Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 2 September 2024 to Question 2138 on Police: Vetting, whether her Department has made an assessment of the effectiveness of English police forces in delivering Disclosure and Barring Service checks in a (a) satisfactory and (b) timely manner.

The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) send their Enhanced checks to a police force if there is a potential match against the names on the application form and local police systems.

DBS commissions 52 independent police disclosure units that are spread geographically across the nation and are operationally independent.

DBS has dedicated Police Performance Managers that assess, monitor and work closely with the police forces to ensure police performance against published DBS Key Performance Indicators remains strong.

The DBS’s target is to issue 80% of Enhanced checks within 14 days. DBS’ performance against this target is published every quarter: DBS dataset 1: DBS checks, the DBS Update Service, and disputes - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).