Saturday 24 October 2009

Safeguarding

I spent 90 minutes yesterday with school colleagues being updated on the latest stuff re safeguarding.Very useful although I have offered feedback about the dire 'lesson plan' - if one of our teachers had delivered the lesson they would have done well to get "Unsatisfactory"!

Still I did learn a bit and it was particularly relevant in the light of my recent participation in a Disciplinary hearing in respect of a (now ex-) staff member who had failed to co-operate in the CRB process.To cut a long story short, it has taken an VERY excessive length of time to dismiss an employee who was offered a conditional contract (conditional on satisfactory CRB check). The circumstances were that, for a while, they worked during the processing of their check (always supervised, etc so minimal risk)

BIG question...once ISA gets up and running we will break the law if we employ anyone without ISA Registration, but they still need a CRB so dare we let anyone actually start work with ISA but not CRB? Personally, I woudl not do so but the delays in the CRB process are such that to make such a conditional offer might seriously disrupt staffing arrangements.

We need assurances that applications will be processed much faster in the future than at present, and we need processes that rapidly 'get rid of' actual or potential staff who do not co-operate in new or revised checks. HR are concerned about the employment law implications of being so harsh, I am concerned about safeguarding and would hope that any Tribunal would weigh the risks and find that safeguarding 'trumped' the other issues.

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