Health and Sport Committee

Meeting date: Tuesday, February 21, 2017

Official Report 627KB pdf

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Child Protection in Sport

Agenda item 8 is an evidence session on child protection in sport. I welcome to the meeting the Minister for Public Health and Sport, Aileen Campbell; the Minister for Childcare and Early Years Mark McDonald; Gerard Hart, who is the director of protection services and policy at Disclosure Scotland; and John Lunn, who is the head of pathways at sportscotland.

Before we move to questions, I remind members and witnesses that, under the standing orders rule on cases being sub judice, no mention should be made during this evidence session of any live or on-going cases or to any issues that might prejudice those cases.

I invite the Minister for Childcare and Early Years to make an opening statement.

Thank you for inviting Aileen Campbell and me to the meeting to contribute to the committee’s consideration of child protection in sport. As the convener said, Gerry Hart from Disclosure Scotland and John Lunn from sportscotland have joined us.

We welcome the opportunity to discuss with the committee the important issue of child protection in sport. Sport plays a pivotal role in Scottish life and makes a huge contribution to the health and wellbeing of children. We are determined to ensure that children can enjoy sport in a safe and secure environment, so I welcome the committee’s focus on that.

I know that the meeting will focus on the protecting vulnerable groups scheme and how sports organisations use it, but I emphasise from the outset that it is not processes or procedures that keep children safe; it is people who do so. The PVG scheme is a system and process that helps to support organisations and people, but it is, and can be, only a support for protecting children. That said, the scheme that we have in place, which Disclosure Scotland delivers on behalf of the Scottish ministers, has played a key role in creating a system of checks and balances in which we can all have confidence.

The PVG scheme was established in February 2011 and replaced previous disclosure arrangements under the Police Act 1997 that had been in operation since April 2002. Its purpose is to provide vetting information to assist organisations in the decisions that they take about people’s suitability for regulated work. There are two workforces in the PVG scheme: the workforce for regulated work with children and that for regulated work with adults. Scheme membership covers paid work, and voluntary and unpaid work. A contract of employment does not have to be in place between the organisation and the person who is doing regulated work.

Upon application by an individual, Disclosure Scotland carries out checks to determine whether the applicant is unsuitable for scheme membership. The Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007 allows ministers to exclude people who are unsuitable on the basis of past behaviour from working with children and/or protected adults, and detects those who become unsuitable. That is achieved through Disclosure Scotland keeping a list of individuals who are barred from doing regulated work with children and a list of those who are barred from doing regulated work with adults.

A person can apply to join the scheme if their normal duties include carrying out particular activities with children and adults. The sort of activities relating to children in sport include teaching, instructing, training or supervising children; being in sole charge of children; unsupervised contact with children under arrangements that are made by a responsible person, for example a parent or carer; and providing advice or guidance to a child or to particular children that relates to physical or emotional wellbeing, education or training. A manager whose role involves directly supervising a person carrying out such activities can also join the PVG scheme.

As members know, many sports organisations rely on volunteers to deliver their activities. Ministers have long been aware of the important contribution that volunteers make in enabling and supporting children to enjoy and participate in sport and other activities. To that end, PVG fees are waived for volunteers who undertake unpaid and voluntary work for voluntary organisations.

We are currently reviewing the PVG scheme; it is only right that we keep under review something that is so important and fundamental to our approach to child protection. The evidence that has been taken by the inquiry to date has brought to light some potential issues with regard to how the scheme operates in sporting activity, which we will no doubt discuss.

I am keen that our review explores the issues and seeks to address them, so I am pleased to inform the committee that the remit of the review is being widened to include the code of practice, to consider whether conditions of the code could be strengthened to ensure that disclosure checks by all organisations are carried out in line with the expectations of Scottish ministers.

I believe that Ms Campbell would like to put a few words on the record.

I, too, am pleased to be before the committee this morning. The fact that both ministers who have responsibility for keeping children safe in sport are here shows how seriously we take the issue.

