Schools out forever

The government has decided that all authors are potential paedophiles. Now admittedly some could fall into the dubious category of dissolute, badly dressed and partaking of the odd glass of claret, but child molestors? All writers who enter schools and colleges form November 2010 will have to be on the Independent Safeguarding Authority database. Philip Pullman is calling it 'the clause 28' for writers. Now it has taken over six months for me to clear the CRB check for a visit and talk to a gaol in West Yorkshire. Aside from the outragious premise that everyone is guilty before they get scanned by the governmets safety police, it will take an eternity. And what if an author, through no mistake of his or her own but because of the petty jealousy of some civil servant who doesn't like their books, is not given the all clear, and refused entry into schools? Will this impact on their professional writing career? I can see the Daily Mail and othert right thinking organs of the Fourth Estate, having a field day with their sanctimonious declarations of concern.