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Kennedy challenges Blair over Criminal Records Bureau Chaos
November 6, 2002 12:00 AM
Liberal Democrat Leader Charles Kennedy today challenged Tony Blair over the Government's decision to indefinitely abandon the background checks into care workers in charge of children and the elderly done through the Criminal Records Bureau.
Charles Kennedy said:
"Given the priority which the Government continues to claim to give to the protection of vulnerable people in care in our society, would the Prime Minister explain this afternoon why 300,000 of those providing that care have had their Criminal Record Bureau background checks abandoned indefinitely?"
Checks on existing care home staff, agency workers in nursing homes and school governors have been abandoned indefinitely as the CRB struggles to process a backlog of new applications. The Prime Minister was unable to say when the checks will be resumed or when they will be completed.
ENDS
A transcript of today's PMQ exchange is attached.
The Rt. Hon. Charles Kennedy MP:
Mister Speaker, given the priority which the Government continues to claim to give to the protection of vulnerable people in care in our society, would the Prime Minister explain this afternoon why 300,000 of those providing that care have had their Criminal Record Bureau background checks abandoned indefinitely?
The Prime Minister:
Precisely because we are trying to focus on those who may have implications for the most vulnerable in our society. And it is important to realise that the Criminal Records Bureau of course are handling far more cases than they ever handled before. And we should concentrate on those that are…those in the most…in the categories where there may be the most risk. I would've thought he would agree with that.
The Rt. Hon. Charles Kennedy MP:
Mister Speaker, surely the thousands of families in the country who have vulnerable relatives in precisely that position of care deserve better reassurance from the Prime Minister than that. Can he therefore give us a time-scale - when will these checks be resumed and, most important, when will they be completed?
The Prime Minister:
We will do the checks necessary as soon as possible. But the reason why we have withdrawn certain categories is because we believe it's important to concentrate on those categories of people where there may be the greatest risk. And, incidentally, for the Liberal Democrats I've absolutely no doubt at all that were we not taking a more flexible and sensible attitude, he'd be up on his feet accusing us of unnecessary bureaucracy.
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