Student Administration and Records

Criminal Records Bureau Disclosure

The University requires that, before admission, all students on a Medicine, Veterinary Medicine and PGCE courses undergo an 'Enhanced Disclosure' of any criminal record through the Criminal Records Bureau.

What is the Criminal Records Bureau?

The Criminal Records Bureau (CRB), an Executive Agency of the Home Office, provides wider access to criminal record information through its Disclosure service. The CRB helps organisations by screening out candidates who may be unsuitable for certain kinds of work or study. In doing this it particularly aims to provide protection for children and other vulnerable members of society.

The new Vetting and Barring Scheme - Halted by the new Government

The Vetting and Barring Scheme (VBS) was established so that all those who work with vulnerable groups would be registered. The scheme was designed to ensure that anyone who is known to present a risk to vulnerable groups is prevented from working with them. The scheme was to be gradually being rolled out throughout 2010.

On 15 June 2010 the Government announced their intention to remodel the Vetting and Barring Scheme (VBS). As a result, the ISA-registration stage of the scheme was stopped and did not launch on 26 July 2010 as planned.

The CRB recently introduced a new application form in readiness for the planned launch of the ISA-registration phase, and although this phase of the VBS has now been halted, the CRB has still launched the new application form as originally planned.

In order to process applications, the CRB will extract and ignore those parts of the new application form which capture ISA registration requirements, and use only those data fields which are required to process a CRB check.

What is a Disclosure?

A Disclosure is a document containing all information held by police and government departments that concerns you as an individual.

When the CRB receives your application form, they will use various means to check details of any criminal record that you may have:

  • They will use the Police National Computer to search for details of any convictions, cautions, reprimands and warnings that you may have.
  • If you will be working with children, they will also check for any details that may be held about you by the Department of Health and the Department for Education and Skills.
  • In the final stages of the process, your local police authority is contacted, to see if local police records contain any additional information that may be relevant.

Further information can be found at http://www.direct.gov.uk/crb

It is important to note that:

  • Exceptionally, and in a very small number of circumstances, additional information may be sent under separate cover to the University's CRB countersignatory and will not be revealed to you. This would only take place if it was necessary to protect the integrity of current police investigations.
  • An Enhanced Disclosure involves an additional level of check to other Disclosures carried out by the CRB (Standard and Basic), including the check on local police records.
  • No Disclosure can be issued without the consent of an individual applicant.
  • A copy of the Enhanced Disclosure is sent to the University as well as the applicant at the address provided on the application form.
  • There are safeguards in the CRB Code of Practice to ensure that personal information provided to any organisation remains confidential. This is to ensure that the individual's rights to privacy should not be abused.