Last night’s Panorama ‘Are You a Danger to Kids?’ on BBC1 gave a pretty balanced assessment of the government’s new Vetting and Barring Scheme (V&BS).
While the focus was clearly on the child protection aspect, rather than vulnerable adults – as with the majority of mainstream media coverage – it outlined many of the pros and cons of the scheme in an accessible way. It didn’t go down the emotive route either – no stories about children killed by paedophiles were used, which would have been an easy trap to fall into.
Part of the aim of the programme was to inform viewers of exactly what it is and who will need to register under it – there is still a lot of confusion about it among the public – but it did not ignore some of the harder questions the scheme raises.
For instance, I was interested to see the vetting process investigated, especially that the case workers who will decide the majority of applications will be able to access ‘soft’ information about the applicant, such as work history, arrests where no charges were bought, and any unfounded allegations.
This is usually skipped over by the media and it was good to see the concerns highlighted, including the human rights angle and whether someone in an office in Darlington can make a correct decision based – in some cases – on rumour. The Independent Safeguarding Authority, which is in charge of the scheme, disputes these concerns.
A quick conclusion from the programme: the V&BS does have its faults – not least that it won’t stop predatory paedophiles – but it will give some assurances and help to ensure that those with convictions can’t get into jobs that give them easy access to children or vulnerable adults. It is hard to argue that this isn’t a good thing.
However, as former rugby star Brian Moore, who suffered abuse himself as a child, pointed out, there needs to be mechanisms to ensure abused children can come forward in confidence to report what has happened, and this doesn’t do that. Surely there should be more focus on this, as well as giving children the knowledge of how to keep themselves safe?