I start by saying “thank you” to the thousands of people who week in and week out give up their time to enable our children to enjoy sporting activities and to do so safely. The vast majority of people who are involved in coaching children in sport do so for the best of reasons, and our children benefit from their commitment.

However, we have to make sure that sport is a safe way for children to spend their time. That is why we have funded, through sportscotland, Children 1st to develop and implement the safeguarding in sport service, which provides information, support, training and advice on protecting children to sports’ governing bodies and clubs. The work includes the minimum operating requirements—MORs—to safeguard children and ensure that governing bodies take a consistent approach to child protection.

Children 1st monitors progress and compliance with the MORs. The MORs are being enhanced by a set of standards that are being piloted by ten sports and will further strengthen protection of children in sport. The Children 1st guidance document, “10 Steps to Safeguard Children in Sport”, provides invaluable resources to clubs and governing bodies across Scotland.

There is a further safety net whereby any clubs using local authority or leisure trust facilities must be compliant with their local child protection safety procedures and policies. In addition to our investment in Children 1st, through sportscotland we invest more than £3 million annually in governing bodies to support their overall administration and running costs. That support underpins work in child protection and PVG administration, as well as work in other areas such as equalities and anti-doping.

The inquiry and the recent allegations of sexual abuse in football have prompted Scottish ministers to reflect on what we do currently to keep children safe. For my part, as minister for sport, I have engaged in discussions with key stakeholders to determine whether our systems are good enough, and that dialogue will continue.

I can advise the committee that I will be hosting a round-table discussion with Mark McDonald and partners including Police Scotland, sportscotland, the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children in Scotland, Children 1st, the centre for excellence for looked after children in Scotland, Disclosure Scotland and some of the sports’ governing bodies in order to understand fully how the PVG scheme works for them and what more we might consider is needed to support them in order to protect our children. That round table will be hosted by Professor Kay Tisdall, who is a well-known academic expert in children’s rights and policy.

I will be writing to all 52 sport governing bodies to ask them to reflect on their current policies and practices on child protection and to offer to work together to further develop our child protection system. I firmly believe that we already have a robust system in place, but there is always room for improvement and development. Just as Mr McDonald said at the outset, processes are only part of the picture: it is the people who use those processes appropriately and effectively, as well as their own skills, knowledge and confidence, who keep children safe in sport and other activities.

We are happy to answer any questions that members undoubtedly have.

I thank the ministers and the panel for coming today. You will be aware that two weeks ago we had a session on child protection in sport, at which we had a representative of the Scottish Youth Football Association. The issue of the 1,300 coaches who were awaiting PVG clearance, according to a BBC Scotland report of 6 February, was raised. The committee was told that the reason for that was the large turnover in coaches and the large administrative workload of processing PVG checks in an organisation with a small number of full-time staff and thousands of volunteers. We heard that the SYFA estimated that it would cost it £70,000 to administer the PVG scheme this year.

What changes does the Scottish Government believe need to be made and by whom to address the issue of the high number of coaches who have not been PVG checked by the SYFA? Has Disclosure Scotland offered that organisation any assistance in clearing the backlog?

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I had a look at the evidence that was given to the committee at its previous meeting. As I said in my opening remarks, there are no fees for volunteers undertaking regulated work if they are doing so for a voluntary organisation, which would be the case in the clubs that the SYFA deals with. The cost will undoubtedly be related to administrative processes. The offer has been made to support the SYFA with any of the backlog issues that it faces; Gerry Hart can perhaps give a little more information on that. There is also an opportunity for Volunteer Scotland disclosure services to undertake some of the checks on behalf of the SYFA, which would perhaps remove some of the administrative burden.

I will let Gerry Hart give a bit more detail on the dialogue that has taken place between Disclosure Scotland and the SYFA.

