childrens lauretes wont visit schools in protest of being forced to be CRB checked!

[lexilex]

some thing doesnt ring right with this! what have they got to hide. children need to be protected. at my sons school parents have a CRB check if they help in the classroom alot and i dont here any of us wingeing.

No, the new system is that you are guilty until prove innocent. You have to pay to be on an "approved list", and if you commit an offence you are taken off it. That's how it differs from CRB which was a one-off check.

Took what job? He's not the current Children's Laureate; Anthony Browne (who hasn't said he won't go into schools) is. Or does the fact that he previously had the job when this policy wasn't on the horizon mean he can't complain about it now it has been introduced, even though he's no longer in the job?

I heard him on R4 say he was perfectly happy to be registered under the new laws and he couldnt understand why other authors thought they shouldnt be treated like 'normal' people.

I find it a bit that children's writers are moaning and threatening to boycott schools.

Why should they be treated differently from music teachers, cleaners etc?

I have heard some pretty prescious statements along the lines of 'children will think that writers are people to be feared if we have to register'. This apparently will put them off reading altogether.

They aren't threatening to boycott schools. They are exercising their right to decide not to cough up £64 of their own money to register for what seems to them an utterly pointless piece of bureaucracy. And as a result of that they will not be allowed into schools -- the government's decision, not theirs.

Music teachers have 1:1 contact with children.

Cleaners wander unfettered around a school.

Visiting authors are accompanied at all times by at least one teacher and generally more than that, and (while accompanied by a teacher) encounter the children in groups of a couple of dozen up to several hundred.

Can you really not see the difference between those situations.

No I cant. From what I have heard (and go only go by this) the sound totally up themselves.

I have only heard a few rumblings about the 64 quid. That is a bit of a cheek TBH. Most of the moaning has been far more high faluting than vulgar financial considerations.

And I HAVE heard the phrase 'boycotting schools' used in a couple of soundbites today. Surely if these people dont mean boycott they are articulate enough to phrase it differently?

Then idiots like me wouldnt think they were being such bloody luvvies about normal child protection procedures.

You only need a CRB check if you are going to be on Your own with children. If their are CRB checked staff in the same room, it is not necessary, so why do people visiting the school to do workshops, where their are presumably class teachers in attendance, need a CRB check?

That isnt true. You now need a crb check for lots of jobs which dont give you direct 1:1 access to children. I had to have a crb in place before I started my job. I had to wait four months after being offered the post. I would not be alone with a child until at least 6 mths into my work. Still had to have the crb though.

Clerks, secretaries etc now need crb checks because they have access to information about children.

I am not saying the system is ideal. What I am objecting to is a group of people clearly thinking they are far too important to be included.

Now if that is not their reasoning they need to be a bit more careful about how they are expressing theirselves. They sound like twonks at the moment.

I think the big divide is that those of us on one side of the argument believe strongly that these shouldn't be "normal child protection procedures" -- that if you are getting to the point where you are demanding higher-than-enhanced-CRB standards of being checked for someone who encounters children at a distance while being supervised by a battery of responsible adults, and seeing that as "normal" then things have gone too far.

Most abuse of children takes place within the family or close circle. We are constantly hearing of how social services are underfunded and overstretched in trying to deal with those cases. I personally know of heartbreaking cases where abuse seems to be going on unchecked. But there's money and time and manpower to spare for "ensuring" that filthy paedos don't manage to get near any children in a setting in which they couldn't possibly do any harm. Except, of course, that it doesn't even do that, because to show up on the check you'd need to have actually been caught. But it's OK, because we can pat ourselves on the back and point out that Britain has the "most rigorous" child protection policies in the developed world. Not, you know, the most effective or anything radical like that. We'd rather put our effort into being more rigorous.

And this is not to be protested against because it's "normal".

So Chegirl, do you think all adults who ever have access to children, should be checked? Uncles, aunts, neighbours, family friends, step-parents, older siblings?

Because that is where the major risk to children is. Everyone knows that children are far more likely to be groomed for abuse by a trusted family member or friend, than by people they might meet once in the company of 40 other children and 4 other CRB checked adults. The risk is very clearly far, far greater from the former group than from the latter - so why not insist on CRB checks for the former?

I would still like someone to tell me how an author could possibly get access to a DC from a school visit.

The author will be in the hall, with rows of DCs in front of him and staff all down the side. If he were to be a paedophile and liked the look of a girl in the second row he could ask her name, in a perfectly innocent way. She would say Ruby, she wouldn't give a surname-they never do to that sort of question. He can hardly say 'and where do you live Ruby? Are you on email! The only way he could find out is to go into the office and find a register-since he will have at least 7 registers and there could be more than one Ruby in a class he would be at a loss. Visiting authors are never alone anyway-someone is always chatting to them, finding them coffee etc.
How could he possibly get hold of Ruby? Wander all around the neighbourhood looking for her and then say 'Hi Ruby-remember me!'and then on the highly odd circumstance that she is completely on her own, lure her away.
A totally mad scenario and smacks of paranoia. If they were coming into school and working with children on a one to one basis, of course they need checking. A piece of paper that is totally unnecessary just feeds bureaucracy. It is also an insulting way to treat an honoured guest.

