[Gayle]

Any sort of formal ID card or CRB check puts people off helping out.

For example - the mother of one of the children at school, she's very helpful when it comes to PTA things (raffle tickets, selling teas at events, helping out selling school sweaters, etc), her kids have been at the school for over 10 years so she's well known, she's never left alone with any children, she's NOT CRB checked.

Now, I realise that these rules are for the safety of the children but equally there has got to be some element of common sense in there too. This example is a hard working contributor to the school - if you asked her to fill in a form or put herself on a list she'd probably run a mile - the school would lose out because it's very hard to find willing volunteers.

Now, if we're talking about an author or someone who is unknown to the school coming in for a one-off session then I think, absolutely, there should be some sort of central check done.