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For people with criminal records
For people with criminal records

Author: Unlock Admin

New guidance for insurers on (not) using enforced subject access to get details of criminal records

We’re pleased to see that the Association of British Insurers has produced guidance for insurers which clarifies the position for insurers after section 56 of the Data Protection Act 1998 came into force earlier this year.

For far too long now, some insurance companies have relied on dubious practices when dealing with claims, relying on individuals to get a copy of their full police record, which runs the risk that they take into account spent convictions which the individual didn’t need to disclose. Since earlier this year, this practice was made illegal.

This guidance should help insurers to make sure that they operate fairer practices when dealing with individuals that have criminal records.

 

Useful links

New employer guide to creating a fair recruitment process, marking two years of Ban the Box

Two years on since the launch of the Ban the Box campaign, Business in the Community (BITC), who lead the campaign, have marked the anniversary by launching a free step-by-step guide to creating a fair recruitment process in dealing with criminal records.

We’ve endorsed the campaign since it launched in October 2013 in response to widespread discrimination against people with convictions, and have helped to support the campaign alongside others. So far, 50 employers with a combined workforce of over 400,000 have banned the tick box from their job applications forms and now assess candidates based on their skills first, not their past mistakes.

Despite the fact that employment can dramatically reduce re-offending rates and contribute to a safer society, three-quarters of employers use criminal convictions to discriminate against applicants – meaning that millions of job seekers are blocked from employment and the opportunity to put their past behind them. Employers also miss out on a large and diverse talent pool, often as a result of exaggerated fear or misconceptions.

To mark the campaign’s second anniversary, BITC has launched a free step-by-step guide. Featuring case studies from companies that have banned the box, as well as guidance on legal and contractual requirements, this is a useful starting place for any employer looking to provide employment opportunities for people with criminal convictions.

Alongside the guide, they’ve published interesting research which shows that prisoners consider the criminal record tick box to be a major barrier to employment, despite having a qualifications and a strong desire to work. The research shows that while 9 in 10 prisoners surveyed want to find work after leaving prison, only a third of prisoners said they would definitely apply to a job with a tick box. Prisoners surveyed expressed concern and confusion over the tick box on application forms – some unaware of the legal obligation to disclose and many convinced they would not be given a chance to compete for jobs if they ticked the box.

The research shows that the criminal record tick box serves no purpose and it adds more weight behind why employers need to put an end to their archaic recruitment practices, taking steps to ensure they are clear and upfront about how they assess criminal convictions.

This anniversary gives fresh impetus to the campaign, which we’re promoting as part of our project to challenge employment discrimination. I urge you to take the time to read this guide and consider joining the growing number of responsible businesses that are opening up opportunities for people with convictions.

Useful links

You can find out more about our project to challenge employment discrimination here or get in touch with us.

You can find out more about Ban the Box here.

Thank you!

We recently sent out a mailshot on behalf of The Co-operative Insurance who were looking for people with burglary convictions to complete a short survey. This survey formed part of a study they were on doing on popular home security measures.

The Co-operative Insurance were seeking up to 25 respondents and in return, to show their gratitude, they agreed to donate £50 to Unlock for each completed response.

Well, we’re delighted to announce that they received the full quota of responses and we have now received a cheque for £1250. We would like to say a big thank you to The Co-operative Insurance and also Media.com who arranged the mailshot, but most of all a special thank you to everyone who took the time to participate in the survey.

We’ll be putting the money towards supporting the information & advice that we provide to people with convictions.

 

Why over-declaring penalty points lets car insurers overcharge 2.8 million drivers

We’re quoted in an article in The Telegraph on how needlessly telling insurance firms about expired penalty points for speeding and other offences adds £57 to premiums, yet insurers continue to ask about old convictions .

“The law is a mess and grossly unfair on drivers,” said Chris Stacey of Unlock. “We now have a situation where a minor driving offence carries a longer rehabilitation period than someone who has gone to prison for assault.

