Q51 Jon Trickett: The fact of the matter is that if somebody chooses to provide false information to the body to which they are applying the Bureau will not have the access to the data, nor would they seek to have access to the data to find out that that was fraudulently filled in as a result of abandoning the identity verification process? This is like leaving a barn door wide open.
Mr Lewis: Applicants are asked to provide two kinds of identity.
Q52 Jon Trickett: You are not answering my question.
Mr Lewis: For example, one is a passport or a recent utility bill etcetera. Significant efforts are made to try and establish that the identity of the person is actually the same as the name on the form for which disclosure is being sought. It is very important to say that, the NAO Report says it, the CRB process does not pretend to be a 100% guarantee that any individual can be hired without any risk. It is not. It does not absolve the employer of the ultimate responsibility for that hiring decision. We will look to the Bichard Inquiry to say whether in its view there are further measures to be taken. For example, one that has been put forward is fingerprint identity which is necessary to try and reduce still further the risks of identity fraud.
Q53 Jon Trickett: You have abandoned the effort to verify the identity of the individual applicant. You are relying entirely on the people to whom you are applying.
Mr Lewis: On the contrary. I simply do not accept that. We are seeking to strengthen the effort to reduce to an absolute minimum the risk of identity fraud.
Q54 Mr Field: Mr Gaskell, can I come back to the question I posed at the end of the Chairman's questioning. You have had three-quarters of an hour to think about it. Would Mr Huntley have been found out by your organisation or not?
Mr Gaskell: I think I have got little further to add to what Mr Lewis has just responded to Mr Trickett on that issue because these are all matters that Sir Michael Bichard will be looking at as part of the inquiry.
Q55 Mr Field: Let us look at the general position. What percentage of applications do you refuse?
Mr Gaskell: In terms of refuse, we do not actually refuse disclosures. What we do is we issue disclosures with relevant information about previous convictions or local police intelligence, as appropriate. In all cases we would do that unless there were particular circumstances which would lead to an application being withdrawn, but they are so very few and far between. If somebody applies for a disclosure we will normally carry out the checks against the Police National Computer and, as appropriate, involve local police forces in carrying out the checks of their local systems and their local intelligence.
Q56 Mr Field: So if somebody was honest enough to put all the information you need on their application form which would allow you to say that he or she had beaten up old people in residential care, you would write back and you would not say, "Do not employ this person," you would just say, "We couldn't confirm this person is a granny basher"?
Mr Gaskell: We do not make judgments. It is not our remit to make judgments about the employability of an individual. At the end of the day it is for an employer to make that judgment.
Q57 Mr Field: You put this information on your statement.
Mr Gaskell: The decision on the information, particularly in relation to the Police National Computer where it is conviction information that is still valid, would appear automatically on the disclosure. Where it is local police intelligence, that is a matter for local chief constables to decide on the relevance of that data for the disclosure itself.
Q58 Mr Field: The only people who might be prevented from employment after what is going to be £400 million-worth of taxpayers' money would be people who are incompetent at filling out the form or people who were so dozey they do not realise what they are telling you?
Mr Gaskell: I think there is an implication behind that, Mr Field, that the only check that is done is the disclosure check because, of course, the disclosure service is only one part of any employer's actions that they would reasonably take before choosing one.
Q59 Mr Field: It is now an expensive part.
Mr Gaskell: I was going to go on and say that what we have found from the research that we have done is the value that registered bodies or the people who these applications are lodged through with us put on this. Some 70% of those, at the last time we researched into this in late autumn last year, valued the service that we were operating for part of their decision-making.
Q60 Mr Field: Mr Lewis, is there any work being carried out on the numbers of people who are refused jobs because of the information the Agency is studying today comes up with?
MrLewis: We know that about one in five employers who we have surveyed as a result of recent work say that the results of CRB disclosures have materially influenced their recruitment decisions and we know that around 70% say that the information is helpful to them.