a committee in case they managed to become treasurer and did a runner with the christmas fair money.

If you're having the officers of the PTA CRB'd and the LA is the signatory then they would receive the disclosure and make the decision, the PTA should just be told yes or no as to the suitability of a person to hold that office.

It turns out Richmond borough actually charges £17 per CRB check.

Eleusis, I've only just seen your CAT - haven't checked that e-mail for a while. The thread's moved on since then. Do you still think I can add anything? Let me know and I will reply!