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Devon Carries Out 18,000 Background Checks
Devon County Council carried out more than 18,000 background checks last year, the second highest rate of any local authority in the country, new figures show.
Councils, private firms and scout groups were among more than 2,000 organisations which ran three million criminal record checks in England and Wales e equivalent of one in 20 of the population of 55.2 million.
Almost 60,000 checks were made by the Scout Association alone, making it one of the highest users.
Devon County Council's total of 18,686 checks put it 19th in a national table and was only surpassed by one other local authority, Essex, which made almost 22,000 checks. Cornwall Council carried out 8,694 checks and Plymouth City Council 6,354.
A spokesman for Devon County Council said the figure was high because it acted as an "umbrella agency" providing services for "a number of voluntary organisations, charities, external companies, schools/academies and district councils".
The campaign group Big Brother Watch, which released the data following a Freedom of Information Act request, said the figures were "a sad indictment of a country that has lost all sight of proportion and has substituted common sense for a piece of paper".
Nick Pickles, its director, said: "For nearly three million people to be checked in just one year is remarkable. "Given just how many organisations now have access to the system, there is a clear risk that it is easy to delve into someone's private life and run a CRB (Criminal Records Bureau) check without them ever knowing.
"The checks have already been shown to wrongly brand innocent people as criminals and cost people their jobs for totally unrelated incidents that would not suggest they pose a risk.
"It's time to go back to the drawing board and fundamentally reform the CRB system."
The Government has outlined plans to reform the system of criminal records checks, saying it was time to return to a more "common sense" approach.
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg announced last February that the current system will be scaled back and only those working most closely with children or vulnerable adults will need to undergo the checks. The results will also be able to move with individuals when they change jobs, cutting down on bureaucracy, the Government said.
A Home Office spokesman said: "The current system of employment checks is too bureaucratic and intrusive.
"That is why we are reforming the regime to scale it back to common-sense levels so that the public are properly protected but the number of excessive checks are substantially reduced."
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