Bracknell Forest Councillors will face criminal record checks in a move made by only a few other councils across the country.

Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks will be carried out on all council members, co-opted members and mayoral consorts to ‘enhance public confidence in local government’.

It comes after an independent government review recommended that authorities such as Bracknell Forest introduced the checks for elected officials involved with children’s services and vulnerable adults.

The Simon Bailey Review, published in January this year, recommended that unitary and upper tier authorities adopted checks as ‘best practice’ before official legislation was passed.

Mr Bailey found that there was ‘no uniformity of practice’ among councils, with some not obtaining any checks at all.

No legislation has yet been passed, making Bracknell Forest one of the first authorities to adopt the policy itself.

A decision to introduce the checks was introduced at a Bracknell Forest Council cabinet meeting on Tuesday, October 15.

Introducing the agenda item, leader of the council Mary Temperton said it ‘should’ve been in place all the time’.

Councillor Temperton said: “Every resident when we go into their houses, or we talk to them on the street, or we go and talk to their children would assume that we have checks.”

Councillor Iskandar Jefferies, cabinet member for leisure, culture, public protection and democracy said: “Although not a legal requirement, it is leading the way for other boroughs or councils that are not doing this already.

“It is a very important step forward in safeguarding our residents and being elected members of the public it is very important that we are able to demonstrate that we are good upstanding individuals of the community.”

Councillor Guy Gillbe agreed that members of the public will be 'amazed' that checks are not already in place.

He said: “We are truly pioneering on this; we are very much one of the first councils to adopt this.”

A draft policy says that while basic DBS checks will be required for all councillors, enhanced checks will be carried out for those as elected members of committees concerning children and adults.

This includes cabinet members, health and care overview and scrutiny members, and overview and scrutiny commission members.

Basic checks should be carried out within 28 days of being elected, followed by every 12 months councillors remain in office.

Enhanced checks will be carried out with 14 days of appointment to a role on proposed committees included.