The Home Office has announced that it intends to stop certain old and minor cautions and convictions from appearing on criminal record certificates. This follows the Court of Appeal judgment of R (on the application of T) v Chief Constable of Greater Manchester and others [2013] EWCA Civ 25 in January this year, which found that a blanket requirement to disclose all convictions and cautions, regardless of how old they were, was incompatible with the right to privacy under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
Under the proposed changes, criminal record certificates would no longer disclose:
- Adult convictions which are more than 11 years old, and cautions which are more than 6 years old;
- For individuals that were under 18 years old at the time of the offence, convictions which are more than 5 and a half years old, and cautions which are more than 2 years old.
However, these changes would not affect certain specified offences or offences that resulted in a custodial sentence. In addition, individuals who have committed more than one offence would still have all of their convictions disclosed regardless of the age of the conviction.
The proposed changes will need to be approved by Parliament before coming into force. Until that happens, the Disclosure and Baring Service (which issues criminal record certificates) has indicated that it will continue "business as usual". This effectively means that the disclosure requirements which were found to be incompatible with the ECHR by the Court of Appeal in T will remain in effect until such time as new rules are implemented.
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