Category: News on policy issues

Response to Scottish Consultation on reforms to the ROA

We’ve published our response to the Scottish Governments’ consultation on changes to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act.

Our response can be downloaded here.

Unlock endorses ‘Ban the box’

Unlock has today lent its support and endorsement to the ‘ban the box’ campaign, which is being led by Business in the Community. The aim of the campaign is to increase the opportunity for people with convictions to compete for jobs.

Christopher Stacey, Co-Director at Unlock, said “We believe that that, by banning the box, employers are better able to consider convictions at a more appropriate stage in the recruitment process, and at the same time are able to give people with convictions a better opportunity to compete for jobs. Far too often we hear from people who are unable to get past the application part of a recruitment process simply because they have to tick ‘yes’ to the questions about convictions. For employers, the end goal has to be to try and find the best person for the job, and with over 9 million people in the UK with a criminal record, banning the box about convictions is one simple step towards this goal.”

“Critically, we believe that it’s important for this campaign to be led by the business community itself, and that’s why we are wholeheartedly behind BITC in their efforts to take this campaign forward. Behind the scenes, we are able to provide confidential advice, support and training to employers on how they can best put the principles of this campaign into practice in their company, using our knowledge and experience of working with both individuals who have convictions as well as employers who are actively looking to improve their recruitment policies and practices.”

“In so far as our own recruitment process, Unlock has banned the box for both paid and voluntary opportunities. We have a specific policy on the disclosure of convictions, where we explain to applicants that we do not ask about convictions at application stage. We provide individuals who are invited to interview with a self-disclosure form, which we ask them to complete and bring with them to their interview. At the end of the interview, we have a separate discussion where we ask questions about the information they have disclosed on this form, and we make it clear that this will only be considered once we have made a decision about whether they are the right person for the job.”

More information about Ban the Box from BITC is available from bitc.org.uk/banthebox and #BantheBoxUK

Ban the Box Interactive Video

Did you skip? Watch the film again to see the story a different way.

Support for the Ban the Box campaign

As part of our support for Ban the Box, we spoke on Radio 5 Live about the campaign.

You can listen to the interview below.

Further delays to changes to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act

Please see below an update that we have received from the Ministry of Justice late last week regarding planned changes to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.

Although we’re disappointed to bring you this news, we felt it was important to provide an update as soon as we knew that the situation had formally changed. This will not come as a surprise to some – the lack of an update from Government has led many people to rightly question whether the changes were going to come in by November. A thread has been running on our forum since January this year, questioning originally whether the changes were going to come in by Spring 2013.

Sadly, while it’s frustrating that it is no longer going to be November, the situation is undoubtedly made worse by the lack of a specific future date. To put it simply, although they are optimistic that they will be able to put an end to the uncertainty on the date of commencement fairly soon, they are still unable to give a definite timetable.

In our view, the combination of a delay plus the lack of a specific delay is unforgiveable. When the initial reforms were passed in April 2012, a 12 month window was given to allow the Government time to get the necessary systems in place. The initial implementation date of Spring 2013 led to many people planning their lives on these changes. Our Helpline has been inundated with enquiries ever since from people who are desperately waiting for the changes to come in.

We are continuing to do all that we can so that the Government implement the reforms as soon as possible. We are urging the Government to announce a specific date for when the changes will be introduced. We are also meeting with MP’s with an interest on this issue to see what can be done to speed up this process.

To help, we encourage anybody who is personally affected by these delays, or feels passionately about the way this is being managed by Government, to write to their MP and ask them to raise this issue as a matter of priority with the Ministers of State for both the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice. You can encourage your MP’s office to contact us directly if they want to help in some way. Ultimately, it’s important that the Government realise how important these changes are, and how many peoples’ lives are being put on hold by these delays. However, the difficulty at this stage is in finding practical ways in which this process can influenced.

Update from the Ministry of Justice

“Whilst the Government was aiming to commence the reforms by November this is not going to be possible but it remains committed to seeing these reforms in place, which will to the benefit of many ex-offenders, and it will give a firm timetable on commencement as soon as it can. As you know, the critical prerequisite for the commencement of the reforms is to put in place a system for producing basic disclosure certificates, which show unspent convictions, reflecting the new rehabilitation periods in England and Wales. Until we do that there would be no way for an individual to obtain an official statement of their unspent convictions under the new rules.

