Category: For specific groups

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.

New guide published – Unlocking Criminal Record Checks

On a daily basis, our helpline gets calls from people who are applying for work and don’t know where they stand because of criminal record checks that (increasingly) employers are carrying out.

A couple of years ago, we approached the DBS (Disclosure & Barring Service – known as the CRB at that time) and raised this as a matter of concern. They agreed to support the production of a guide, specifically for people with a criminal record, designed to explain in detail the criminal record checking process, with particular focus on the specific issues that people with a criminal record might face.

The result is a detailed guide which was written by Unlock and which was circulated by the DBS (it was announced in DBS News September 2013). Download the guide here or click the image below.

For Unlock, this guide represents a number of things:

The DBS has recognised people with a criminal record as being a particular audience, and have responded by supporting the production and circulation of this guide
During the writing of the guide, Unlock asked a number of questions of the DBS about their processes, and in a number of respects, the DBS have responded by working to improve aspects of their process
In particular, the guide shines a light on the process of ‘eligibility’. The Establish Eligibility Process Flow-chart (page 19) sets out a clear and detailed process for individuals to follow if they believe that an employer might be asking for the wrong level of criminal record check. It also documents the specific ‘Eligibility query’ process that the DBS has in place to respond to concerns around eligibility from individuals
It provides a starting point by which evidence can be collected about how employers and the DBS are dealing with eligibility issues

Since the guide was published, we’ve already started getting feedback from people. A couple of examples include:

People asking questions of employers: “I went into Human Resources and asked why they were asking for enhanced checks. They wasn’t sure, and once I pointed out that a basis disclosure could be used, they were happy to accept this, and changed their policy as a result. Given my criminal record is spent, it means I don’t have to resign, which I feel I would have had to do otherwise”

People using the DBS’s ‘Eligibility query’ process: “My employer was insisting on an enhanced level check for a job working as a door-to-door salesman. I tried to talk to them, but they wouldn’t listen, so I didn’t have any other option but to consent to the check. Following Unlock’s guidance, I raised a query with the DBS, and they looked into it. The outcome of this was that the DBS wrote to my employer saying that they didn’t think that the position was eligible, and that they should do a basic level check. Result!”

This guide is an important first step, but there is still a long way to go to ensure that employers are carrying out the correct level of checks and at the right time.

We’re keen to get your feedback on this guide, and in particular if you’ve tried to make use of the advice contained it in, either in your dealings with an employer or in raising an eligibility query with the DBS.

First information session for people with convictions

Why?

We’ll be explaining about Unlock and our Helpline, which provides confidential peer advice on overcoming the effects of criminal convictions
Different topics will be covered in detail at each session
Our Helpline Advisors will be on hand to answer any questions you might have
You’ll have the opportunity to book a free one-to-one session the following week
If you’re still not convinced, there’ll also be free hot drinks and biscuits!

When? The first will be held on Thursday 3rd October 2013, 5pm – 7pm

Where? Maidstone Community Support Centre, 39-48 Marsham St, Maidstone, Kent, ME14 1HH

Interested? Just turn up on the evening. However, if you do plan to come along, it would be useful if you could let us know, so that we have a better idea of how many people to expect on the evening

Background

As part of our running our Helpline, we think it’s important that we try to reach people that wouldn’t ordinarily contact us. As a result, we’re holding our first ever series of local information sessions.

Spread the word

If you work with people who have convictions and you think they may be interested in attending, please pass on this email to them. You’re also welcome to print this out and put it up on any noticeboards you might have.

Any questions?

Please contact our helpline; call 01634 247350 or email advice@unlock.org.uk.

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.

Our Helpline is now open 5 days a week

As a result of increased staff and voluntary resources available to our helpline, we’ve now been able to re-open our Helpline 5 days a week (it had previously been restricted to 2 days a week).

As always, as a small charity, it may not always be possible for us to answer your call immediately, as we may be dealing with other enquiries. You can always leave a message and we’ll call you back as soon as possible.

Generally, our open hours are Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm.

If you would like to contact our helpline, our contact details are here.

New addition to the team

We’re delighted to announce that we have a new member of staff.

As many of you will know, we’ve had quite a few changes at Unlock recently. When we announced that Chris Bath was leaving us at the end of February, we committed to investing our resources into front-line staff. This ultimately resulted in the Services Coordinator vacancy, which we advertised from April, and for which we held interviews for in May. Given we were specifically looking somebody with a conviction, we were blown away by the quality of candidates that applied, which truly shows the skills and experiences that many people with convictions have.

As a result of this process, we appointed Debbie Sadler as our full-time Services Coordinator, and she started with us on the 18th June. You can find out more about her here.

Debbie’s primary role is to manage our Helpline, dealing with queries that come in by telephone, email and letter, providing accurate and reliable information to people about how to overcome the issues that a criminal record can cause when you’re trying to move on with your life.

Questions?

If you have any questions for Debbie, please contact her via our helpline.

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.