Protecting Vulnerable Groups (PVG) scheme data: FOI release

Information requested

How many individuals signed up to the Protecting Vulnerable Groups scheme have convictions, and could you supply the data for each of the last five years?

- Can you include what jobs they have, and what the convictions they have, i.e violence, sexual?

Response

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance Disclosure Scotland does not have some of the information you have requested.

We must emphasise that all data provided has been prepared on the basis of information provided at the point an individual applied to join the Protection of Vulnerable Groups Scheme (“the PVG Scheme”). It does not therefore correspond with the number of active PVG Scheme members in a role. It does not include information about the number of individuals who have subsequently been barred from doing regulated work with children and/or protected adults as a consequence of their conviction(s).

Disclosure Scotland keeps a list of people who are unsuitable to do regulated work with children and a list of people unsuitable to work with protected adults. When a person who is applying to join the PVG scheme has a previous conviction(s), Disclosure Scotland will assess whether the conviction(s) indicates that they may be unsuitable to carry out regulated roles with children and/or protected adults. If so, Disclosure Scotland will consider whether the person should be included in the children’s list and/or the adults’ list and barred from doing regulated roles with these groups.

Even after a person has joined the PVG scheme, they are subject to continuous monitoring. This means that if they are convicted of a new offence, or the police provide Disclosure Scotland with information that is relevant to their membership of the scheme, Disclosure Scotland will proactively place the scheme member under consideration for listing if the new information is such that Disclosure Scotland considers that it may be appropriate to list the person in either the children’s or adults’ list (or both). Disclosure Scotland will advise all organisations for whom it knows the person is carrying out a regulated role, and any professional regulator if relevant, that it is considering whether the person should be barred.

From 1st April 2025, membership of the PVG scheme became mandatory for people carrying out regulated roles. It will be an offence for an individual to undertake a regulated role without having obtained PVG membership. It is a criminal offence for a barred person to do, or to seek, or agree to do, any regulated role from which they are barred. And it is an offence for an organisation to offer a regulated role to a person barred from carrying out that type of role.

I have responded to each of your questions below.

(i) How many individuals signed up to the Protecting Vulnerable Groups scheme have convictions, and could you supply the data for each of the last five years?

Table 1 below contains the number of new applications to join the PVG scheme in the last five financial years, and the number of applicants in each of those financial years who had convictions.

Table 1

Financial Year*	Number of applicants who joined the PVG Scheme	Number of applicants who joined the PVG Scheme with convictions
2020-2021	54729	2501
2021-2022	83755	3229
2022-2022	89792	3004
2023-2024	88350	2637
2024-2025	75048	2297

*Financial year 1st April to 31st March

(ii) Can you include what jobs they have, and what the convictions they have, i.e. violence, sexual?

Disclosure Scotland does not hold data on who has or hasn’t been approved for, or recruited into, any given role/job. Disclosure Scotland helps employers make informed recruitment decisions by providing PVG checks as part of a wider recruitment process. It is for an employer to decide whether someone is suitable for a particular role, and Disclosure Scotland is not informed of the outcome of that recruitment decision. As such, Disclosure Scotland cannot advise what jobs or corresponding convictions the individuals referred to in table 1 have.

This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that Disclosure Scotland does not have the information you have requested regarding jobs of scheme members or their corresponding convictions.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.