Education recruitment providers Capita Education Resourcing has launched ‘Teachsafe by Capita’, a new compliance procedure to be used following the surprise January announcement from the Department for Education (DfE) that it will not continue its Quality Mark accreditation for supply teachers beyond 31 March.

The Teachsafe scheme has been developed by employment screening and risk mitigation firm The Security Watchdog.

The Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC) previously pledged, with support of the members of its Education Sector Group, to push forward with a new revamped version of Quality Mark, which it developed alongside the DfE.

Today an REC spokesperson confirms that the body is “launching a more comprehensive REC Audited-Education product that will be broader in scope and include all educational workers”, which will launch in April.

“By continuing with the legacy of the Quality Mark, education providers can be confident that they are using an accredited and legitimate agency supplier,” the spokesperson says. “The new REC Audited-Education Scheme will be launched in April 2013 and REC members who are holders of the Quality Mark will be able to apply to join the new scheme when their existing QM award has expired.”

However, Peter Flannery, Capita Education Resourcing’s managing director, tells Recruiter that the key is that the scheme is Capita’s own – it will not be used by other recruiters.

The company did not want to work alongside an organisation like the REC, or the Association of Professional Staffing Companies (APSCo), which launched an education sector group in January, Flannery says, because “a broader scheme would only negate the quality provision we’re putting in place. Playing in the same pond as everyone else, I can’t set myself apart”.

But he also said that in practical terms, his company, which supplies “upwards of 4,500 teachers in any given week”, would not be changing how it supplied teachers when the new scheme comes into play in April. “We’re operating already to these high standards,” he tells Recruiter.

The firm says its decision was reinforced following a survey of over 2,000 clients, in which 59% of respondents stated that quality assurance does affect their choice of supplier.

Included among the elements of Teachsafe are:

• Vetting for all candidates accordance with DfE Safeguarding and Safer Recruitment in Education regulations

• Client email vetting confirmation for every booking 

• Database controls to prevent candidates being deployed with incomplete checks

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