An undercover researcher posed as 'Emily', age 22, who told agencies that her only relevant experience was babysitting for her sister and that she wanted a job looking after children while their parents were out.
'Emily' phoned 20 nanny agencies across the UK - ten agencies were randomly chosen from the Yellow Pages and ten were members of the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC), which represents employment agencies.
Which? said that five of them were prepared to take her on their books, despite her lack of experience, and some did not insist on references or a proper criminal records check. It is now calling for a comprehensive national nanny registration scheme that insists on minimum qualifications or experience and a full CRB check.
Jean Gemmell, general secretary of the Professional Association of Nursery Nurses (PANN), which is lobbying Government for nanny registration, said, 'It appals me, but I'm sorry to say that it does not surprise me.'
She added, 'What we want is to make sure employers pursue the CVs and the background of people they have on their books so families can be confident of who they are employing.'
Elizabeth Elder, chair of the REC's childcare division, said, that the Which? article was 'grossly misleading and unnecessarily alarming to families'. Contrary to the implications in the article, she claimed, 'this nanny was not taken on by any REC member agent or recommended to any family and did not have an interview arranged.'
She stressed that nanny agency members must sign up to the REC's code of practice and those found failing to comply would be investigated and face disciplinary action.
A group of nanny agencies and PANN, concerned about the lack of regulation, launched a new body, the Association of Nanny Agencies (ANA), on 2 October.
Its goals are to set up a professional code of conduct for all agencies and to lobby Government to require all childcarers to be registered and all nanny agencies to be regulated.
Since April the revised Conduct of Employment Agencies and Employment Business Regulations has required nanny agencies to obtain copies of relevant qualifications and two references. A spokesman for the Employment Agency Inspectorate said it took any complaints it received very seriously.
