'New approach needed' on child vetting

Monday, 27 September 2010 12:00 AM

By politics.co.uk staff

Ministers should scrap the vetting and barring scheme used to protect children from paedophiles because it increases, not diminishes, the risk, the Civitas thinktank has argued.

Its updated report, Licensed To Hug, calls on the coalition government to abandon the current vetting procedure altogether.

It argues that by forcing all adults who come into contact with children other than their own to undergo a check has created a culture of reduced responsibility where employers could let their guard down because they had completed a criminal records bureau check.

"What's required is not just a new system, but an enlightened approach towards the promotion of intergenerational contact," the report argued.

Civitas added: "Rather than creating an atmosphere of fear and suspicion based on the assumption that the majority of adults have predatory attitudes towards children, we should encourage greater openness and more frequent contact between the generations."

A review of the vetting and barring scheme initiated by home secretary Theresa May is set to report shortly.

Tags:
• child abuse
,
• children
,
• domestic policy
,
• education