We conduct compliance audits of the various bodies that countersign PVG applications, and we did one of those audits with the SYFA in September, when a small backlog was detected. At that time, we offered on an informal basis support with clearing that backlog. As time moved on, it became clear that the backlog was larger than the small number that was reported in September. I wrote to the chief executive of the SYFA on a number of occasions in the period from December through to January to offer practical assistance with clearing the backlog, which by then was in the high hundreds rather than the small number that had previously been intimated to us.

The SYFA initially accepted the offer of support, but it eventually transpired that it did not wish to take up that offer or did not require the additional support to clear the backlog. The offer was not accepted by the SYFA, and that remains the position to this point.

If you think that it would be helpful, convener, I would be more than happy to provide the committee with copies of the correspondence.

Clare, do you want to follow that up?

I am sorry, convener—I was waiting to see whether you were going to respond, because I am quite astounded by that information. In essence, the SYFA has been offered assistance to clear the backlog and has not taken up the offer. Has it given any rationale for rejecting the assistance?

No—not in any great detail. We made the offer in December. I wrote twice to make the offer and we have had informal contact with the SYFA through our compliance team. The offer was initially accepted but, in January, the information came back to us that the SYFA did not think that it was a practical way forward to have that support.

Has it cleared the backlog?

We are still trying to ascertain the exact size of the backlog, but I believe that there is still a backlog outstanding—colleagues can correct me if that is not the case.

Is it one or 1,000?

I think that it is a significant number.

Has there been any discussion with the SFA, which was also in attendance at that meeting, about its responsibilities to ensure compliance by the SYFA with PVG and child protection requirements?

I understand that the SFA has been seeking to progress the issue and wants the SYFA to make progress. There are regular discussions there. However, you are right to pursue that line of questioning. We have an issue in that the SYFA has a backlog, there has been an offer of help and that offer has not been taken up.

As the Minister for Public Health and Sport, I want to ensure the smooth running of sport and that there are good opportunities for children, so that is a concern. I know that that concern is shared by the Minister for Childcare and Early Years. We want to ensure that children have the opportunities. We understand that many children are getting great opportunities as a result of the fantastic work that a number of volunteers do in each of our communities. Indeed, some of us probably have children who have experienced that good work being carried out by those fantastic volunteers.

That said, the structures that have been in place do not seem to be matching that fantastic work, and we need to ensure that the support that is being offered is taken up so that we can proceed, confident in the knowledge that the protection for children is as robust as it can be. Of course, the culture change, the support and assistance from sportscotland and all the other areas in which sporting bodies can be assisted must be in place, too, but, in this particular instance, we must ensure that the help is being taken up and that progress is being fast tracked.

This issue took up a fair amount of the time for discussion at our previous meeting, but we also heard about various differences in practice between the sports bodies and whether coaches could volunteer in a limited capacity without completed PVG checks. Scottish Swimming, for example, highlighted the example of parents standing poolside during sessions. Clearly there was an element of supervision in that respect, but I want to understand the Scottish Government’s position on the question of volunteers taking part in a limited capacity—or not, perhaps—without that safeguard in place. I understand that there is always a balance to be struck between encouraging, sustaining and maintaining volunteer numbers and child protection, which is an issue that we have to look at very seriously.

In essence, it comes down to the activity that the individuals in question are undertaking. There is a difference between supervising a child who is undertaking a sporting activity and watching the child. In the example of a parent volunteer working alongside a coach who is supervising a session, we would expect the coach to be subject to a PVG check but not the parent volunteer; the parent would not be the supervising individual, so they would not be undertaking regulated work and therefore would not require to be subject to a check.

You highlighted differences in practice. That is why we have decided to include the codes of practice in the review. We want to create a robust code of practice that ensures that the approach being taken by all sporting governing bodies matches ministers’ expectations.

Returning to the football scenario that has already been mentioned, do you think that sportscotland funding should be contingent on adequate child protection systems being in place? Perhaps that might encourage the SYFA to take up the kind offer that has been made.

