More than 250,000 people a year are ‘Garda vetted’ – but what exactly does it involve?

If you’ve helped out at a school drama club, coached a local children’s rugby team or supervised a CoderDojo class, you will more than likely have been asked to complete a Garda vetting form. This voluntary child-protection measure, put in place in the mid-2000s, is soon to become a legal obligation for any adult who intends to work with children or vulnerable adults.

But how does the process actually work? Is it an effective mechanism to prevent potentially dangerous people working or volunteering in church, social, arts or sporting organisations? And will the system change once the National Vetting Bureau (Children and Vulnerable Persons) Act 2012 is formally signed off by Minster for Justice Frances Fitzgerald?

Gearóid Ó Maoilmhichíl is the child-welfare and safeguarding manager of the GAA, one of the largest organisations that request people working with children to be vetted by the Garda Síochána. “We’ve used Garda vetting on a good-practice basis for the past three years and have vetted about 65,000 people to date. It’s often difficult to sell the idea of vetting, but once it becomes legislated for, people will adhere to it.”

The standard practice is for each organisation to ask every adult to be vetted to complete a form that requires, among other things, details of every address they have lived at and any previous or pending convictions. The organisations collate the forms, then send them to the Garda central vetting unit, in Co Tipperary.

“People might think that the information isn’t looked at closely by organisations or the Garda, but it’s meticulously gone through line by line by us and then by the Garda,” says Rene English, child-protection officer with the Church of Ireland Board of Education. She adds that up to 25 per cent of forms have been returned for further completion before they are forwarded to the Garda unit, which will process more than 250,000 forms this year.

One of the concerns raised by adults filling out vetting forms is the delay of up to three months between submitting the form and getting the all-clear. Some people have finished their volunteering by then, which makes the process seem useless. Other concerns are why the forms aren’t transferable and why the details aren’t kept on a central database for future use.

“We’ve raised this issue with the Garda vetting unit in advance of the new legislation being passed,” says Ó Maoilmhichíl. “We hope that it will be possible to get access to a vetting form – with the person’s written permission – from another organisation, such as a drama society or parish group, so that they could begin work with us. Then we would revet them under the GAA procedure. However, the Garda tell us that the vetting is only as good as the day you were last vetted.”

The issue of how often people need to be revetted has not been finalised in the new legislation. The GAA has suggested a period of between three and five years.

“We believe the issue of revetting will not be dealt with initially in the legislation, because there will be a need to concentrate on vetting everyone in the first place.”

Home-care providers are already asking their carers to be vetted, in advance of the passing of the Act. “It’s vitally important for anyone working with an older person to be Garda vetted. Ninty-five per cent of home are is one-to-one care, and the opportunities for abuse are much higher. In fact, we believe the home-care sector should have been regulated before the nursing-care sector for this reason,” says Michael Harty of Home Care Plus, one affected organisation.

Garda vetting is only one part of a wider recruitment process at Home Care Plus; he says it also checks references, holds face-to-face interviews and gives carers three days of training before taking a carer on. “The Garda vetting wouldn’t be enough in itself.”

Harty says that forms are being processed more quickly than previously, possibly in advance of the legislation. “We used to wait for up to three months. Now they are being processed within six to eight weeks. I think the system will move online next year.”

The biggest question is what happens if potentially sensitive information is disclosed through the Garda vetting process. The Garda press office declined a request for an interview with the Garda vetting unit for this piece. “In order to protect the vetting process, an Garda Síochána does not disclose how certain vetting checks are undertaken,” it said in a statement.

It is, however, widely known that the Garda returns the disclosed information to the authorised organisation, which then decides how to proceed.

Ó Maoilmhichíl explains what happens within the GAA. “It’s a tiny minority of cases, but once a disclosure is made by the Garda, the children’s officer and the human-resources manager in Croke Park examine the conviction. If it’s a sex offence, it’s a definite no. If it’s an act of violence, it’s no in most cases, and if it’s fraud or serious theft, it indicates dishonesty but we deal with it on a case-by-case basis.

Confidential interview

“For example, it could be something that happened to a 16-year-old who is now 28. The chairman of the local club would request a confidential interview to decide. If the person doesn’t want to be interviewed, he’s refused. Otherwise, it’s decided on the basis of the interview.”

There are two aspects of the new legislation that will change the process of Garda vetting. The first, called an administrative filter, will allow the Garda to ignore certain minor offences, such as a speeding conviction. The second change is the sharing of so-called soft information between agencies. “This could be relating to an unsuccessful prosecution or a concern that the HSE or Tulsa, the child and family agency, has about an individual,” says Ó Maoilmhichíl. “Some people are concerned about their rights regarding this ‘soft information’, but our paramount concern is the safety of the children. ”