What is Safer Recruitment?

Safer recruitment practice is an essential part of the Church of England’s approach to safeguarding.  Safer recruitment refers to the whole recruitment process including application forms, confidential declarations, role descriptions, taking references, interviews and criminal record checks.

The new Safer Recruitment and People Management Code of Practice 2026  sets out safer recruitment practices for people working or volunteering in a Church of England setting and imposes requirements on relevant persons to ensure the safer recruitment and ongoing management of those appointed to roles that work with children and vulnerable adults. 

To ensure only the most suitable people are recruited to work with children and/or adults experiencing, or at risk of abuse or neglect, churches should follow the Steps to Safer Recruitment.

What is the Disclosure and Barring Service?

The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) helps employers make safer recruitment decisions and prevent unsuitable people from working with vulnerable groups. 

Criminal record checks provide details of an individual’s criminal record, including convictions, cautions, reprimands and warnings. Individuals who have been judged as unsuitable to work with vulnerable groups can also be placed on a barred list, and therefore cannot seek or undertake certain work with children, young people and/or adults at risk. It is the policy of the Church of England that all those who work in eligible roles must have an enhanced criminal record check, with or without a barred list check, as appropriate.  

DBS eligibility Changes September 2026

From 1 September 2026, the supervision exemption for regulated activity with children has been removed. As a result, more paid and volunteer roles working with children will be eligible for an Enhanced DBS check with a children's barred list check, even where activities are supervised by another checked individual.

The Church of England have provided a helpful infographic which helps to raise awareness of this change and this can be found by clicking here

Cost of DBS checks

There is no charge to parishes for enhanced DBS check for volunteers. 

From the 5th October 2026 the DBS have reduced the fees for paid posts and Basic Checks so the new prices can be found below.

• Paid posts in parishes will be charged the DBS fee which will be £41 + Admin Fee (£48.08).  
• All Basic Checks for parishes will incur a cost of £20.00 +Admin Fee (£27.08). 

The Diocese of Portsmouth have appointed thirtyone:eight to process its DBS checks.

If your parish needs to appoint a new Lead Recruiter to process DBS checks please contact safeguarding.admin@portsmouth.anglican.org

Click here to login to the E-bulk system

Click here to read the DBS Code of Practice - Churches and organisations are required to fully comply with this practice

Overseas Criminal Record Checks

The DBS cannot currently access overseas criminal records or other relevant information as part of its disclosure service. If you are recruiting people from overseas or if an applicant has either lived and/or spent a period of time abroad s/he will be required to obtain a criminal record check or certificate of good conduct from the relevant embassy/consulate/high commission to cover the time s/he lived/spent abroad.

For further information about criminal record checks for overseas applicants please click here.

If it is not possible to obtain criminality information from the relevant embassy, the recruiting parish/church body will need to make further appropriate checks so that any relevant events that occurred outside of the UK can be considered. These further checks should include additional references, including at least one from a previous employer, and if necessary the referee should be contacted to provide further clarification as appropriate.

Right to Work Check

A DBS does not check whether an applicant is permitted to work within the UK. Therefore, parishes must make sure that any new workers (paid or voluntary) are allowed to work in the UK before they are appointed. The implications of not checking an individual’s right to work in the UK can be costly, and therefore parishes are encouraged to ask all their new appointees to provide evidence of their right to work in the UK before they start their role, and keep a record of this as evidence that they have checked.

For further guidance on checking the applicants right to work in the UK please click here and to access the government quick answer tool please click here.

Update Service Check

The Update Service is an online subscription service for individuals who hold  Enhanced DBS checks that lets organisations and employers carry out a free, instant online check to view the status of an existing Standard or Enhanced DBS certificate.

The subscription is free for volunteers and costs £15 per year for paid posts.

If an employer or organisation wants to check the status of an applicant’s certificate, they must do so with the individual’s consent, following the steps set out in this guide.

Before carrying out a DBS Update Service check, you must first ask to see the applicant’s original DBS certificate. This allows you to check that the certificate is at the correct level and covers the correct workforce for the role.

You can only use the Update Service where the existing DBS certificate is for exactly the same level and workforce as the check required for the new role.

For example:

• If the new role is not eligible for a barred list check, but the applicant’s DBS certificate includes a barred list check, you cannot use the Update Service.
• If the role only requires a check for the Child Workforce, but the applicant’s certificate covers the Child and Adult Workforces, you cannot use the Update Service.

Before carrying out a status check

You must be able to answer yes to all of the following questions:

• Have you seen the applicant’s original paper DBS certificate in person? A copy of the certificate, or viewing it over a video call, is not acceptable.
• Have you checked the applicant’s ID to confirm their identity?
• Do you have the applicant’s consent to carry out the check?
• Are you legally entitled to the same level of DBS certificate?
• Does the DBS certificate contain only the exact workforce information that you are entitled to know about for the role you are recruiting for?

If you answer no to any of these questions, you must not carry out an Update Service status check.

You can read more about the requirements on the DBS website by clicking here.

Carrying out the check

Once you have confirmed that all the requirements above have been met, you can click here to carry out the Update Service check.

When completing the check, enter the name of your parish as the organisation name.

Further guidance is available on the DBS website here, including information about how to interpret the result of an Update Service status check.