According to recent child protection guidance, schools should not employ staff who live with someone convicted of a violent or sexual crime. Many school staff complying with newly enforced disclosure requirements – more than 300, according to the union Unison – have been suspended from their jobs. They will be allowed to return to work if they obtain a waiver of the regulation from Ofsted. But the application process takes up to two months, leaving some schools short-staffed while experienced teachers and support staff have to stay at home.
At first glance, these regulations seem to imply that people can be guilty by association. Perhaps it is just about possible that someone who, for example, marries a convicted sex offender is indifferent to the crime, or even condones it. But it is far more likely that someone in this situation takes the past offence seriously, struggles to accept it, but is able to give his or her partner a second chance. In fact, the government regulations apply even to those who have not chosen their connection to the person with the conviction. Brian Lightman, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, described how a headteacher living with his elderly father, who has historic convictions, resigned from his job because he feared suspension.
This policy may be more the effect of bureaucracy than of a principled moral stance. The disclosure requirements have long been in place for childminders, and have only been pressed on schools under the new child protection guidance.
However, the guidelines are still being defended by government officials, and the debate certainly raises important moral issues. A spokesperson for Ofsted stated: “We appreciate the inconvenience this may cause to some staff affected. However, parents and carers would expect us to take all necessary steps to ensure that children are safeguarded.” The bland reference to “inconvenience” glosses over the distress caused by the policy, and sidesteps taking any moral responsibility for it. At the same time, the moralistic appeal to child safety seems to assume that this end justifies any means. No one in their right mind thinks that children shouldn’t be safeguarded, this argument goes, and therefore we must “take all necessary steps” to ensure this.
A Department for Education spokesperson reinforced this message, claiming: “Nothing is more important than keeping children safe and schools should ensure this is paramount in everything they do.” Again, this emphasis on child safety seems uncontroversial. But the implication that there is a specific danger that the government guidelines guard against is much more questionable. What is at issue here is not guilt or innocence, but risk.
Risk can sometimes be calculated in terms of probability: for example, women in their 40s are more at risk of having babies with Down’s syndrome than younger mothers. Even in such cases, where risk assessments are supported by decent empirical evidence, it can be hard to make decisions on the basis of statistical probability. But the risks to children posed by school staff who share a house with someone convicted of a violent offence are far more indeterminate. This kind of risk seems to be a matter not of probability, but of possibility – a possibility that in some vague way becomes more vivid by association with past crimes.
The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard emphasised the contingency of human affairs, and explained that our awareness of possibilities that may or may not happen naturally makes us anxious. But we have to learn to live well with this anxiety. Following thinkers like Plato and Aristotle, who thought that our ethical task is to cultivate virtues that help us to live well, Kierkegaard argued that courage is the virtue that faces anxiety wisely. This combination of courage and wisdom means knowing how to deal with anxiety-provoking risks in an appropriate way. Sometimes this will involve taking preventative measures, but at other times it is better to live with a risk for the sake of upholding other values.
The risk-averse culture we now live in endangers our trust and confidence in one another. The new child-protection guidance is one symptom of this. It does not seem very sensible, let alone wise. The Department for Education advises schools to exercise discretion in applying the regulations, but the government should take responsibility for the failure of this policy – and change it.