Currently, basic disclosures reflecting the existing rehabilitation periods are available from Disclosure Scotland and this service is provided to residents of England and Wales as well as Scotland. However, the reforms to the ROA only revise rehabilitation periods for England and Wales, leaving the position in Scotland unchanged under its legislation. This complicates matters and creates two different rehabilitation regimes within Great Britain.

One option to address this situation is to agree with Disclosure Scotland that they will provide two differential basic disclosure services, one reflecting the rules in Scotland and the other the rules in England and Wales. Another option is for the Disclosure and Barring Service to initiate a basic disclosure service for England and Wales which adheres to the reformed rules in this jurisdiction. Neither of these options is straightforward and there are significant business and technical issues to work through. However, the Government expects these issues to be resolved shortly.”

‘How to employ with conviction’ – An Unlock Webcast for EFFRR (the Employers Forum for Reducing Reoffending)

Today we delivered a training session to the Employers Forum for Reducing Reoffending (EFFRR), covering a range of common questions that employers have when they are looking to recruit people with convictions.

Download a factsheet that was produced after the session.

Find out more information about our support for employers here.

One conviction or multiple offences? The DBS filtering process

Ever since we published our Information Hub guide on the new DBS filtering process, our Helpline has been receiving queries left, right and centre about the filtering process and how it applies to them. It’s fair to say that, in lots of cases, it doesn’t help, because they have more than multiple convictions over many years, or received prison (or suspended) sentence.

One issue that seems to be quite common is where people believe themselves to have one conviction, only to find that, when they do a DBS check (or get a Police National Computer record) , they have a number of ‘offences’ on their record, all of which were dealt with at the same time in court. A common example is drink driving and driving without insurance. The court records this as one conviction, but would have two offences.

We’ve clarified this kind of example with the Home Office, who interpret this situation as meaning ‘multiple convictions’, meaning that none would be filtered from a DBS check.

This is something we’re looking at challenging, and as part of this, we’re keen to hear of people who may be affected by a similar kind of issue. The more examples we get, the better chance we have of finding a way of challenging this.

If this is something that affects you, please get in contact with our Helpline. If you have a copy of a DBS (or CRB) disclosure, or a copy of your PNC record, which shows this, please send this through too. All information is treated confidentially.

Scottish Government consult on the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974

This week, the Scottish Government has (finally) launched its consultation on the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.

England & Wales has passed its own reforms on this (although they’re still waiting to come into force), but these will not change the situation in Scotland.

The Scottish Government hasn’t put forward a specific proposal at this stage, which suggests a genuine openness to look at different ways of improving it.

Not only is this is a great opportunity to influence potential changes in Scotland, but it’s also a way of setting out arguments for why broader changes in approach may be needed, and how this may relate in the future to changes in England and Wales.

For information, when the UK Government published a consultation on amendments to England & Wales, Unlock submitted a response, which can be downloaded here.

We want to encourage anybody who has a view on the ROA in Scotland to respond to the consultation. All the details can be found on the Scottish Government website.

For anybody who wishes to their share contributions more broadly, we’re happy to circulate responses via this site – just send them through to therecord@outlook.com.

DBS Update Service and One Certificate

This is an update taken from our Information Hub

Today, we’ve published a brief guide which explains some of the changes that the DBS has introduced this week.

The Update Service is a new subscription service lets you keep your DBS certificate up-to-date so you can take it with you when you move jobs or roles. The employer can then carry out free, online, instant checks to see if any new information has come to light since the certificate’s issue – this is called a ‘status check’.

To coincide with launching the Update Service, the DBS will now only issue certificates to you; they’ll no longer send a copy to the Registered Body. This change is being referred to as ‘One Certificate’. Employers will now need to ask you for sight of your DBS Certificate.

The guide we’ve put together discusses some of the issues and questions that people with convictions are likely to be interested in, including some of the benefits and potential downsides to these changes.

Read the guide we’ve published here.

Questions?

If you have any questions about this information, please contact us.

If you’d like to discuss this information with others, there is a specific thread on our online forum.

