To think this is discrimination and its damn right wrong.

[EvalionAngel]

A Salford woman is 'too fat' to look after children, says council

dailym.ai/2c2xwoB

If this was race it would be wrong if this was a disability it would be wrong if this was gender it would be wrong. So why is fat discrimination allowed. Time for overweight people to be protected under discrimination and hate speech laws. Overweight people have to face daily abuse and thin privilege. The same way black and POC face white privileges and women face make privilege.

I'm so sick of this.

Sorry for the rant.

I'm quite glad that when they are considering potential fcs their criteria aren't just 'is it better than a care home?'

Adoptive parents often have to lose weight before they are approved, to ensure that they are fit enough to deal with running around after (possibly more difficult than usual) children and so they aren't at risk of premature morbidity

She's ten stone plus overweight, this isn't a case of someone liking their food, you don't get to twice a healthy bodyweight without having extremely disordered eating and an inactive lifestyle. She has eaten herself into infertility and a perforated bowel. At 32. No child should have that diet inflicted on them!

She can't take care of her own health, how on earth could she possibly provide healthy meals and appropriate activity for a child? Not to mention that her size reduces her mobility. How would she deal with a child who runs off? It's not like she could run after them. She couldn't grab a young child running out onto the road. Her reflexes wouldn't be fast enough.

Big, healthy people can foster, nobody's rejected on bmi alone, it's the health and lifestyle. She can't foster because she's barely mobile and suffers health problems due to her eating disorder and lifestyle.

Foster care is about providing children with a safe environment. You need to be able to feed them, exercise them, keep them physically safe, nurture them, deal with behavioural and psychological issues they may have. It takes a very competent, mature adult who can see from the childs point of view to do that.

Not someone like this woman who can't even take care of herself or understand that it's not all about her and her sense of entitlement.

They have health criteria and she didn't meet them because of her obesity. Lucky for her this is something she can fix

Bump yes, I've known a couple who both smoked and fostered, but you have to do it out in the garden away from the child.

You can't smoke and foster with my LA, they changed that rule in 2013. You have to be clear of smoking for 2 years.

There are lots and lots and lots of toddlers in care.

The primary concern is the welfare and rights of the children so tbh the whole debate about whether it's a choice to be fat or not is really redundant. They have decided that she can't provide the quality of care she needs to in order to be employed by them.

We accept far too low standards of care for our looked after children.

And to claim that she has some kind of 'right' to do this is fucking obscene frankly

Its not the same thing at all, OP you should be ashamed of yourself for that ridiculous post!

And lookit, if she's the kind of person to run to the Daily Mail crying about being discriminated against, she clearly isn't a good bet for fostering. Because she's an attention seeking dope, and from the sounds of it, with a tendency to exaggerate.

bumpmadethemjump -
you cannot be newly approved if you are a smoker no - and adopters have to prove how long they have given up for.
if you are already approved you are unable to foster children under 5
this is where i live - it is different all over the UK.

i'm an adoptive parent - this comes up all the time. if your BMI is over 30 you have to go for an additional medical, it is the medical adviser for the local authority who looks at the risks involved with any health issues and either says yes or no to foster or adopt - usually with weight they say loose X amount or get to X BMI and we will redo the medical. loosing the weight reduces the risk of different health conditions - heart attack, stroke, diabetes etc...

children in care have lost enough without the foster or adoptive carer suddenly becoming very ill or passing away. this is why its considered so carefully.

most people i know who are serious about fostering or adoption just choose to loose the weight - the LA or GP sometimes fund slimming classes for support.

There are lots and lots of toddlers in care

Not in my area. There are 8, all in foster care. And over 200 children over 10, nearly half in multiple occupancy properties (children's homes).

Vast majority of children in care are teenagers. Only 2 babies (under 1) came into care last year.

I was abandoned as a baby and so dragged up in a children's home, I would have loved to have been adopted by someone like her. Instead I spent 17 years being told I was a worthless piece of shit, a drain on society etc etc.
beaten, used and abused by staff who were much bigger.

I don't doubt her weight was a factor. However, given their reaction, and how they have chosen to present said reaction, I'd leave room for the possibility there had also been concerns about other characteristics, or perspectives too.

Their reaction doesn't scream an abundance of ability to communicate calmly, proportionately and appropriately in the face of issues that elicit a strong emotional response. Which I'd imagine would be a highly desirable, if not absolutely essential, quality in a foster parent.

Perhaps going to the Mail was not the first time they set off a yellow flag with the people assessing them. Specifically with regards as to how they react to difficulties and set backs.

YABU, foster parents need to provide over and above good enough parenting. If she was that serious about filtering she would lose weight instead of posing for photos in national press 😡😡

Fostering not filtering!

Very well put MrsDeVere

"Salford council say their teams assess whether potential carers are fit enough - and say it is crucial they were physically able to keep up with children."

This is wrong.
What about the artist Alison Lapper, whose son Paris featured in the BBC programme Child of Our Time? How would she fulfill the above council's statement?
Obviously if the person in question was totally bedridden or disabled to a point where she couldn't care for a child, it might be different but I'm really not seeing where Salford Council is coming from.

There is likely to be much more to this story. If you read the statement from the council carefully you'll notice that they don't actually say why she was turned down. We've only got her version of the story.

Do you have any idea how difficult it is for social services to remove children from their parents? I don't believe a word of it. What a load of crap.

And it's the fail! Jeez!

Stupid woman. She seems to see her rights and entitlements as more important than children who through no fault of their own except for crappy adults and their bad decisions, have had awful starts in life.

No one has a right to be a parent. No one has a right to adopt. No one has a right to foster. Children are not possessions to make adults feel better about themselves.

I would have thought that a loving family home would have been better than a care home, but what would the cut off be? I haven't RTFT but perhaps she could lose weight and apply again?

Just read it properly (oops) and see she wants to be a foster carer. I would think it very important that foster carers are physically fit and healthy and still stand that the article is full of crap and only a fraction of the real story!

Alison Lapper's child Paris is her birth child. She loved him and looked after him and disciplined him in such a way that he didn't need running around after. She has demonstrated that she is a perfectly fit person to be a parent, despite her disability. And he seems like a happy, well brought up, well adjusted lad (not that I know him of course).

Woah. Not all children are in care because their parents are crap

I've just placed a child because the sole family member is in hospital having chemo/radio. The child will go back.

verbena there is a world of difference between the standards expected of carers appointed by the govt and what bio parents are allowed to get away with.

In the case of Alison Lapper, IIRC she did have able bodied carers for Paris as well as providing some care herself.