You are correct to pursue this line of questioning, which highlights the way in which football is structured. The relationship that sportscotland has is with the governing body, and the governing body in this case is the SFA. As a result, the funding does not go directly to the SYFA.

Collaboratively, the SYFA and the SFA must ensure that the system has rigour and robustness. Indeed, that is why the SFA issued the directive and why it has set the deadline of, I think, 28 February for the coaches to get compliance and the backlog to be cleared. Of course, that raises the question of why the help that is being offered is not being taken up to ensure that the deadline of the end of the month is met.

As I said, you are right to point out the differences in approach between football and other sports in this respect. I should also point out that a balance has to be struck. The disclosure system was meant to be proportionate; it was meant to ensure that there was a balance and that volunteers who, for the best of reasons and intentions, wanted to provide opportunities were not put off. However, you are right to suggest that we must ensure that the systems in place provide adequate protection for our children, and in that respect it is worth pointing out that a huge culture change has been happening for a number of years now through the work of sportscotland, helped and aided by Children 1st, to ensure that children can enjoy sporting experiences in safe environments.

With regard to safe environments, the Minister for Childcare and Early Years pointed out the difference between those who supervise and those who watch. I suppose that talent scouts might come under the heading of those who watch, and they are not currently covered. Given that they might be in a very powerful position in the lives of some ambitious young people, is there an aim to look at that?

It comes down to what an individual’s normal duties are. The incumbency to determine whether that individual is required to undergo a PVG check sits with the employer so, as most football scouts are employed by professional clubs, the club determines whether the scouts’ normal duties require them to undertake a PVG check. From the information that the SFA has provided, it appears that scouts make most contact with parents rather than directly with children, and the SFA is of the view that that is why they are not covered by the scheme. However, it has agreed to look at the issue of scouts and other intermediaries as part of the independent review. There might be grey areas in how those individuals operate, so some clarity would be welcome.

There is worth in us continuing the dialogue with the SFA on those issues. As you know, the review has been set up to cover historical abuse and there has been no timescale set on that. It is appropriate for us to explore that with the SFA alongside the review process. If there are loopholes, we will explore the mechanisms that the Government can use to close them.

I am astonished at the revelation that the SYFA turned down the offer of help to get through the backlog, not least because it received the directive in October and the offer was made a month later in the knowledge that the SYFA had to make good on the checks by February. I am particularly astonished that the SYFA turned down the offer, given that it told us that it was trying to process about 800 checks a month and that that was done largely by a volunteer network.

I am concerned that the directive was issued by the SFA only in October. The legislation has been implemented for more than a decade, yet there still seems to be significant confusion in some, although not all, governing bodies; we are aware of some sports that have a zero-tolerance approach to having coaches on the pitch or in the area without the checks. What confidence do ministers have that the governing bodies of all sports in Scotland are aware of their duty to ensure compliance under the 2007 act? How can that be improved on in the forthcoming review?

I do not think that there is a question about the governing bodies’ awareness of their responsibilities. However, there appears to be—certainly in relation to the SYFA—a question about the processes that they follow and the systems that they have in place. That is why we extended the offer to the SYFA to help to clear the backlog of applications, which exists at the SYFA end rather than at the Government’s end. There is no backlog of applications being cleared once they are submitted to Disclosure Scotland. We will be able to take that forward as part of the round-table meeting that the Minister for Public Health and Sport and I will host. That will give us an opportunity to get a better understanding of the issues that the governing bodies consider to exist and to think about how best those issues can be tackled as part of the review of the scheme that we are taking forward.

Do you have the power—if need be—to make the offer a compulsion and, for example, to bring organisations into special measures in order to give them assistance?

We have a code of conduct that organisations that countersign disclosures must sign up to and it is specified in statute. We have the power to adapt the code of conduct and we will urgently look to ensure that it covers not only the process efficiency of organisations in following the right steps to get a disclosure, but whether the scheme is used in a reputable way. For example, we must ensure that large backlogs are not a part of the deal so, if an organisation signs up to be a countersigning organisation, there is a way in which we can intervene to address concerns about a backlog that builds up. We will do the work of looking at the code of conduct immediately.

