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Children's charity attacks Tory leader's CRB comment 1

Finance | Tania Mason | 7 Oct 2008

A children’s charity has condemned a comment by Conservative leader David Cameron that adults hosting youngsters on exchange visits should not always have to undergo enhanced criminal records checks.

In his speech to the Conservative Party conference last week, Cameron (pictured) criticised the requirement for all hosts to be cleared through enhanced CRB checks. The clip was broadcast on national television.

Cameron said the problem with the country was not Gordon Brown, but Labour.

“They end up treating people like children, with a total lack of trust in people’s common sense and decency,” he said. “This attitude, this whole health and safety, Human Rights Act culture, has infected every part of our life.

“Even foreign exchanges for students…you can’t host a school exchange any more without parents going through an enhanced Criminal Records Bureau check.”

‘Populist misuse of his position’

Jan Cosgrove, national secretary of the children’s charity Fair Play for Children, which was established in 1972 after two eight-year-olds drowned for lack of safe playspace, accused Cameron of a “populist misuse of his position”.

“I know it is becoming fashionable in some ideologically-motivated quarters to try to equate criminal records checks with some form of alleged ‘politically-correct’ philosophy,” she said. “If the leader of the Conservative Party actually believes this, he is far off the mark.

“The CRB and now the new Vetting and Barring Scheme arose from actual tragedies, involving the deaths of children. His party has given support to this progress. Cameron needs to correct the appalling endorsement he gave to the attacks on the CRB mounted in some media and ideological quarters.”

Action for Children ‘supports checks’

Action for Children, meanwhile, made no specific reference to the Tory leader, but confirmed its backing for exchange visit hosts to be screened. Shaun Kelly, the charity’s safeguarding manager, said: “What we know of people who offend against children is that they often seek roles which give access to this group.

"Services like exchange visits which involve children being away from home and their usual support mechanisms, can make them more vulnerable. In these circumstances, we support enhanced CRB checks as they offer some level of screening of potential hosts.”

New system for Scotland

Meanwhile, the Scottish government is proposing to scrap mulitple criminal records checks and create one Protection of Vulnerable Groups register.

The scheme will enable records to be updated automatically when someone’s circumstances changes, for example if they are convicted of a crime.

The new streamlined system is intended to attract more people to volunteering or working with children, by encouraging those currently put off by the drawn-out

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