Tag Archives: independent safeguarding authority

Tom Brake writes: The Freedom Bill is a staging post towards an even freer society

By Tom Brake MP | Published 13th February 2011 - 11:17 am

The Freedom Bill is clear evidence of the Liberal Democrats setting the political agenda and making a positive difference to how we live in Britain.

It’s our robust answer to unwelcome and unwarranted intrusions into our everyday lives. It starts the dismantling of an overbearing surveillance state and restores British civil liberties that we used to be able to take for granted.

At the heart of the Bill is a commitment to safeguarding and protecting individuals and national security. What has felt to many like an obsession of the state to monitor our every waking moment is broken down by the …

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Rejoice! 11 months (and 1 new government) on and the Home Office responds

By Mark Pack | Published 14th August 2010 - 9:20 am

Long term readers may recall my concerns over how the approach the Independent Safeguarding Authority was taking to the Vetting and Baring scheme, and in particular the way its guidance suggested that it didn’t really treat being found innocent in a court as counting as being innocent.

The ISA passed the issue on to the Home Office, and – as I previously reported – then there was silence, despite prompts from me. Silence too reigned when I contacted my Labour MP, Jeremy Corbyn, three times about the matter. Between them they didn’t even reply the once.

The ISA had the …

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Sir Roger Singleton writes…

By Mark Pack | Published 9th February 2010 - 1:50 pm

Last month I recounted the Home Office’s repeated failures to reply to my letters, including one to Sir Roger Singleton of the Independent Safeguarding Authority which was passed on to them and was about the ISA’s procedures:

[I am concerned by] Paragraph 5.6.1 of “Guidance Notes for Barring Decision Marking Process”, which states in part:

“even where a jury has found someone not guilty of having done something, you must always remember that, at most, this means is that the court did not find that someone did something “beyond a reasonable doubt” (the criminal standard of proof).”

My concern is simply

…

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Memo to Home Office: it would be terribly nice if you sometimes answered a letter

By Mark Pack | Published 27th January 2010 - 10:20 am

From a letter to my MP:

I emailed Sir Roger Singleton [see letter here] on 14 September about my concerns with the way the Independent Safeguarding Authority’s guidelines state that if someone has been found innocent in a court of law that does not mean they could have been completely innocent. Particularly given the many issues about the ISA’s remit, this choice of wording in their own guidelines is one of obvious concern.

I heard nothing so I emailed again on 16 October. On 19 October I was told by the Vetting & Barring Scheme Information Team that the issue had

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