REVISED ARRANGEMENTS FOR POLICE CHECKS

Home Office circular 047 / 2003

REVISED ARRANGEMENTS FOR POLICE CHECKS

Dear Chief Officer
REVISED ARRANGEMENTS FOR POLICE CHECKS

Introduction

Over the years, provision has been made for police checks to be carried out, for pre-employment and other purposes, covering widely-varied sets of circumstances. Such arrangements have in part been set out in Home Office Circulars, and have in part been determined by the ACPO Sub-Committee on the Disclosure of Convictions (as it was then known). Others are covered by arrangements of very long standing.

2. Some of those arrangements have now been overtaken by the introduction of the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB). Others will come within the orbit of the CRB when its service is fully available. The circumstances of others are such that they do not lend themselves to the CRB model, and other arrangements will continue to be required.

3. The purpose of this Circular is to set out - essentially for the information of forces - how the various requirements are to be met for the foreseeable future. It reflects the results of detailed research into the background to the previous arrangements, and quite extensive consultation to establish whether the need continues and how it should best be addressed in future. It is stressed that this Circular focuses on the particular categories of posts, positions, etc, which have been considered for the purpose of police checks and agreed by ACPO at national level. The circular has been drawn up in consultation with ACPO.

Annex A

4. The Home Office Circulars detailed in annex A are hereby cancelled.

5. Part of Home Office Circular 45/86 remains in force for the moment. This deals with the long-standing arrangements under which the police have reported to employers or professional bodies convictions of people engaged in posts of special sensitivity - known as "notifiable occupations". These arrangements have been under review separately, and updated guidance will be issued shortly.

The Criminal Records Bureau

6. The CRB, which is an executive agency of the Home Office, has both

· replaced previous arrangements for police checks in a wide range of situations, including checks of staff working in the public sector in positions affording substantial unsupervised access to children, who were previously the subject of police checks, and also

· made available a wider range of checks in the public, private and voluntary sectors that were not previously available from the police.

7. The CRB currently offers two types of Disclosures - Standard and Enhanced - which are applicable to posts, positions and professions covered by the Exceptions Order under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974. The Bureau initially encountered operating difficulties and, although its performance has improved very significantly over recent months, it is not planned to introduce the third, and lowest, level of Disclosure - Basic - until the CRB has demonstrated that it is able to meet in full the demand for higher-level Disclosures.

8. The advent of the CRB has lifted a heavy administrative burden from the police. While the police continue to have an involvement in supporting the work of the CRB, they are specifically resourced for this.

9. Very exceptionally, the police should be prepared to deal with a case of a kind that would have been covered by police checks under former arrangements even though now it should ordinarily be dealt with by using the CRB higher-level Disclosure service. This is most likely to arise in an emergency situation and to involve someone having substantial unsupervised access to the vulnerable - such as where, for example, social services need urgently to secure clearance of a relative into whose care it is proposed to place a child, and where the CRB is unable to process an application within the time available.

Other circumstances

10. There are a number of circumstances in which the arrangements under which the CRB operates are not appropriate. For example, applications to the CRB have to be initiated by the individual, to whom the completed Disclosure is issued. This is clearly not appropriate in a range of situations. Similarly, an individual should not be expected to go through the CRB process, eg, in order to be checked for the purpose of jury service. In such situations, other arrangements for police checks need to be available.

11. Except where specific statutory provision is in place (including Part V of the Police Act 1997, under which the CRB operates), the governing principle must be that the police must safeguard sensitive personal information, and must not disclose such information to a third party unless there is good justification in the particular case. Even though cases are tried in open court and may have been reported in the media at the time, this does not justify disclosure by the police of information about convictions that is stored by the police for their own operational purposes. Conviction data must be regarded as sensitive personal information. So must soft information which the police hold for operational reasons, and whose disclosure it may be appropriate to consider in certain circumstances.

12. Such information may be disclosed, if the circumstances of the individual case justify this action, under police common law powers, in the interest of the prevention or detection of crime. Areas in which exceptions may be made are

· the protection of vulnerable members of society;

· the need to ensure probity in the administration of justice; and

· national security.

13. Decisions as to the disclosure of information must have regard to the provisions of

· the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and the Exceptions Order;

· the Data Protection Act 1998; and

· the Human Rights Act 1998.

14. Convictions which are spent under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 should not be disclosed unless the matter in question is covered by the terms of the Exceptions Order made under the 1974 Act.

15. The ACPO weeding rules were drawn up in order

· to ensure consistency of practice across forces in disposing of PNC records that are no longer of operational value, and thus

· to help to achieve compliance with the principle under the Data Protection Act that information should not be retained for longer than is necessary.

If a request for a police check brings to notice a record that falls to be weeded under the terms of the weeding rules, action should be taken to weed the record and the response to the request should be that no record of convictions is held.

16. As regards the Human Rights Act, it is crucial to keep in mind that the disclosure of sensitive personal information represents an interference with the individual's right to respect for his or her private life. Any such interference must be in accordance with the law and proportionate - ie, necessary in the circumstances of the case and for the purpose of the detection or prevention of crime. Any information must be relevant to the matter in hand and, in the case of soft information, must also be capable of being substantiated if need be. Old, stale, convictions (or other information) should not be disclosed.

17. Those requesting police checks must be asked to make every effort to confirm the identity of the individual before the police are asked to make a check. Where possible, verification should be sought of identity, date of birth and any change of name. Even so, in the absence of fingerprints, the identity of the subject of an inquiry cannot be firmly established. Therefore, it will be sensible for information supplied to be prefaced with a statement to the effect that the subject of the inquiry is, or may be, identical with the person to whom the information relates.

Annex B

18. Annex B sets out future arrangements for checks.

19. The posts, positions, etc, subject to checks are listed in 5 groups:

1. those who will continue to be checked by the police;

2. those who will continue to be checked by the police for the time being - until the CRB's Basic Disclosure service becomes available, at which time applications must be made to the CRB;

3. those who will continue to be checked by the police for the time being - but which are expected to become eligible for the CRB's Higher-Level Disclosure service, at which time applications must be made to the CRB;

4. those who are checked through direct access to the PNC; and

5. those who should now be checked through the CRB's Higher-Level Disclosure service.

Further information

20. Any queries arising from this Circular should be directed in the first instance to Bridgette Brooks (tel: 020 7-411.5502) or Paul Willis (tel: 020 7-411.5533) in the Criminal Records and Security Industry Unit, Ground Floor, 85 Buckingham Gate, London SW1E 6PD.

21. Further information about the CRB can be obtained from their information line (0870 90 90 811), or from their websites www.crb.gov.uk (which contains general information) or www.disclosure.gov.uk (which contains specific operational information); or from Customer Services, CRB, PO Box 110, Liverpool, L3 6ZZ.



Yours sincerely





Charles Goldie
Criminal Records and Security Industry Unit

Attachments

• ANNEX A.doc (Microsoft Word file - 23kb)
• ANNEX B.doc (Microsoft Word file - 45kb)

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