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Peter O'Sullivan:
This topic came up too close to exams to give it a full airing.

So the system/plan is.
1. Instructor types fill out a form for AUC. The form requires details of place you lived for 3 months or more.
2. The Gardai get the form and return whatever info they have on you to AUC
3. AUC do what with the info?

I've so many issues with this? What are AUC looking for, say if I had a string of convictions for fraud and embezzlement would they say I couldn't be a kayak instructor? So what is the threshold for AUC rejecting someone? Is it a published threshold, who decides it and how does in vary? 

What is the AUC's data protection policy? If they are collecting mountains of personal data they legally need to have a storage and disposal policy? I checked the AUC's website, no mention of a data policy.

Could info gained in one club be used against an individual in another club. Example, an active kayak instructor with fraud convictions gets elected as treasurer of another club. Will AUC be happy to have that person instructing but veto them being treasurer?

According to the last census about 10% of the Irish population have lived and worked abroad. How on earth are they to get Garda/AUC approval if the police in the other country don't have an reciprocal arrangement with the Gardai?

I hear it takes about 3months to be 'vetted'. So does that mean from next year on when the safety officer is calling instructors on a Friday evening they will also have to ask 'have you been vetted?' This will further reduce the pool of available instructors. Should we be sending out the forms to all the outside instructors now to be ready for September?

Its very hard for people who are no risk to children and who would pass the AUC scrutiny to say they don't want to be vetted, its an emperor's new clothes situation. No one will want to object or be seen to object, but they might not want their life filled out on paper and passed around.

This Garda vetting in complete nonsense. Its aim is to protect children, the effectiveness of this system is completely unknown. But what certainly does is creates a huge heap of bureaucracy, rules out vast numbers of legitimate people and creates a false sense of security.

These are only some of the many issues I have with Garda vetting. I'm glad I am not instructor and I can bring this up in context where people aren't asking what do I have to hide.

Tiny Tim:
this isnt a topic for discussion its a requirment for instructors, trainee instructors and the club to have completed

Diarmuid:
I agree with some of what you've said there Peter but like Dave says, we just have to do it!

It's AUC rules and also (soon to be) the law that all instructors must be fully vetted before working with under 18s, it'll be a criminal offence for everyone involved (bar the child of course) for this not to happen...

Douchier:
I'll try and answer some of Peter's questions as best I can.

Paragraphs 1-3:
*The Garda Vetting Unit check for "details of all convictions and/or prosecutions, successful or not, pending or completed, in the State or elsewhere as the case may be are disclosed to the authorised liaison person in the registered organisation."
*They only disclose this information to the specified liaison person, not the organization overall.
*If a disclosure is made, you have the right to find out exactly what it contains. Indeed, you have the right to any personal information that anyone has about you.
*the AUC isn't an independent body, it's part of UCD which certainly does have a data protection policy.
*These criteria will be possibly unique to the UCD/ the AUC - in which case it does make sense for the to publish them - fair point. It's possible that UCD have a standard set of garda vetting policies that are listed somewhere else.


Paragraph 4:
*The're the AUC, not the mafia. They're not into blackmail or marginalising people for the hell of it.
Aside from that, it's illegal to keep personal information for purposes other than those specified.

Paragraph 5:
*This is certainly a big potential problem with the Garda vetting procedure. However, it's a problem that would need to be addressed at a national and international level. Perhaps the college could encourage movement on this issue but it shouldn't be criticized for something that's not in its power and we shouldn't refuse to follow the procedure even if it might not work in all cases.

Paragraph 6:
* I'm sure that NiallF will tell you that it means a lot for him to organise, but he seems to be pretty on the ball. That is why he's asked us all to do this now, so that they'll be ready in time for September.

The rest:
As Dave and Diarmuid said, it's not an option.

Peter, I understand that you're not a person who likes to blindly follow into things, someone who likes to see the point of doing something and see that it's done right- it's not a perfect system and you're skeptical of it because of that. UCD are implementing it as best they can.

I disagree about a false sense of security. Having vetting isn't a carte blanche and nobody thinks it is. People are still required to act in a respectful manner to everyone and follow ISC child-protection policy at all times.
UCD has a few different forms to be filled out for this reason and whilst no one of them does everything, between them all they're covering as many bases as they can.

Hopefully the Gardai will be able to implement a perfect system in the future, but for now this is what we can do. It's better to have something that works in the vast majority of cases than to have nothing at all.


(now, to remember to print out those forms...)

Peter O'Sullivan:

--- Quote from: Douchier on May 15, 2013, 22:49:53 ---
Garda Vetting Unit
data protection policy

*These criteria will be possibly unique to the UCD/ the AUC - in which case it does make sense for the to publish them - fair point. It's possible that UCD have a standard set of garda vetting policies that are listed somewhere else.

*The're the AUC, not the mafia. They're not into blackmail or marginalising people for the hell of it.
Aside from that, it's illegal to keep personal information for purposes other than those specified.

* I'm sure that NiallF will tell you that it means a lot for him to organise, but he seems to be pretty on the ball. That is why he's asked us all to do this now, so that they'll be ready in time for September.

As Dave and Diarmuid said, it's not an option.

It's better to have something that works in the vast majority of cases than to have nothing at all.

(now, to remember to print out those forms...)

--- End quote ---

Cheers for the links, good to see what is actually being checked.
When I searched ucd.ie I kept getting a different policy, good to have the right one.

I didn't intend to suggest AUC is some kind of mafia, but when you start gather large amounts of data in a structured way you can find whole new uses for it that you never considered.

Usually companies never intend to breach data protection laws but do so by accident through sloppy storage or poor understanding of what they are allowed to use the data for.

I am more worried about getting outside instructors to fill out these forms, especially for instructors that only occasionally instruct, and may never teach kids, I'm sure the current club members will have the forms filled out ASAP.

Would it make sense to have the form linked on the board so people could download it and return it, speed up the process some bit.

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