Summary
Criminal record disclosure is one of the fundamental barriers that prevent people with criminal records securing employment, often unnecessarily. We generally welcome reforms that reduce the length of time a person must disclose and endorse the position that people receiving custodial sentences of more than four years should be included in the right to withhold information about their convictions after a certain period of time.
However, for the system to be fair and proportionate, disclosure periods must be consistent with the severity of the sentence/disposal. We are concerned that reforming disclosure periods for community and custodial sentences in isolation from the other (more common) disposals will create disproportionality: in some cases, people convicted of less serious offences will be obliged to disclose them for longer than those with more serious convictions.
This cannot happen.