Can HE be a cover cfor child abuse? discussion on Radio 2 today.......

[Yurtgirl]

I know I know Jeremy Vine and his show not what everybody enjoys but...........

He has just announced that todays show will feature a discussion called "Can HE be a cover for child abuse?"

Anyone confident enough to phone up and have a rant?????????????

Kay I must agree with you about the NSPCC but honestly, The Voice is an utterly fabulous organisation and Camilla at Kids Company is, in my view, peerless.
These are not suits, or government agents, or politicians, these are just a bunch of folk committed to disadvantaged kids.
But TBH it will be the Police and NSPCC who will swing this change in legislation...the governemnt would be hung out to dry if it ignored pressure from heavy hitters like that.
I'm afraid the proposed change is a done deal.
I hope it helps some children and doesn't inconvenience any HEers too much.
And I do mean that because I can see you all do a fab job with your children.

watch this YouTube video

I wouldn't think it is a 'done deal'Litchick, I wouldn't worry about it! I can't see the government taking on such a vocal group-it wouldn't be worth the trouble it would cause. There is also the fact that in some areas people can't get a decent school for their DCs. It would open up a huge can of worms.

Its not the inconvenience litchick - I'm home with my children anyway so not like I need to take time off work or anything to let some inspector in - its the insult that is the implication my children are more likely to be abused because of how they are educated. Thats what really sticks in my throat.

Only read OP so far but this sort of thing makes me They talk about it over here too[southern Ireland]
Of course it could be or parents could be setting their children to work on the farms.Then again you could send your child to a Catholic school to be abused by the local priest.This is just sensationalism because the Government dosen't like the idea of home ed,they feel threatened for numerous reasons.Have to go as dp wants comp will read rest later.

Why do the people on here who actually HE want to claim the tiny group of people who only pretend to truly HE (but who actually deregged their children for other reasons), as being HEers? Surely they are not HEers at all?

OK there must be a tiny number of people who truly HE but secretly abuse, just as there are people who send their children to school and secretly abuse - abusers who are expert in the whole maintaining a facade of normality, whether this is 'normal school life' or 'normal HE life'. But isn't this review about identifying not those people, but the people who do not even have a facade of 'normal HE life' to maintain - people whose real agenda could be discovered relatively easily by interviewing the child involved?

I didn't take this as meaning the government thinks people who HE are more likely to abuse their children. Isn't it more like separating the wolves in sheep's clothing (a small number of pretend HEers) from the sheep (the real HEers)? (I know you'll all love that analogy .)

No one would say a real sheep is more likely to howl at the moon than, say, a cow, just because they might know that there is a problem with some wolves dressing themselves up as sheep. Real sheep are still real sheep, no more likely to howl like a wolf than any other animal, and genuine HEers are still genuine HEers, no more likely than average to abuse a child. But it seems that there are a few wolves out there pretending to be sheep and they are what this review seems to be aimed at finding, aren't they?

The whole issue of sheep and cows who secretly howl - true secret abuse it's very hard to discover - that's taken no further by this - surely that's not really the point of this and no one is saying the sheep are actually more likely than the cows to be doing this? It may not do anything for those families, to get the wolves identified, but at least it does something for the children in the families of the few 'pretend HEers' represented by the wolves in this analogy.

Before I got involved in HE, I would have agreed that it was a very small thing to ask HErs to let their children have a face-to-face meeting with an LA representative in the interests of finding the "wolves". A minor irritiation and inconvenience, which would help to protect vulnerable children - no problem.

But now that I know far more about it, I see the problem quite clearly.

In order to get the power to do this "small thing", a very big principle would have been established in law - that the decision to deregister a child from school in order to HE is automatically a basis for starting child welfare procedures.

Once that link is a legally established one, it opens the door to far more intrusion by LAs in how families live their lives.

At the moment, some LAs misuse the powers they have, and claim to have additional powers, in order to harass and intimidate innocent HE parents. Those parents who know the law can protect themselves from this interference. These LAs do this because they do not believe that parents should have the right to educate their children outside of school, or that they ought to be forced to follow the NC or take standard tests, or ought to be regularly inspected. All this despite the fact that it is perfectly legal in this country to opt out of the school system and accept responsibility for your own childrens education without using schools.

If those LAs had the right to invoke "child welfare" against HE families when there was no suspicion of anything apart from the HE itself, they would make use of it to further interfere in family life, and use it as a threat to ensure co-operation. They would also very soon start trying to get extra powers and control.

I'm a decent law-abiding citizen, as concerned about child welfare as anyone, and also about issues like terrorism. But anyone who has seen the way in which powers of surveillance gained under anti-terrorism legislation have been misused (eg to watch families who might have fraudulently applied for schools) can hardly doubt that the government (central and local) will not hesitate to make full use of any powers they have, regardless of whether that was the basis on which they got those powers.

