Representations to the Chief Officer of Police

No, and this trips a lot of people up. The DBS is a separate regulatory body. But before a certificate can be issued, the police are asked to provide any relevant information they hold.

Roles in activities involving children, including children's clubs, sports, childcare and education, and roles involving children or vulnerable adults such as health and care, require an enhanced DBS certificate. That is the most detailed certificate, and it can include information that has nothing to do with a conviction or caution. So even if you have never been in trouble with the police, they may hold something they consider relevant and think ought to be disclosed.

Where they propose to do that, they may offer you the chance to reply in writing with reasons why the disclosure should not be made, before a final decision is taken. Those are known as Chief Officer representations, or simply written representations.

For enhanced certificates the police can disclose not only convictions and cautions recorded on the Police National Computer, but also local information held by the force, sometimes called soft intelligence. That covers complaints, allegations and investigations even where no action was ever taken against you.

It can extend beyond criminal matters entirely, including, for example, the police being present at a multi-agency safeguarding meeting held by the local authority after an incident was reported, often called a LADO or MASH meeting.

Every force has a DBS disclosure unit which considers applications individually. Importantly, it is not deciding whether a crime took place. It is assessing risk. Even where an investigation ended in no further action, that may not prevent disclosure, because the police need only believe the information is factually correct on the balance of probabilities. That is a much lower threshold than bringing a criminal charge.

No. The police have total discretion over what to disclose, and the DBS has no power to influence, amend or control it. Everything the police disclose must be included on the certificate, and it can also trigger a barring investigation. That is why it is extremely important to get the right advice and prepare a comprehensive response if you receive a letter from the police offering you the opportunity to make written representations.

Two things can happen if disclosure is made on your DBS certificate, and the second is the one people underestimate.

First, it may cost you the role the certificate was for.

Second, it will also alert the DBS, which can open a barring investigation into whether the conduct justifies including you on the Children's Barred List, the Adults' Barred List or both. If that ends in barring, you will be unable to work or volunteer with those groups at all in future.

The stakes at this stage could not be higher.

If you have received a letter from the police offering you the opportunity to make representations, and you want to stop the police disclosing information to the DBS, get advice quickly, because the window to respond is limited. I will assess the proposed disclosure against your circumstances and against the criteria the police themselves have to apply, and where there are grounds, prepare robust written representations aimed at stopping the information being added to your certificate.