I just received this email from a Scout leader, who was asked to CRB a serving police officer. A worrying story for the times, showing how old forms of authority (police, politicians) are being replaced with new (child protection coordinators, health and safety advisers).

'I have just been asked to do a CRB check on a serving police officer so that he can help in his son's cub scout pack. I thought this had to be an over enthusiastic misinterpretation of the rules, so I queried it with the Scout Association. Amazingly, they have confirmed that indeed they do NOT trust the Police to employ only such people as a young person can safely turn to when in trouble.

The Independent Safeguarding Authority requires the registration of anybody who works in a school for four days a month - even if they are fixing the radiators or installing wind turbines on the roof. Businesses are rightly angry about what they see as a hidden tax. The fact that they have no contact with children cuts no ice, as this email we just received from a renewable energy business outlines:

'We install renewable energy systems for example wind turbines and solar photovoltaic (electricity generation) systems to both residential and commercial customers. Many of our larger customers are schools and they are starting to ask for vetting and barring registration, although they call it CRB checks.

I've just received this email from Richard Ellam, a popular science presenter, who makes the important point about the lack of evidence for the efficacy of the CRB system. Indeed, I've repeatedly asked officials what evidence they have that this vetting database does any good - but they steadfastly ignored the question.

'As a strong supporter of civil liberties of all sorts I have been following your campaign against the Child Protection Mafia with interest for some time. This issue affects me directly, as I am a freelance writer and presenter of science shows who regularly visits schools and other places to perform my work. Just yesterday I had to send off yet another unnecessary CRB disclosure form so that I can stand on a stage for three days next month, in costume, and talk about Galileo in front of teenagers at the Newcastle Science Festival!

This piece from the Bookseller shows that children's authors are still against the vetting database, even though they themselves are largely exempted. The piece includes a wonderful quote from Anne Fine:

"This is still a deeply pernicious and misguided business that is already damaging relations between adults and children, discouraging the varied social contacts that are so necessary in a child's life, and creating a deeply unpleasant and suspicious society in which most of us no longer feel comfortable. If nine million citizens are still on the list, I think it goes almost without saying that list needs pruning radically yet again."

Read on: http://www.thebookseller.com/news/106672-authors-reaffirm-opposition-to-...

This article from the Telegraph is an interesting case study of how child protection rules work. Some schools are demanding CRB checks for parent visitors, because they believe this is necessary for Ofsted. Ofsted denies this, and says that there is no such rule. Over-cautious teachers, you could say. And yet this situation is emblematic of a new kind of political authority, where there is a rule for everything and you are encouraged to pre-empt - to always ask the question, 'are we allowed to do this?: shouldn't we have procedures in place?' These head-teachers are not being paranoid, they are only thinking in the way that today's procedure-happy bureaucrats tell them too.

I just had a 45-minute run-in with a Cardiff councillor on Radio Wales, who is trying to bring through a city-wide drinking control zone for Cardiff. He says that the police are asking for these powers, to enable them to 'deal more effectively' with problems. But as a caller pointed out, the police always want more powers - and they already have a whole series of options if somebody is causing disorder, from breach of the peace to obstruction of a public highway. The councillor told the caller he was 'talking rubbish' - though turns out the caller was a retired magistrate.

I just received this email from a model flying enthusiast, showing how the vetting database is dissuading people from forming new clubs: 'A local model flying club, due to reasons of its own lacklustre, has declined in membership to the point where it can no longer afford to pay the rent on both of its two flying fields. Accordingly it seems as if it will give up one of it's fields come the years end. I and a few others were asked if we would be prepared to establish a new club at the field when it becomes vacant. Following discussions we decided not to proceed but to monitor the situation instead.

The Home Office official, John O’Brien, gives a telling outline on Radio 4’s The Report (13 August) of who should be vetted. Someone should be vetted, he says, if ‘you get the opportunity to become familiar to them [children]’, and he says that ‘there is lots of evidence that the ability to build the relationship [with children] can lead to things like grooming’. He says that people who meet a group of children once should not be vetted, on the basis of ‘one-off contact not giving ability to form a relationship’ – but that organisations should be careful that non-vetted adults don’t meet the same children at different events!

Sir Michael Bichard, the man whose report into the Soham murders started the vetting database, is now having his doubts. In an interview in the Independent, he says that the regulations ‘need to be looked at again’ and that ‘there will always be situations where you could argue that the line has been drawn in the wrong place’. This shows the tide of opinion has shifted. It also reflects the fact that the government copied the database out of the report’s recommendations, almost without thinking about it.

This is an excellent article from Francis Bennion, on the importance of establishing legal ‘proof’ in cases of damaging allegations.

His points will be even more pertinent with the new vetting database, which will make decisions on the basis of whether an event happened ‘on the face of it’ or ‘on the balance of probabilities’.