If we allow this to happen, within a few years it will no longer be able to opt out of the school system to educate your children in the way you believe to be suitable for them. You may not think that matters, you may think schools are fine. But they are not fine for all children all of the time, and those children need an alternative.

Sorry I'm in verbose mode this morning...

Another reason I'm against this -

Children who are being deregistered from school have been seen in school 5 days a week by a number of adults with a duty of care for them. Adults who the child should know and hopefully trust. If the child has not confided in those adults, and those adults have not detected any problems important enough to raise child welfare concerns, then why does anyone believe that a single meeting with a stranger from the LA who doesn't know the child, and who the child doesn't know and trust, is going to make these things obvious?

Final point for a bit

How many of you have moved house more than once with your children?

I could provide evidence which shows that some abusers move house frequently in order to conceal the abuse.

How about we give the LA the authority to come round to the house just after you've moved in, to demand a face-to-face interview with each of your children "just to make sure" they are not being abused?

The way you feel about that suggestion is probably similar to how HE families feel about this one.

Great points AMIS, no need for !

three great posts in a row, AMIS. You're on fire today!

In secondary schools, colleges and universities inappropriate relationships of a sexual nature are sometimes formed between students and teachers. There has been a recent debate about whether or not teachers who get inappropriately involved with students on or over the age of consent should actually face prosecution and be included on the sexual offences register. So it is generally accepted that abuse, or at the very least unethical behaviour, can and does happen within schools by certified teachers. I think it would be safe to assume that most of these relationships involve a larger proportion of male teachers than female ones. Would it be fair, therefore, to require that every would-be male teacher be subjected to extra police or welfare checks "just in case" they may become involved with a student in an unethical way? Would it be fair to subject male teachers, nursery workers etc, to more checks than their female counterparts just because there exists a greater proportion of male peodophiles than female Ps in society? I think many would say that such a suggestion was unreasonable. So what basis is there then, to suggest that parents who have their children full time should be subjected to extra supervision than other parents, just because a tiny minority "may" use the excuse of HE to perpetrate their crimes?

See I think you're mixing up 'wolves' and 'howling sheep', there. The point of looking for 'wolves in sheep's clothing' is not to find long-term abusers who'd been abusing while the child was in school (I quite agree, why should one meeting find out any more in that situation) - but the ones who had deregged because something was happening or about to happen (be it marriage or whatever) that would have been picked up in school.

I'm not convinced by the 'allowing face-to-face meetings will lead to HE being illegal' thing, either.

If we had moved frequently, the LA would not need to come to my house as my dds would, as it happens, be at school. So yes I would be annoyed if they wanted to come to my house. But if I was a teacher and a child came into my class who was new to the area and it turned out had moved often, I wouldn't think there was anything odd about being particularly alert to any signs of problems. Do you think that would be wrong?

You see I send my child to school every day knowing that the teacher has a moral responsibility to act on any signs of abuse at home (whether or not they always do so efficiently, or always see signs, is a separate issue). I'm quite happy for that to happen. I don't see the idea of a face to face interview as being any 'stronger' than that, in terms of interference.

I think I would understand the HEers point of view more if I could see some positive suggestions from people here about how to find the wolves who do exist - alternative ways to a face to face LA interview. After all, that's the obvious thing to do in a way - take it 'in house' as it were, persuade people that that's not needed to find the wolves, there are better ways. At the moment the argument seems to be "yes there are people sho specifically pretend to HE in order to mistreat their children, but that's nothing to do with us - the right in principle to keep a child entirely isolated should we want to* totally outweighs any responsibility we have as general members of society to help protect those children". Like all arguments based on civil liberties, it could be seen as important, but also harsh - surely in practice adopting that position on principle goes hand in hand with finding practical alternatives, rather than just washing your hands of the children of the 'wolves'? A bit like taking a stand against identity cards ought to go hand in hand with an attitude of being willing to work on alternative solutions to problems the government claims justify cards, rather than just shrugging our shoulders and saying we don't care about those problems, the principle of no cards is more important. (But maybe there have been such suggestions and I haven't seen them, in which case sorry!)

*I know very well most HEd children are not isolated, quite the reverse.

See it seems obvious that any child that's out and about in the community as most HEd children are, in regular contact with people outside their family including club leaders, sports teachers, other parents and so on, doesn't need a special interview. But then how do you identify the children that isn't happening to? You could imagine systems where there are other ways of showing a child is not at risk because they're out and mixing all the time, but also that that would be a bit of faff and a simple short interview is a lot easier and more efficient. But sometimes principles of civil liberties demand faffier solutions rather than the convenient ones (big brother databases being very convenient, but unacceptable, for instance). But the faffier solutions, whatever they are, require effort and a willingness on the part of everyone involved to actually see the problem as worth solving.

