Thursday, September 17, 2009

Keeping children safe - sign Downing Street Petition against new vetting and barring system

As you'll be aware, many of us in the Liberal Democrat blogosphere and beyond have been very concerned about the Government's plans to vet every volunteer who comes into contact with children. I, as the most over-anxious mum on the planet, wrote about how I didn't see how this system would make my child safer and how, actually, it could do a whole load of harm.

Having been convinced of the iniquities of the system, it's then been harder to work out what on earth we could do about it. Mark showed how difficult it will be to campaign against it - those in its favour will just cast us up as being against child welfare. He recounted dialogue he'd had on Twitter with someone who was in favour of the scheme. Mark's line of argument is impeccable and logical, but the emotive stuff he got in return is going to be quite difficult to rebut.

While I think it's vital that we keep this issue in the public consciousness, I expect,sadly, it will be the banning of some perfectly innocent people from working with children which will lead to change.

I'm glad to see that someone has put up a petition on the Number 10 website calling on the Government to abandon the new anti vetting and barring procedures. I signed it this morning and if you share my concerns, I hope you'll do the same. It's important that the Government realises the strength of feeling on this.

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