Nursery World - CRB must speed up early years checks

A leading early years organisation has called for the Criminal Records Bureau to make early years staff a similar priority as it has teachers in England over recent weeks. The call was made by the National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA), as 12,000 teachers in England awaited Disclosure checks from the CRB and Ofsted, the umbrella body for the early years sector, revealed its latest figures for the sector.

The call was made by the National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA), as 12,000 teachers in England awaited Disclosure checks from the CRB and Ofsted, the umbrella body for the early years sector, revealed its latest figures for the sector.

Although Ofsted had fielded 65,000 enquiries for Disclosure checks in the first week of July, by the start of August the CRB had issued only 8,000 Disclosure notices for the sector. An Ofsted spokeswoman pointed out that although 65,000 enquiries had been made, this did not mean they had all applied to the CRB for the checks. But she conceded that even if half the enquirers had not gone on to apply for Disclosure checks by the CRB, this would still leave around 25,000 applications outstanding.

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