Recent Letters & FAQ Relating to CRB Checks Sent by DFES

I am aware that you have received several letters directly from the DFES from the 7th July onwards about record keeping and checking the identity and qualifications of your staff and that the appropriate CRB and/or List 99 checks have been made as follows:

• The letter sent on 31 October 2006 by the DfES, following up the letters sent in July and September, detailing the process for carrying out the remaining CRB and List 99 checks in order to complete the record.


• The letter sent on 19 September 2006 by the DfES, following up the 7 July letter and describing the next steps schools need to take to create a single central record of pre-employment checks


• The letter sent on 7 July 2006 by the DfES, with details of how schools should undertake to strengthen record-keeping procedures in practical terms


• A detailed set of frequently asked questions on record-keeping


• The letter sent to all head teachers in June 2006 from Beverley Hughes, Minister for Children, Young People and Families and Jim Knight, Minster for Schools, setting out how record-keeping in relation to recruitment checks carried out by schools should be improved

These letters and the FAQ can be reviewed/downloaded.

The purpose of this letter is to ask for your help by providing the information required so that the Local Authority can collate the information and provide the DFES with a comprehensive picture for Norfolk. In addition, we will provide a hard copy of this letter together with an updated record of the information we hold for your school by separate post this week. Please note that if we have received a CRB form from you in the last week or so, this will not have been yet inputted onto our database. However, the fact that the application has been sent should be recorded on your local record.

I hope you will find the following link to a template helpful for recording the required information. Once completed we suggest that you save the document as your current and future updated record. At the same time please send the completed hard copy with any required re-checks to: The Recruitment Team (CRB) Norfolk County Council, Room 130, County Hall, Norwich, NR1 2DL, but also please see below reference to action you should take where an Ofsted Inspection is imminent.

Please ensure that you mark the template with your Schools name and DFES number in order that we can identify individual returns.

With the hard copy of the letter, we are sending a further supply of CRB application forms so that any gaps are addressed by initiating a re-check. Please treat any re-checks that are required as a matter of urgency so that we can send all the applications to the CRB by 30th November.

I must also draw your attention to the new Ofsted framework in which schools that cannot tell the Local Authority the number of List 99 and CRB checks that are missing and, or that they may not have gathered the information and formed a single central record.

- Might be deemed not to meet their statutory safeguarding requirements and
- The schools leadership could be queried in any inspection that they undergo

In order to prepare for any notified forthcoming Ofsted Inspections, when returning the template, please draw this to our attention by marking in the heading "URGENT - OFSTED INSPECTION NOTIFIED FOR (insert date).

Similarly there are other categories that the school is expected to have records of andwe will not have included these in the data sent out to schools e.g:

- Supply teachers
- Agency supply teachers
- Governors who are also volunteers or who work in the school

You will need to ensure that your records include these categories.

Overseas Staff

Please note that there has been a change in respect of overseas staff. From May 2006 onwards it is mandatory that all overseas staff appointed are CRB checked. Such staff appointed prior to May 2006 should also now undertake a CRB check if they have not already done so. Where this has not already been done you should also seek to obtain a "Certificate of Good Repute" from the relevant national embassy. (The CRB check is against national records, the Certificate of Good Repute is against the person's home county records).

I hope that our advice in February 2006, in which we asked you to check against a list we provided so that you could update your records, means that this task will not be too onerous. Since then, no doubt you have continued to build up your records and this will provide a firm basis upon which to base your return.

I fully recognise that although a FAQ has been provided, there may be some specific queries that you will wish to discuss prior to returning the information. Where these occur, please contact the CRB Team on (01603) 223152 or by emailing CRB.