The Partnership team

The Partnership and Engagement team at the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) work regularly with other organisations, to identify how we can collaborate and share key messages among the safeguarding community

The Regional Outreach service, which consists of our Regional Safeguarding Outreach Adviser, has recently been launched within the Partnership and Engagement team

Regional Outreach team

The Partnership team at the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) work regularly with other organisations, to identify how we can collaborate and share key messages among the safeguarding community

The Partnership Team is responsible for partner and stakeholder engagement across DBS

Our team of Regional Outreach Advisers sit within the Partnership Team and provide dedicated support to organisations within their allocated region

Who are the Regional Outreach Advisers and what regions do they cover?

The Regional Safeguarding Outreach Advisers are currently working in the following regions:

DBS aims to protect the public by helping employers make safer recruitment and employment decisions, and by barring individuals who pose a risk to vulnerable groups from engaging in regulated activity

My role is to work with organisations across the West Midlands to advise and support on DBS functions and act as a single point of contact for DBS related enquiries.  For example, I can advise on what level of DBS check a role in your practice may be eligible for, or I can support in cases where you might have a legal duty to refer an employee to DBS for consideration for barring

I also offer a range of free training to raise awareness and knowledge of DBS processes and safeguarding responsibilities

If you have any general enquiries about the work of the Outreach team, please contact dbsregionaloutreach@dbs.gov.uk.

How can the Outreach Advisers support my organisation/network?

The Outreach Advisers will be working with organisations and networks within their region in several ways, including:

• Answering DBS-related queries and providing advice via phone/email
• Attending meetings, training and conferences, or visiting your organisation to have a face-to-face discussion (in line with pandemic restrictions)
• Developing and delivering presentations, workshops, webinars or discussions to provide an overview of DBS
• Collating feedback, suggestions or comments and feeding this back into DBS
• Helping organisations/networks to understand what level of DBS check can be applied for, and what information these checks will provide
• Informing organisations and employers of their duty or power to refer

The below video will provide some more information. A transcript for this video is available here: DBS Regional Safeguarding Outreach Programme – Video transcript (PDF, 453 KB, 1 page)

Please note, this video was launched when our Regional Outreach service was only available in Wales and the East Midlands. As detailed above, we now have Regional Safeguarding Outreach Advisers in a number of other regions

Barring referrals and the legal duty to refer

Certain employers and organisations have a legal duty to refer to DBS

Who has a legal duty to refer?

Regulated activity providers (employers or volunteer managers of people engaging in regulated activity) and personnel suppliers* in Northern Ireland, England and Wales are legally required to make a barring referral to DBS, where conditions are met

*A personnel supplier may be an employment agency, employment business or an educational institution, and is described as:

• An employment agency that makes arrangements to either find a work-seeker employment with a hirer, or to supply him to a hirer to employ
• An employment business that engages a work-seeker and supplies him to a hirer to work under a hirer’s control
• An educational institution, if it makes arrangements to supply a student – following a course at the institution – to a regulated activity provider such as a school

The two conditions that must be met

If you are a regulated activity provider or fall within the category of personnel supplier, you must make a barring referral to DBS when both of the following conditions have been met:

• Condition one

you withdraw permission for a person to engage in regulated activity with children and/or vulnerable adults, or you move the person to another area of work that isn’t regulated activity. This includes situations when you would have taken the above action, but the person was re-deployed, resigned, retired, or left. For example, a teacher resigns when an allegation of harm to a student is first made

• Condition two

You think the person has carried out one of the following:

• engaged in relevant conduct in relation to children and/or adults; an action or inaction has harmed a child or vulnerable adult or put them at risk or harm
• satisfied the harm test in relation to children and/or vulnerable adults e.g. there has been no relevant conduct but a risk of harm to a child or vulnerable still exists
• been cautioned or convicted of a relevant (automatic barring either with or without the right to make representations) offence

Must I make a referral?

If you are a regulated activity provider, or fall within the category of personnel supplier, you have a legal duty to refer where the relevant conditions are met

The duty to refer applies even when a report has been made to another body such as a local authority safeguarding team. The duty to refer also applies irrespective of whether another body has made a referral to DBS in relation to the same person

This helps to make sure that DBS has all of the relevant information to consider a case. DBS can then make a fair, consistent and thorough decision about whether to bar a person from working with vulnerable groups

A person who is under a duty to refer and fails to do so without reasonable justification is committing an offence, and if convicted, they may be subject to a fine up to £5,000

How to make a good quality barring referral

The below video explores what information we need as part of a barring referral and why this is important.

A transcript to accompany this video can be found here.

Barring referral guidance

There is a selection of guidance and leaflets available across GOV.UK, which may be of use when making a barring referral:

• Guidance: Making barring referrals to DBS
• Leaflet: Barring referrals – how and when to make one (English)
• Leaflet: Barring referrals – how and when to make one (Welsh)
• Flowchart: Should I make a barring referral?
• Online barring referral form
• Paper barring referral form

Contact us

If you have any questions about barring referrals, please refer to the list of Regional Safeguarding Outreach Advisers.