Changes to insurance disclosure

The below is post from our Information Hub

The reason for this update is to let you know of some changes to insurance disclosure, which came into force in April 2013, which should help many people with convictions. We updated the guidance on our website at the time, but to raise awareness of this, we thought we’d send around an e-update as well!

For many years, people with convictions have found themselves in a difficult situation when purchasing insurance. This is because of archaic insurance law dating back to the Marine Insurance Act 1906, which imposed heavy duties on all consumers to disclose all material facts, even if the insurer didn’t ask about them specifically. If you failed to guess what the insurer wanted to know, your claim could be rejected.

In 2008, the Law Commission consulted on whether the law should be changed. Unlock made a submission which highlighted the problems that the law caused for people with convictions. Following this consultation, the Law Commission recommended a change in the law. Unlock, along with a number of other consumer organisations (including Age UK, Consumer Focus and Which?), worked hard to push the Government to change the law. This was successful in March 2012, when the Consumer Insurance (Disclosure and Representations) Act 2012 received Royal Assent.

The Consumer Insurance (Disclosure and Representation) Act 2012 came into force on 6th April 2013. It removes the duty on consumers to volunteer ‘material facts’ if not asked. The onus is now on the insurer to ask the right questions. For people with convictions, this will help to clarify the law when companies do not ask about certain convictions (e.g. non-motoring convictions). Previously, you had to disclose all unspent criminal convictions, regardless of whether you were asked about them. This is no longer the case.

The onus now sits squarely with the insurer to ask you the questions that they want to know information about. Instead of a duty to volunteer material facts, now the law requires you to answer the questions that are put to you fully and accurately. You need to “take reasonable care”, and one of the factors that will be taken into account is whether the questions asked by the insurer were clear and specific.

For more information

We’ve published a guide on the changes to insurance disclosure. We’ve also updated our simple and detailed guides, as well as updating our list of insurance brokers and list of motor insurers. As always, all of this can be downloaded from the insurance section of our website.

Can you help us improve our lists?

Since these changes have come in, some insurers have changed the questions they ask. Some mainstream motor insurers, for example, have started asking about non-motoring convictions, meaning we’ve had to take them off our specific list of motor insurers that didn’t ask about non-motoring convictions.

However, there are many other insurers that ask quite specific questions about convictions (e.g. convictions in the last 5 years). For these insurers, even if your conviction is unspent, if it was after this period, you do not need to disclose.

As a result, we’re in the process of reviewing our list of motor insurers, to identify more mainstream companies that do not ask about certain convictions. We’re also looking to produce a similar list of home insurers, providing details of companies that ask quite specific questions. If you come across any specific insurers that you think should be included in either of these, please let us know by emailing the details to advice@unlock.org.uk.

DBS start filtering cautions and convictions

This update is taken from our Information Hub

As some of you may have seen from the news, the Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) has started, as of yesterday, a process of ‘filtering’ for cautions and convictions held on the Police National Computer.

Today, we’ve published our own detailed guide on how the DBS filtering rules will work. This can be viewed here.

Although we’ve known this has been coming for quite a few weeks now, it wasn’t until last week that we found out exactly when it would be coming into force. It wasn’t until yesterday when, along with everybody else, we got a chance to see the guidance that the DBS had written and, in particular, saw the full list of offences that are exempt from filtering.

We’ve written a lot about this issue in recent years (see more here). Unfortunately, the filtering process that the Government has introduced doesn’t go far enough in lots of ways. However, based on the calls our Helpline has been receiving in the last couple of days, it is certainly going to help some people, and for those people, it could mean the difference between getting refused the role they’ve applied for, and finally getting an opportunity to prove themselves. We will continue to argue that the system should go much further, to ensure that genuinely law-abiding people with convictions are able to reach their potential.

In the meantime, after having chance to digest the DBS guidance, alongside the list of offences, and the numerous questions we’ve asked of Government in recent weeks, we’ve published a detailed guide on the DBS filtering process. We hope that this information will help you to understand whether the process will help you in your own situation; we’ve tried to put together a number of questions that should help, as well as frequently asked questions and some examples.

It is going to take some time for people to understand this process. In particular, it’s likely that employers will be confused about what it means for them and their recruitment. On top of many other changes being made to the DBS process, this represents an unprecedented level of uncertainty about how the DBS process operates. We will continue, as always, to try to help people with convictions better understand the system as best as we can.