“Insurers have lobbied to keep the blanket five-year period for motoring offences because getting rid of it would restrict their ability to charge drivers higher premiums for old offences”, he said. You can read the full  article here.

Are car hire and insurance firms using private data to reject customers?

New electronic access to drivers’ licence details has sparked concerns that firms are misusing information about drivers’ past convictions.

Motorists with a clean driving licence risk being unfairly denied car hire or cheap insurance premiums as a result of a Government-backed data-sharing project, according to experts.

The Department for Transport is handing over details of Britain’s 40 million drivers to companies, including details of driving convictions, as part of its “MyLicence” project.

But promises that the database will “catch fraudsters and take the guesswork out of insurance applications” come amid concerns that insurers are misusing information about old driving offences to reject customers. Read the full article here.

Check out our LinkedIn page

At Unlock, we like to think of ourselves as making good use of social media as an effective way of communicating with a range of groups of people.

Yet, if we’re being honest, although we try and make regular use of Twitter and Facebook, we’ve probably neglected the role of LinkedIn, and how it might help us to reach out and engage with others.

So that’s what’s new – we’re going to start.

Given LinkedIn is a business-orientated social networking site, to us that means it’s potentially a great way to engage with other organisations and practitioners.

Although we’ve had a page on LinkedIn for a while, we haven’t really used it. So, from now on, we plan to use it to share updates, particularly those that we think might of interest to other organisations, including those that help people with convictions, employers, insurers and others that use criminal records.

So please help us raise awareness of our page – if you have a LinkedIn page, please visit our page and hit ‘Follow’ in the top right-hand corner, or click the ‘Follow’ button below.


Filtering process brought in for Scotland

Last week, the Scottish Government announced details of a process that will apply to Standard and Enhanced checks that are issued by Disclosure Scotland. The process started on the 10th September 2015.

This process will remove certain convictions and cautions from these types of disclosures.It’s similar to the filtering process that the Disclosure & Barring Service operates, but instead it will apply to checks issued by Disclosure Scotland.

An example that Disclosure Scotland provides on it’s website is below:

If a person is convicted of theft and is sentenced to 6 months in custody  – once the conviction is spent under the terms of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974, this will be disclosed for a further 15 years after which it will become a protected conviction and is then no longer disclosed.

Disclosure Scotland have issued guidance on their website about how the process works. For advice, contact Disclosure Scotland.

How is this relevant to us?

We regularly get contacted by people who live in Scotland. Our information & advice on this site covers England & Wales only, so this post is for information only, as well as providing a link to the guidance on the Disclosure Scotland website.

The process that the Scottish Government has introduced differs to the DBS process.

  • In some ways, it’s better – for example, it appears to cover more than one conviction.
  • In other ways, it seems worse – for example, it takes much longer for a conviction as a adult to become filtered – 15 years.

As part our policy work, we’ll be looking at how the Scottish process works as part of our work in pushing for the DBS filtering system in England & Wales to go further.

Google ordered to remove search results about a spent conviction

In an interesting development to the issue of the ‘google-effect’ and spent convictions, the Guardian has reported that Google has been ordered by the Information Commissioner’s Office to remove nine links to current news stories about older reports which themselves were removed from search results under the ‘right to be forgotten’ ruling.

The search engine had previously removed links relating to a 10 year-old criminal offence by an individual after requests were made as the offence is now spent under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act.

Removal of the original links from Google’s search results led to new news posts detailing the removals, which were then indexed by Google’s search engine. Google refused to remove these further links, which included details of the original criminal offence, despite them forming part of search results for the individual’s name, arguing that they are an essential part of a recent news story and in the public interest.

Google now has 35 days from the 18 August to remove the links from its search results for the individual’s name.

We will be keeping a close eye on how this case develops, and hope that Google will take the sensible steps of removing the links and upholding the privacy of the individual concerned.

 

Useful links

  • Have you managed to get details of your convictions removed from search results? Let us know – send us your experience
  • More information on issue of the ‘google-effect’ and spent convictions can be found on our policy page here.
  • We also have practical information for people dealing with the google-effect on our information site.

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