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Departmental Vetting

Answer

The current position is that all staff recruited to posts within the Home Office and its agencies (the UK Border Agency, Identity and Passport Service and Criminal Records Bureau) are subject to criminal records checks as part of the National Security Vetting (NSV). Checks are not random. Vetting is reviewed at various times during service.Table 1 shows the number of individuals subject to NSV.Machinery of Government changes will have affected those to whom NSV applied over the last 10 years.The figures also include renewal of security clearance; not all refusals of NSV will have been for reasons of criminality.All figures include those HM Prison Service posts where the Home Office Departmental Security Unit was required to complete the security clearance. HM Prison Service became an agency of the Ministry of Justice in May 2007.

	Granted NSV¹	Refused NSV²	Total
1 April 1999 to 31 March 1999	10,708	240	10,948
1 April to 31 March 2000	12,829	303	13,132
1 April 2000 to 31 January 2001	20,928	694	21,622
1 April 2001 to 31 March 2002	26,079	767	26,846
1 April 2002 to 31 March 2003	30,391	1,188	31,579
1 April 2003 to 31 March 2004	27,237	2,251	29,488
1 April 2004 to 31 March 2005	24,155	1,239	25,393
1 April 2005 to 31 March 2006	26,592	1,305	27,897
1 April 2006 to 31 March 2007	27,535	1,827	29,363
1 April 2007 to 31 March 2008	21,151	1,018	22,169
Total	227,605	10,832	238,437
¹ Numbers include cases where a criminal record did not preclude granting of NSV.
² Numbers include applicants who withdrew or where a criminal record may have resulted in refusal.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

213130; 478 c715-6W;478 c717-8W

Session

2007-08

Subjects

Home Office Vetting

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk