CHILDREN DENIED ACCESS TO QUALITY MUSIC EDUCATION

12.00.00am UTC (GMT +0000) Tue 17th Oct 2006

Paul Holmes, Liberal Democrat MP for Chesterfield has today slammed the performance of the Security Industry Authority (SIA), which has failed to process applications for a licence from Chesterfield security staff for months more than their target. Mr Holmes said:

"The Minister may state that the SIA aims to process 80% of applications within 6 weeks and that the backlog results in some applications taking 12 weeks but constituents of mine have been waiting for a licence since last year.

"This backlog is unacceptable. The SIA is still processing 38,568 cases but only 15,450 of these security workers have been given exemptions from prosecution while their applications are being processed.

"Even the applicants given an exemption cannot be given a guarantee that their licence will be processed before their exemption expires. This is forcing thousands of security staff to work illegally without a licence or face unemployment due to the inefficiencies of the SIA.

"This is a typical example of the Government introducing new regulations without providing the resources to make the new system work properly."