[aldo_14]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/5001624.stm

Some 2,700 people have been wrongly labelled as criminals by the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB), it has emerged.

The mistakes have led to some people being turned down for jobs.

The Home Office said the errors arose when personal details were similar to those of people with a conviction, but were "a tiny proportion of cases".

It said 90% of disputes were resolved within 21 days and, while errors were regrettable, it would not apologise for its "caution".

Education Secretary Alan Johnson told the BBC only 0.03% of the nine million "disclosures" the agency makes had been wrong, so the issue had to be put "into context".

Emma Budd, from Maesteg, South Wales, lost out on a job she was offered by a children's charity when she was incorrectly identified by the CRB as a convicted shoplifter.

She said: "Because they sent the CRB check to the employee and the employer at the same time, the job just went out the window.

"Then I had a letter of apology which said it wasn't their fault."

The CRB is an executive agency of the Home Office which runs checks for organisations recruiting people to work in positions of trust, often with children.

The Home Office said customer satisfaction about the checks was "now at an all-time high" and said last year's checks prevented 25,000 unsuitable people being recruited.

t said it made "no apology for erring on the side of caution".

A spokesman said: "The Criminal Records Bureau's first and foremost priority is to help protect children and vulnerable adults by assisting organisations who are recruiting people into positions of trust.

"We err on the side of caution in these rare cases precisely because it is vital to ensure that the disclosure individuals do not fraudulently try to claim they have no criminal convictions when in fact they have."

He added that individuals could see the information disclosed about them, so if there had been an error, they could dispute it.

Shadow attorney-general Dominic Grieve said there was no excuse for making mistakes.

"There should be no reason why there should be mismatches of identity," he said.

"People have identifiers and it ought to be possible to resolve that issue. Lots of people in this country share the same names."

Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Nick Clegg said the errors took "Home Office incompetence to new absurd levels".

He added: "This latest fiasco will erase the last bit of public confidence in the Home Office."

These are the people that want to slap ID tags...sorry, cards on people, of course.

[ilya]

I still don't get how someone can be "wrongly labeled" as a criminal...

[Fineus]

Two thoughts;

I can appreciate them wanting to err on the side of caution, but they should have a step in place to ensure that this doesn't happen again - and they should apologise specifically to those affected by the mistake. Missing out on a job oppertunity is a potentially life altering occurence.

Secondly, if they are involved in utilising ID tags then presumably this (mistaken) criminal data could be written to innocent folks cards. What then?

[aldo_14]

I still don't get how someone can be "wrongly labeled" as a criminal...

Because they look a bit funny.

[Grug]

This has happened here quite a few times too. It's usually when two people share the same name. Even when the other person may live in an entirely different state, the other person's name will shine up with the other person's criminal offences. Just the stupid way they have things setup. =/

[vyper]

Another blow is struck for Quality Assurance in information system development.

[NGTM-1R]

I saw a set of statistics somewhere that gave out what you get with 99.99% success rates. If, say, the airlines settled for that, it would amount to about a crash a day at most major airports in the US. There's a good reason why most organizations are out not to screw up, and do something about it when they do...

Does the term "Bertillon" mean nothing to these people? Or is that the fault of the people requesting?