Oh no, that won't work piscesmoon, because when I started working the registers had the children's names and addresses in.
However, due to child protection rules, that is no longer the case. In order to find out Ruby's name, he'd have to plow through every file in the office. But he'd have to pick the lock first, and circumnavigate the two members of staff that run it.

In that case Goblinchild I think there are easier ways to get access to a DC than becoming a successful author so that you can visit schools! The whole thing is ludicrous.
If someone culd tell me one single incident of a visiting author being a danger to a child or tell me how they would get access to a child from the visit I might have some patience.
To have to have a CRB because he is in a school, as a blanket rule, isn't good enough when it is a complete waste of time and money. Common sense should come into it rather then 'jobsworth' rules.

sorry-could

I suppose the argument would be that the author will be seen as a trusted person because they have appeared at school. The author can't then pursue Ruby in particular, but suppose Millie from the same class subsequently writes to the author and says 'You came to my school' he is in a position to groom her because he seems safe to her due to his school appearance.
Tenuous - yep.
You could equally say he might look like a trusted person simply because he has written a book that is read to them at school, so should all authors of children's books be CRB checked before they are even published? Or should they be allowed to publish without a CRB check but not have their books in the school library?

Nope I dont think everybody who looks at a child should be CRB'd. I happen to think its a deeply flawed system. I am not a paranoid parent who sees pervs behind every corner.

I have worked with abused kids quite a bit and I know that the majority of abuse is far more 'mundane' than the headline grabbing media tragitainment we are used to.

My is reserved for a bunch of celeb writers who seem to think they are above convention. I mean dont we know who they ARE!?

They are no more but no less likely to groom/abuse a child than the rest of us. Why the hell shouldnt they be subject to the same checks as the rest of us?

They should take a great big leap over themselves.

They are subject to the same checks as "the rest of us", as in "the vast majority of people who don't work closely with and have access to other people's children", because they don't work closely with and have access to other people's children.

To turn your question around, why the hell should they be subject to the same checks as people who do a completely different job under different circumstances? Although that could be fun if the government ran with the idea a bit further... let's have them subject to the same checks and certifications as insurance salesmen, firefighters and aerobics instructors as well. True, they don't sell insurance, put out fires or teach people aerobics, but what the heck -- why the hell shouldn't they be subject to the same checks as the rest of us?

It's not just famous authors who object -- I first heard of the policy from a small-time author who is perfectly well aware that no one knows who she is. The bulk of authors don't make a living (or barely make a living) out of writing, and the bulk of school visits are from that mass of lesser-known writers. It's just that the media are understandably interested in talking to the names everyone will recognise. So are they objecting because they are up themselves, but the lesser-known non-celebrity authors making exactly the same objections have a reasonable point? Or are the unknown authors, somewhat unbelievably, proceeding from a position of "don't you know who I am?"

They are doing the school and the children a favour. Why should they be treated like potential paedophiles. It is so unhealthy.

They are actually working for a fee most of the time. Not as a favour.

Not that this should make any difference to one's view on this one way or the other!

OK. Doesn't make any difference though as you say.

OK. Doesn't make any difference though as you say.

The authors are right. If I were one I wouldn't pay on principle if it was only £1. They will not have access to kids which is what it's supposed to be for.

Btw do fireman and ambulance drivers have to go off and fill a form in to apply for a CRB check?

And lexilex's comment "some thing doesnt ring right with this! what have they got to hide" is the kind of thinking that got us in this mess in the first place.

Firefighters and paramedics do need a CRB check, yes, although I don't know whether they need this new souped-up thinggumajig.

I expect they might for other reasons, but I just imagined the school turning them away while the place was burning down.

A lot of people who work with children get paid feck all. So I dont think how much the authors get paid or do not get paid come into it.

I think the OP did sound a bit hysterical as it goes. But these rules were bought in to try and protect children after Soham. Of course they are not ideal, perfect and who knows if they will make a difference? But what do we do to protect children from very determined people who seek to harm children.

We know enough about peadophiles to understand that they will spend years and years getting into a position of trust and power JUST to have access to children.

It is very sad that all people who work with children (myself included) have to go through all kinds of procedures but I dont know what else we can do.

Maybe if the authors sounded a bit less snotty I would have more sympathy. But so far they have really not done themselves any favours in that department.