Have we become a Stasi state under Blair's Britain?

[the voice of reason]

As a father, there is an instinct that dictates that if people want to work with my kids, they should submit to anything (including a polygraph or anal probing), to prove to me that my kids will be safe...but after a few seconds.....common sense kicks in and i have to ask:

1) Will this new vetting scheme make my children safer?

No, because a seasoned pedophile will bypass areas of contact that require vetting. the panarama show stated itself that the scheme isn't designed to stop pedophiles it is more to do with giving parents confidence in their local bodies... to say "hey look, all our staff have been checked...you're kids are safe", so are we just paying through the nose to have government accreditation for local groups.

2) what are the strengths and weaknesses of the new vetting process?

and in that one question, i suddenly realise that i want nothing to do with what our government are about to hit us with. the strengths are that, it will close some avenues to a minority of sex offenders, but in the process by allowing the new scheme to come into effect, we allow our government to bring new liberty curbing measures into affect in the process.

In any court in the land, we are innocent until proven guilty, but if your government have their way, every complaint, every false accusation, and every malicous complaint will be printed in black and white for employers to see. of course you can contact the case worker who did your vetting, but they don't need to change their view, ultimately, for some, you are guilty without trial and there's nothing you can do about it.

in my younger days, i worked as a bouncer and whilst working one night, a male and female bouncer had to escort a rather drunk young woman from the premises, to the clubs horror, a few days later the police turned up to investigate a complaint about sexual assualt.

turned out the foul mouthed little tart who was ejected claimed to the police that while being escorted from the premises, the male bouncer molested her by grabbing her repeatedly...down below.

needless to say, the cops sat down with the security tape and quickly came to the conclusion that there was no case to answer. i bet that guy thought, that was the last he'd ever hear of that one.

but if panarama is to be believed that investigation could come back to haunt him in a big way....

Or take the case of the guy who was caught urinating against a wall in a completely deserted town at 3am, apparently it is indecent exposure and is a sexual crime. rehabilitation of offenders act removes the act from the police record, but will still be admissible in a vetting report.

suddenly, one ill thought out vetting process will make some peoples life miserable, it will circumvent the rules of law by labelling people guilty until proven innocent and it still hasn't made children any safer.

Companies and private individuals will pay £64 a time giving the government an extra £224 million in revenue in the first three years alone....for what?

The legal system was formed on the premise that it is better that ten guilty men go free than one innocent man be imprisoned, our loony left government sponsored by civil liberties groups want to change that concept.

Guilty until proven innocent, or until we agree with you

and "the state no longer feels that they need to meet the legal requirement of burden of proof, rumour and lies is good enough"

what i find really funny is that there are still people out there who will happily vote for this bunch of clowns at the next election.