Breaking news: Balls promises U-turn on child protection legislation
- Dec. 14, 2009
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Keywords:
- balls
- u-turn
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Schools secretary Ed Balls has accepted the findings of a review by the government’s chief safety adviser, Sir Roger Singleton, which concluded the legislation to be “overzealous”
The original plans, due to start from November 2010, meant schools would have had to ensure that anyone who came into contact with their pupils had to be registered and be subsequently vetted.
Ed Balls has now conceded there had been a “ludicrous over-reaction” that led to authors, including Philip Pullman, to pull out of educational visits in protest.
In a letter to the children’s secretary, seven associations from both state and private schools warned that the new rules will not have stopped some paedophiles:
“You will recognise that the first duty…is to the health, safety and care of the student population. We take that duty extremely seriously.
"However, we believe that the newly introduced system is disproportionate to risk."
Legislation has now been limited to those working weekly in schools, reducing the number of adults being vetted from 11 to 9 million; therefore no longer applying to speakers and parents helping out on school trips, school productions and events.
The requirement was recommended leading on from the Ian Huntley inquiry into the murder of two girls by the school caretaker in Soham in 2002.
The revised rules will still make it difficult for schools to employ emergency plumbers or dinner ladies, leaving the school in a predicament when shorthanded.