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Compliance with the minimum operating requirements is monitored quarterly and sportscotland has a great deal of work to do with the governing bodies on compliance. There is also the pilot with 10 clubs that will enhance the process. Although PVG is one element of that, a host of things has happened in sporting governing bodies and sports clubs in the past decade or so to ensure that sporting arenas and environments are safe for children. Compliance with MORs is certainly monitored by sportscotland.

Youth football must be one of the biggest areas for disclosure.

Within sport, yes.

So a small organisation has a small number of staff who are processing huge volumes of forms on a voluntary basis. I cannot help but think that the SYFA is being hung out to dry by the SFA. When the SFA representative gave evidence to the committee, he said that it was the SYFA’s fault and hung the volunteers out to dry. Obviously, I question the organisation’s competence to cope with the volume of work, but the overseeing body to which it is affiliated must take some responsibility for ensuring that the scheme works better. Do you have confidence in the SFA’s role?

Again, you point out the way in which the SYFA chooses to approach the PVG scheme. That is not the same for other sporting organisations, because they are the ones that do all the countersigning.

None of those organisations faces the same volume as the SYFA.

I understand that none of the other governing bodies chooses to approach the situation in that way. There are things that could be done to help. We should also bear in mind the fact that investment goes into Volunteer Scotland to help voluntary organisations.

My question was whether you think that the role that the SFA has played in this means that one of its affiliates has been hung out to dry.

As the governing body, the SFA has a role in ensuring that children who want to play football are able to participate safely in a safe environment. PVG checks are one element of providing that comfort of safety. The evidence that the committee took before the February recess and has taken today shows that there are relationships that we need to explore, and that we need to show a bit more rigour and robustness around how things are checked and how quickly things can be expedited. Drawing all that together, we need to ensure that there is clear leadership and that the problem will be sorted quickly to give the Government, the committee and sportscotland the comfort that we all need to make sure that we are progressing as we would all expect.

Mr Lunn, would you care to comment? You have been very quiet.

The SFA is the recognised governing body and the SYFA is one of the member associations of that body. The MORs that we have in place and our relationship are directly with that body.

One of the components of that is how that body administers and manages its PVG schemes, among other things, in terms of the MORs. The situation has highlighted the fact that how the SYFA chooses to administer its PVG is probably different and it has presented—

What does that mean? What is the SYFA doing that is so different?

Everything comes through the SYFA. Not all clubs have to come through the governing body to get their PVG done. They can do it through local authorities or the leisure trusts. In some cases, large clubs can set themselves up to act as the intermediary; we have some clubs that do that. The governing body also provides that service.

One of the MORs is the mechanism that allows the governing body to administer and manage the PVG, if the club chooses to do so. The SYFA has taken that responsibility on itself, so that all the PVGs, the requests and the paperwork come through that body centrally. It does not need to be set up like that.

Presumably you have asked the SYFA why that is.

We have not asked yet, because when the SYFA gave evidence at the previous session, that was the first time that we had become aware that that was how it was applying the process. As Gerard Hart said, a backlog was identified last year, but we became aware only recently that the backlog was of the extent that it is.

I am seriously concerned that it appears that we are being told about a massive failure of process. The response seems to be that it is bad that the organisation has failed to deliver. I am not hearing exactly what is being done—by either the Scottish Government or Disclosure Scotland—to enforce changes to make sure that it starts to comply.

How often does Disclosure Scotland carry out compliance checks and how effective are they? In the case that we are talking about, you indicated that the figures seemed to change every time that you checked with it.

There is a rolling programme of compliance checks with bodies. In the past 12 months, we have done 33 compliance checks on bodies that are associated with youth sport. As I said, we did the SYFA check in September 2016. If I recall correctly, the number reported by the organisation at that compliance check was 186, which is substantially fewer than the number that later emerged as the actual figure. A figure of nearly 1,500 was given in the media at one point.

