The Education Secretary today announced he would tighten vetting procedures to stop paedophiles working with children as teachers after a damning report from Ofsted, the education watchdog.
The report, published today, accuses schools of failing to take children’s safety seriously and says that inspectors had uncovered chaos in the vetting system.
It criticises Ruth Kelly, Alan Johnson’s predecessor as Education Secretary, saying that there was evidence that some serious criminals had slipped through the net during her period in charge.
Not enough was being done “to keep proper records of what, when and against whom checks are being being made”, said the report.
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Mr Johnson assured the Commons in a statement that checks on prospective teachers were in fact being carried out.
“We will act quickly but carefully to tackle the failings that Ofsted has identified,” he said, promising that new regulations would be laid before Parliament requiring schools and local authorities to keep “secure, reliable and up to date records” of vetting checks.
Mr Johnson said that he was writing to all schools and local authorities today, setting out measures to strengthen the system.
“I am asking all schools to make sure that they have the records they need to demonstrate that they have checked the identity, qualifications and any criminal record of their staff. If they do not have a record that a check has been made, then a further full CRB check will have to be conducted and a record kept.”
Ofsted will check that adequate records are being maintained as part of the regular inspections regime, he said.
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Criminal Records Bureau checks will also be extended to all staff recruited from overseas, said Mr Johnson. He claimed that he was going further than Ofsted had recommended to ensure schools completed a CRB check on all staff from abroad.
Agency staff also needed “special attention”, he said. Supply agencies were under a duty to ensure staff were properly checked, but regulations would be tightened to ensure schools were legally required to obtain confirmation that CRB checks had been made.
The Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Bill, currently before MPs, will make it a criminal offence for agencies to supply staff without having made the appropriate checks. “I know headteachers already have a very heavy workload, but these are matters which we all agree are paramount.”
Ms Kelly was engulfed in controversy while she was Education Secretary after it emerged that there had been a number of cases where ministers or officials had decided not to include teachers with convictions for abuse on the List 99 review of people barred from working with children.
Today Mr Johnson issued an update on the List 99 debacle, saying that all but one of the individuals whom officials or ministers had decided not to include on the list had been reassessed by police as not posing any threat to children.
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“Of the one individual who is being considered further, he has been visited by police, is not working with children and has not been identified as an immediate cause for concern,” said Mr Johnson.
Ms Kelly had also referred to a further 32 cases where people were on the sex offenders register but not been referred to the Department for Education by the police. All had now been or were being thoroughly investigated, he said.
“Twenty two have already been barred. The remaining 10 are still being investigated. They have all been visited by police, were not working with children and remain subject to ongoing monitoring.”
Mr Johnson added: “We need eternal vigilance to protect children from those whose nature it is to manipulate and deceive - and it is our responsibility to make sure the system is as robust as possible and any failings addressed as soon as they are identified.
“With today’s changes, the system will be stronger still, producing greater trust and confidence in our schools and colleges, to ensure that our children are safe and secure.”
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David Willetts, the Shadow Education Secretary, said that he was very worried at what the Ofsted report had revealed. “It does show extraordinary poor standards of record-keeping in our schools.”
Mr Willetts added that there were clearly enormous loopholes when it came to teacher supply agencies. “It is absolutely extraordinary that the Department of Education, so dependent on teacher supply agencies, seems not to know how many there are.” He said estimates ranged from 300 to 1,500.
“Your predecessor, Ruth Kelly, said on January 19: ‘We can give the public an absolute assurance that the process is as robust as possible to ensure that the risk to children is minimal’. Do you feel able to repeat that assurance today in the light of this report? I fear not. The only way to restore public confidence in the system is for lessons to be learned.”
He said that the Department must take its share of responsibility for the confusion described in the report, which showed that schools were deluged with sometimes contradictory guidance.