NHS trusts in England have been told to ensure that criminal record checks are up to date on their staff and, where necessary, on volunteers, after a survey of trusts revealed many did not undertake three-yearly reviews.
The measure was a key recommendation of former barrister Kate Lampard’s report on improvements needed to protect patients in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal. She raised concerns in February about lack of management and oversight over an estimated 78,000 volunteers, highlighting 14 areas where improvements were needed.
The Department of Health (DH) never accepted one recommendation of the Lampard report – that all volunteers should have enhanced checks conducted by the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS), the official body responsible for protecting vulnerable people from “unsuitable” individuals.
Ministers said these should typically only be necessary for volunteers in close or unsupervised contact with patients. The DH’s update on the NHS response to Lampard, published on Wednesday, said that progress had been made in implementing most of the changes she demanded.
These included ensuring every hospital had policies for agreeing to and managing visits by VIPs, celebrities and other official visitors, as well as for ensuring their volunteers were properly recruited, selected and trained, and subject to appropriate supervision.
But NHS regulators Monitor and the Trust Development Authority found a four-way split in how the 240 NHS trusts in England were responding to the recommendation on three-yearly checks when they surveyed them between March and June.
Some said they already had implemented such checks, or intended to, while others were still reviewing procedures or awaiting further guidance. But some trusts said they did not undertake regular “refresher” checks because of the cost. One trust said it would cost £250,000 a year to do so.
There were concerns, too, that such checks were effectively out of date as soon as they were carried out, while trusts pointed to existing requirements in staff contracts to inform employers of an offence that would be picked up in criminal record checks.
The body representing NHS employers has updated its guidance to say that while there is no legal requirement to do so, trusts can require periodic checks as part of local policy.
The DH said: “Trusts should make sure their information on volunteers is up to date ... Trusts should encourage staff and volunteers who are eligible to join the DBS update service. It is free for volunteers and allows an individual to register with the DBS and have a portable certificate.
“This means a volunteer can work for several organisations with only one DBS application and an employer can check the status of their volunteer at any time and make safe recruitment decisions.”