We obviously share the concerns about that number of outstanding checks, for safeguarding reasons. First, our compliance team approached the SYFA informally and offered practical support with clearing and countersigning those checks. When that was not accepted, I then wrote to the organisation and formally offered that further support. As I have said before, that has not been taken up by the SYFA—ostensibly for reasons of practicality. I do not know any more detail about why it has not availed itself of the offer; it has not shared that with us.

We have no statutory powers to compel anyone to use the PVG scheme; it is a non-mandatory scheme. However, that is why the code of conduct response is perhaps the most appropriate one. If an organisation is going to sign up to use the PVG scheme—as we hope and expect that all responsible organisations offering youth sport would seek to do—part of the deal needs to be that it uses the scheme correctly and in a reputable manner. We can make changes to the code of conduct that would tighten the reins, as it were, on that aspect and ensure that we can manage backlogs much more purposefully. However, there are no statutory powers whatsoever for the Government to compel the SYFA to do the checks at any particular rate or in any number.

I share Colin Smyth’s concerns. Since, following the previous evidence session, the refusal of the SYFA to take up the offer of support was brought to light, I have this morning written to Mr Little, first asking him to meet Aileen Campbell and me ahead of the round table that we will host, and also strongly urging him to take up the offer of support from Volunteer Scotland disclosure services and Disclosure Scotland, to help his organisation to clear its backlog. It is strong encouragement that I have given him in that letter, so I hope that he will avail himself of that opportunity.

For clarification, the first point is that Disclosure Scotland said, in effect, that you had detected only 100-odd cases, so it was actually the media that revealed the 1,000 or so—

It was not detected—

Based on the information—

The figure was what the SYFA advised was its backlog.

Absolutely—but the revelation that there were more than 1,000 cases did not come from whatever process is followed for the compliance check, but through the media. What I am not clear about is what power the Government has to ensure that checks are carried out. We currently have across Scotland hundreds of coaches working with young people without checks having been carried out. It is not clear to me what the Government is able to do, or is currently doing, actually to enforce action to tackle the backlog.

That takes us back to Gerard Hart’s point that the scheme is not mandatory, so there are limitations on what we can do to enforce it.

I share the committee’s concern about the scheme, but I do not want members to get the impression that the only thing that offers protection to young people in sport is the PVG check. There is a much wider culture in respect of how things operate at local club level, which is part of the wider child protection agenda. Although the PVG checks are important and we want to ensure that they are undertaken, there are other safeguarding practices out there that help to ensure that children are being kept safe while they participate in sport.

The committee has heard, from a number of people, evidence about differing practices. However, it is clear that the PVG process has not been successful in delivering what all of us want, and I am not sure how we can ensure that it does that. Surely we accept that a football coach who works with young people should be PVG checked: whatever we say about whether the check should be mandatory, surely we accept that as a basic principle. What is the Government doing to ensure that the checks are being carried out in what is, in effect, our nation’s biggest sport?

As I said, we have repeatedly offered to support the SYFA in clearing the backlog of PVG checks, and a number of PVG checks have been completed each month. In January, 418 checks were completed. I am not sure how much of the backlog has been cleared as a consequence of those checks or the checks that have taken place up to today but, as Gerry Hart said, the evidence suggests to us that there is still a backlog. That is why I have written to the SYFA to encourage it to take up the opportunity of help.

The wider review of the code of practice and operation of the scheme will give us an opportunity to probe the exact issue that Colin Smyth is referencing, which is not only about how we ensure that PVG checks are being carried out timeously and that a backlog is not created, but about the expectations that we ought to have of coaches who are working directly with children but who have not yet been subject to a PVG check.

