Wednesday 18 March 2009

CRB CHECKS FOR COUNCILLORS.

The Pioneer carries an article called “Criminal checks for Councillors” and, whilst being no “saint” myself, here was my reply…


In reference To your article “Criminal checks for Councillors”.
CRB checks on Councillor should be carried out as a matter of course, prior to any Councillor taking Office. The public have a right to know what, if anything, a Councillor has or has not been up to.
I, for one, do not have spotless past, this paper, in fact, has reported on my driving offence, having said that I have done nothing I am ashamed of and welcome public scrutiny.
In this day and age the protection of the public should be paramount, The Council could, quite easily, carry-out these checks and publish them on their web-site. Any Councillor not willing to have this done, for whatever reason, should step-down.
It is high time for more transparency, in all levels, of Government, too many, for too long, have got away with too much.
Councillor John Oddy.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Whilst I am generally in sympathy with your sentiments, within the UK we do have the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 which allows for certain offences to be regarded as "spent" after the required qualifying period of time. This would therefore possibly make a mockery of any requirement to declare past convistions. The only way round this is for the Act to be disregarded, which is the case with regard to some "sesitive" Government posts.

John Oddy said...

Adrian,
I’m sure you will agree with me, if there is a person acting on behalf of his/her community that community deserves to know that they are putting their trust in a deserving person. That stretches from the bottom all the way to the top, in particular some of our sleazier MP’s would and should be made to resign.