NO2ID

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/u ... 898127.ece

From The Sunday Times
November 1, 2009

Vetting stops pupils caring for elderly

Jack Grimston

The tradition of pupils visiting lonely pensioners for a chat or to help with housework is under threat because schools fear that both the teenagers and the OAPs will have to be officially vetted to check they are not potential abusers.

Several independent schools have abandoned the visits, which have become the latest example of interaction between children and adults falling victim to the government’s strict vetting regime.

Staff believe the prospect of someone in their eighties or nineties undergoing a criminal check before pupils are allowed into their homes would be bureaucratic and degrading. Under the vetting and barring scheme, people working with children or vulnerable adults — including the elderly in some cases — will have to start registering with the new Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA) from November next year.

Some organisations have started implementing policies to reflect ISA requirements and some schools have dropped home visits following seminars by ISA officials.

A Home Office spokeswoman said she “could not believe” schools had been given the advice and blamed them for getting “completely and utterly the wrong end of the stick”. She said neither the old people nor the pupils would have to be vetted as the visits did not involve formal caring.

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I think the Home Office may be starting to panic. It would seem that they hadn't realised that few organisations would read the regulations in forensic detail, but instead would see the words "£5000 fine" and decide to err of the side of safety by banning all contact between children or "vulnerable adults", and anyone not on the ISA's approved database.