Linked to the point that Mark McDonald made about this being not just about PVG checks, the minimum operating requirements for sports clubs that work with children have been in place for a number of years, and set out the broader context in which we should be creating a safe place in which children can enjoy sport. Compliance with those requirements is monitored regularly by sportscotland, and work is being done with Children 1st to develop and enhance that.

Nevertheless, the PVG scheme gives us all a bit more confidence because we can see explicitly which coaches have had a PVG check. In relation to football, that confidence is not being given to us, which is why Disclosure Scotland, Volunteer Scotland and the Scottish Government have offered proactively to seek reassurance directly from the SYFA that it will make fast progress on that. The directive gives the SYFA until the end of this month to ensure that all its coaches have had PVG checks.

I cannot be the only member who is concerned by the fact that this is the first time that the committee has been told about the offer of funding, although ministers have been aware of the work that we have been undertaking, and by the fact that we have not had an opportunity to question all the bodies that are involved until now.

Which offer of funding is that?

It is the offer of funding to clear the backlog of PVG checks.

Disclosure Scotland made an offer of practical support at the point at which the backlog came to light.

That offer was made in December.

It was made in December.

We have been undertaking our inquiry over the past few weeks, and that information would have been incredibly useful. I am sure that other members of the committee would agree with that.

Specifically, has such support been offered in the past—

Volunteer Scotland has also—

Just a minute, minister. You will get your turn.

In the past, has support for clearing such a backlog been offered but not taken up?

I am sorry; I did not mean to interrupt. Volunteer Scotland is funded to help voluntary organisations. That is not a new thing; it has been funded for a number of years to help volunteers to cope with the pressures that are put on them and to ensure that they are compliant with PVG checks.

We give Volunteer Scotland an annual payment, which allows it to act as the umbrella body for a range of sports clubs and other voluntary organisations throughout Scotland, and to work with those who get free checks to ensure that that is done much more efficiently. A significant funding package goes from the Scottish Government to Volunteer Scotland for that purpose, and Volunteer Scotland offers practical assistance to organisations to help them use the scheme effectively.

To answer the question, I am not aware that there has been previous incident involving the SYFA. However, when I became aware of the backlog, it seemed to me to be very important to offer practical—not necessarily financial—assistance with clearing the backlog, because we were aware that the SYFA was struggling to clear it by itself.

12:30  

When specifically did you become aware of that? Was it in October?

I became acutely aware of the issue in December.

Was that from the BBC investigation?

No. One of the compliance managers in Disclosure Scotland approached me with concerns about the issue and explained it to me. I directed the actions that took place thereafter. I was also aware of the BBC reports; the information was coming to me through a twin approach at that time.

I accept what the minister said about the question being wider than simply PVG and that there are issues of culture, not least because there is a range of conduct, from the very worst types of abuse through to bullying. However, given the centrality of PVG to the current system, do you think that it should be mandatory?

I do not want to pre-empt the review that we are about to undertake, and we have not fully defined the terms of reference for that review, but I expect that to be one of the questions that the review will consider when we look at the PVG scheme. I do not want to say any such thing here on the record before we have undertaken the review. It is important that we take a range of evidence in the review and then come to a firm conclusion based on that evidence. However, from what has been revealed during the course of the committee’s inquiry, I think that it is a question to which ministers need to give consideration.

I have a different question on PVG. Is Government—

I am sorry, Donald. I will let Alex Cole-Hamilton in with a supplementary.

Thank you, convener. That point speaks to the confusion that exists in all sectors where PVG applies. PVG checks are not mandatory, but it is an offence to employ or to engage in a regulated childcare position a person who is on the barred list. The only way that a person can indemnify themselves against that offence is by getting a PVG check.

No—that is not entirely accurate. It is not an offence to employ somebody if you do not know that they are barred; that is, if you have not been told that they are barred by the Government.

Parliament originally intended for there to be a discussion of exactly such an offence, so we held a public consultation in 2016 on whether that offence should be brought in. The outcome was that people thought that the safeguarding that the existing scheme provided was adequate; they did not think that such an offence would add any advantage to the current situation.

