Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 85:"Page 5, line 2, at end insert—" ““(   )   In subsection (7) an ““occasional basis”” means no more than six times a year.”” . The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 85, I shall speak also to Amendments Nos. 141 and 146, which are grouped with it. Amendment No. 85 is a probing amendment to tease out from the Government what they mean by ““on an occasional basis”” and to achieve greater clarity on the issue. In the Explanatory Notes—the only information that I had available to me when I tabled the amendment—the example is given that a parent assisting with certain activities in a school does not have to be subject to monitoring if he does so ““on an occasional basis””. I have suggested ““six times a year”” in my amendment simply for the sake of specifying something. I am not fixated on ““six times a year”” being the only definition of what ““on an occasional basis”” means but, in order to stimulate the debate, I felt we should have something to talk about. Since I tabled the amendment, I have been grateful to receive a copy of the very large bundle of papers the Minister sent to the noble Baroness, Lady Buscombe, during the bank holiday weekend. I did not receive the bundle until yesterday morning and I was not able to refer to it in our debates yesterday afternoon. But I wrapped a wet towel around my head this morning and ploughed through it. I notice that information note 1(iv) states that,"““anything happening less often than once a month and any contract shorter than a week””," could be regarded as being ““on an occasional basis””. To take the example given of a university lecturer who comes into a school to help a class of GCSE students, broadly speaking, the Government would expect that the school should not have to check the lecturer’s barred status if he held the class on a one-off occasion or was invited in once a term over the school year—I think that means three times. But the criminal offences in Clauses 10 and 11 would apply to the school if it used the lecturer every week—however many weeks there are in a school year; I am not quite sure—every fortnight or every month. The latter would be 12 times. From what I can make out, it looks as if my ““six times”” is actually about right. It is just about what the Government were thinking about. It needs to be clear who would be covered by these regulated activity categories. Our debates yesterday showed that it is not clear from the drafting whether certain kinds of people such as telephone counsellors and people looking after data are covered. However, we discussed that yesterday. It would be very helpful if, in addition to the note that we have, the Minister could tell us a little more about why he feels that it is inappropriate to specify. I think that I understand that, but perhaps he can say what range of frequencies can be regarded as ““on an occasional basis””? How will somebody be judged if they say, ““I didn’t think 12 times a year was frequent. I thought that was an occasional basis””? But someone else might disagree—it really is rather difficult. Amendments Nos. 141 and 146 would clarify another aspect of the Bill: what is meant by ““harm to a child””. We have some comment on that in the notes as well. In fact, it is in the same note. The Government say:"““In both these cases we believe that harm should take its normal commonsense meaning so that a special definition is not required on the face of the Bill””." Over the page they say:"““Given that the IBB is required to form a view that it is appropriate to include a person on the list and that the board will only bar if it assesses that the risk to children and/or vulnerable adults is significant enough, there is little need to legislate explicitly on the face of the Bill for harm to be significant””." It is not clear from the Bill what thresholds the Independent Barring Board will use when deciding whether to bar a person from working with children or vulnerable adults and whether it is appropriate to put them on the barred list. It is crucial to ensure that the new system is a marked improvement on the current arrangements and that those decisions are consistent. Nor is there an adequate explanation of ““relevant conduct”” that would lead to barring as defined in Schedule 2. For example, it states that,"““conduct of a sexual nature involving a child””" would be defined as ““relevant conduct”” if it appears to the IBB that the conduct is inappropriate. But it leaves unclear what and how conduct of a sexual nature involving a child would be acceptable. The Children Act 1989 introduced the concept of significant harm as the threshold that justifies compulsory intervention in family life in the best interests of children. It was updated in Section 120 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 to include a child seeing domestic violence happening. The local authority is then under a duty to make inquiries or cause inquiries to be made where it has reasonable cause to suspect that a child is suffering or is likely to suffer significant harm. A court may make a care order committing the child to the care of the local authority or a supervision order putting the child under the supervision of a social worker or a probation officer in respect of a child only if it is satisfied that the child is suffering or is likely to suffer significant harm and that the harm or likelihood of harm is attributable to a lack of adequate parental care or control. In my amendment I have therefore defined significant harm in the Bill in the same words as used in Section 31 of the Children Act 1989, in an attempt to be helpful and to be very clear on the criteria on which the IBB should base its decisions. There are no absolute criteria on which to rely when judging what constitutes significant harm. I am quite aware of that. Consideration of the severity of ill treatment may include the degree and extent of physical harm. It might be the duration and the frequency of abuse and neglect, the extent of premeditation, the degree of threat, and the level of coercion, sadism or bizarre and unusual elements in child sexual abuse. However, we must try to be as clear as possible about what we mean; and the definition in the Children Act 1989 is well known and understood by all workers in the children sector—which is why I have chosen to use it in Amendment No. 146. I beg to move.