@Stu Wilson
Stu,
Its good to see someone defending their well paid, pointless, and ultimately harmful to the national interest, job.
"1) £64 - ok the price sounds about right, can't tell you what it will be in Scotland, but if it's required for your job(s) then in most cases if you are already working for an existing company with an existing CRB check, I'd expect they'd be forking over the cash not you."
Expect away. I can say for definite that where I work the CRB is paid for now by the individual if they want to help the local chavs by mentoring them. The company provides time (to an extent....nowhere near enough) and a location. Everything else, including a cup of tea and a biscuit for the chav/chavette is paid for by the volunteer.
Frankly its not worth the bother now, never mind with the new set up. My early suggestion of saving the money and buying the little darlings a kitchen devil set to let them reduce their numbers using their natural talents (taking drugs, whining about their families, nicking stuff and stabbing each other) was, sadly, rejected. Given that the kitchen devils are a damn sight cheaper than the new check it might be worth making the same suggestion again.
" If you want to work in areas where you know you will need one, admittedly not a lot of people know they need one before applying for jobs, then it saves you a hell of a lot of time, you have a major advantage over other applicants who may not be able to work until a check is returned, 's money well spent."
So even you accept that the individual will need to spend the money, even if they haven't got the job, in the hopes of getting the job. That sounds like a tax on jobseekers. It also means that, rather neatly, the best person for the job may not get it, but the one with the shiny new government stamp might. Excellent.
That's two disasters for the price of one. People that we desperately need to help out, won't and the less qualified but easier to get hold of will slide into jobs where they'll make a mess of it. Brilliant.
"2) It's an opt-in register, the point being that you chose to work in jobs whereby you have the possibility of power over member's of vulnerable groups (and yes that includes teachers, nurses and doctors, youth group leaders, swim instructors, and cleaners in old peoples homes, ad nauseum)."
So, basically, around 11 million people will have to opt in. Or lose their jobs. Many of which require a serious amount of professional training to get (teachers? doctors?). Obviously the concept of "Opt" wasn't really understood here. Forced-entry might be a more apt description.
You haven't even considered the other possibilities of the power element, if you're going down that frankly daft route. A simple one for 10 points: what about landlords? Surely each renter should have full details on the landlord. After all, sex for rent is as old as rent. Oh, sorry, landlords are rich - no point in inconveniencing them.
"Your details once passed the intial security check are then placed on the register but are then routinely monitored for criminal or other activity."
Other activity... so something that isn't actually illegal. Such as? Perhaps protesting against a government ordered motorway development? Or sending a letter to an MP? Perhaps by standing for election to parliament for the wrong party (Tories? BNP? Leafy-Green Alliance?) Would throwing an egg at John Major do, or would it have to be John Prescott?
Or why not just on some gossip that the person you're going out with looks too young or is the wrong colour? Chris Woodhead was rather famous for living with one of his former students. I can only assume that in this brave new world he'd not be allowed to continue teaching, although quite why escapes me - it certainly wasn't illegal.
So please do explain very carefully what "other activities" might be covered, sufficient to justify losing your job, that are not already illegal? Then explain why this kind of coercive, overbearing, and frankly freakish control of the vast majority of our key workers is in the national interest.
"The requirement to record current employment addresses is for this; it is a proactive check, if your registration is flagged as having changed within certain limits, then your registration could be pulled and your employer(s) informed of your new status as a raving paedo/granny basher."
Ah. Excellent so for the employer there's actually no middle ground. Either we're as completely innocent as a new born babe, or we're a paedo.... Fantastic. Given that millions of people wander through the criminal justice system each year it seems that fairly quickly no-one will be qualified to work with kids. I feel the kitchen devil suggestion coming into its own here.
More realistically its so that each time you change jobs you have to fork over more money to the otherwise useless people running the computers. Experience says that I can't wait for the sheer weight of the paperwork to bring this one crashing down. Every time a cleaner moves company (and they move a lot as cleaning companies go up and down all the time) it'll require more paperwork. Its the Child Maintenance System issue all over again, where 300,000 applications that hadn't been processed were shredded to "remove the backlog". That'll be excellent, except instead of child maintenance a doctors position won't be filled. Presumably no actually sick kids will need to be seen.
Overall, this is the kind of stupid scheme that gives child protection a bad name. Its also similar to the governments many and various crazed IT projects (as noted "Computers are Wizard" should be the motto).
The sooner its dumped the better.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