It is an offence to employ somebody who is barred, if one has been told that they are barred. It is also an offence for an individual who is barred to seek or to do regulatory work with children or protected adults, under any circumstances.

To distil that down, in effect, our approach to child protection at the moment is “Don’t ask, don’t tell”.

There are more than 1 million scheme members in Scotland, covering a large proportion of regulated work in almost every setting. I think that the current evidence is that the scheme is very well taken up and used by employers and voluntary organisations across the country.

Within the PVG scheme, the phrase “regulated work” is central. Is the Government giving consideration to that definition and to whether—along the lines of what Alison Johnstone was asking—it should be widened?

We will give that active consideration; it will form part of the work that the review undertakes. As Alison Johnstone highlighted, questions exist around, for example, intermediary football scouts. There is potential for confusion about whether clubs feels that individuals who are offering support in a voluntary capacity at local level need to be PVG checked. At the end of the day, I do not think that there is any harm whatever in somebody who might not be performing regulated work being PVG checked, because it provides an additional safeguard. However, perhaps we need to make the lines clearer for organisations, so that they can feel comfort with the approaches that they are taking.

To go back to Alex Cole-Hamilton’s point, the minimum operating requirements include making sure that recruitment and selection of people who work with children and young people include access to PVG checks. The minimum operating requirements are monitored by sportscotland. A range of support is on offer directly from sportscotland in community hubs and through local authorities. I want to counterbalance the suggestion that there is a “Don’t ask, don’t tell” approach: I do not think that that is the culture that the committee would experience in the sporting organisations that currently comply with the minimum operating requirements, which are regularly checked by sportscotland.

John Lunn will expand on that.

As I said to the committee the last time we gave evidence, the minimum operating requirements are checked by Children 1st. We get an annual formal review, and we get a quarterly status report. We work proactively with Children 1st and the governing bodies when there is any deviation from those requirements or when a governing body is not fully compliant.

The move to the standards that are currently being piloted is a positive step, as the minister has said. It has been an evolving picture. I take on board the fact that new best practice is always emerging, that changes occur and that the culture is constantly shifting. We are trying to learn and develop as we go.

It is important to say that the standards are being piloted by clubs, which will take us way beyond the current level of compliance. We want to embed the core elements of the minimum operating requirements in clubs, which will provide much greater rigour. As the minister has said, there are a number of organisations that can undertake PVG checks on behalf of clubs; it is not the case that there is a lack of resource or capacity—they are definitely already there. The move towards the standards, along with the taking on board of recent developments in an effort to make progress, is a positive step.

What is the timescale for the review?

I think that we are looking to conclude the review by 2019.

In legislative terms—

We will have the review: if legislation is required on the back of that, we anticipate that that would be passed by 2019. We are probably looking at 12 months or thereabouts for the review.

The review has commenced, in effect. The current phase is that the terms of reference are being finalised—the ministers will clear those at the end of February.

So the review has not commenced.

I am sorry—when I said that the review has commenced, I meant that we have had two conferences to engage with stakeholders on the review themes, and a number of workshops have already taken place with a range of stakeholders. The terms of reference will emerge at the end of February, and the substantial work to take forward the review will be done through the summer and into the autumn.

The work that the committee has done has been very valuable in helping to flesh out issues that we might not have been fully aware of prior to establishing the review. That will help us to crystallise some of the terms of reference. I put on record my gratitude to the committee for helping in that regard.

I would reflect that back and say that some of what we have heard today has helped to crystallise our views on how we view the situation that has emerged. We thank the ministers very much for their evidence.

I add that we will make sure that we keep you updated on how the round-table discussion goes. Although the PVG review is on-going, we can explore whether the code of conduct offers an opportunity to provide additional rigour in the system. The review will not necessarily need to have been completed before we can consider that.

Thank you very much.

12:38 Meeting continued in private until 12:53.