Do HEers see the problem of parents who dereg and pretend to HE to mask abuse as a problem society should be making an effort to solve? Or as something only relevant to them when it's brought forward as justification for an unwelcome interview, and therefore something to be dismissed as insignificant?

thing is though, this consultation appears to have been started on the say-so of a few people/agencies who are alleging that various sorts of abuses are happening, but have not, despite requests both directly and via the FoI act, managed to come up with any actual statistics, or case details. They're saying "we don't know who these children not at school are, or where they are, so there must be something horrific happening to them.

beep - Not all of us are saying that we have an issue with the LA coming into our house to check our children are safe.

Let me explain something to you - I chose to de register my child becuase the rigid and unbending curriculum and methods of teaching he was subject to (like most children in school) made him frustrated, annoyed and just want to "get away". Now he is at home he has the space and freedom to pursue topics in his own way to a certain extent. I am still fairly structured with him - we have 2-3 hours each morning that he has to focus on maths or literacy and during those times I can see his stress levels rising again. Already the media are making me nervous enough to start insisting DS does written work even when he doesn't want to because I want something to "show for it" when the LEA come knocking to inspect me.

AMIS makes perfectly succint and rational arguments as to why this review is bad news for HErs. Its not about wolves and sheep its that old "slippery slope" chestnut - IF they are allowed additional and further rights of power over HErs that will become a slippery slope into further interference and ultimately the very freedoms of HErs will be restricted and it will no longer be Home Education it will be "school at home" - with us follwing curriculums and rigid timetables - which if that worked for my son he would be in school believe me!

OK - here's my suggestion for how this could be addressed.

Children who are deregistered from school might come in a number of categories -

1. Children where there has been a long history of discussion between home and school about the problems, eg bullying or lack of SEN provision.

1. Children where social services are already involved with the family

1. Children where the school already had some concerns, and were "keeping an eye on things", but not yet involved SS.

1. Children who there were no concerns about, but fit into "worrying" patterns eg Asian teen girls

1. Children where there are no worrying patterns, but also no apparent reason for the decision to HE.

Families in category 1 are surely "sheep" - they are choosing HE over school for reasons which are clear, even if the school and LA don't admit there are any problems.

Families in category 2 - well, SS already know them, but the school should inform them about the HE so they can continue to be involved appropriately.

Families in category 3 and 4 - I'd suggest that the school should inform SS about their concerns. SS have the authority to investigate them.

Families in category 5 are maybe trickier - I'd have come into that category myself, the choice to HE DS was about practicalities rather than problems at school, but in fact we had discussed our plans with his form teacher. Perhaps this is a category where it is up to the form teacher/head of year to decide whether or not it raises concerns?

So, the choice to HE is not in itself a cause to raise concerns, but the choice to HE along with other worrying factors would be.

How does that sound as a suggestion?

OK, so surely what's needed is a way of stopping that slippery slope yet dealing with any child protection issues that would be helped by some means to distinguish between 'true' HEers and those who are faking it. Not ignoring the child protection stuff because of fear of the slope.

See I don't HE but have no problem even with the idea of unschooling (though I wouldn't go that far myself). I don't HE but would support any campaign against legislation to force 'school at home' to happen. I'm very familiar with the reasons why people HE and the types of things they do (and don't do). I even know teachers who can see that 'school at home' is not the way to go. So why an interview like this would lead automatically to government requiring 'school at home', I don't know. I can see there is a big public education issue there, so that people know more about HE, but surely addressing that, hard work as it would be, is better than dismissing the idea of something like an interview (taking your point that many wouldn't automatically object anyway) as out of the question simply because it's potentially the start of a slippery slope?

a lot of LAs try to enforce "school at home" at the moment anyway, despite it not being any of their responsibility - I think the concern is that if these LAs are given the authority to do what they currently (illegally) try anyway, what more are they going to try?

I think if this were the 1st review of HE in a while HErs would be more comfortable with it. But I understand its the 3rd or 4th in as many years? That's partly the problem I think - HErs are starting to feel victimised - there's only so much "reviewing" that can take place before people start to get paranoid!

I wish I knew how to help the children at risk - but frankly that is the job of social services and if anyone needs a review its them. I appreciate the difficulties they face - they are overworked and understaffed - but the govn should be looking at how to minimise their workload (and maybe teachers too while they are at it!) to allow the time required to monitor and protect children at risk. Giving the LEA more power isn;t going to help the children at risk - how do the govm propose they are going to squeeze a year or two's professional training of a social worker into the frantic calender of an LEA worker - who has already just taken on a bigger workload with their increasing responsibilities.....

shrinkingviolet-sadly my LEA appear to be one of them.....:-(

I think suggestions like that sound good, are they the sorts of alternatives being generally suggested? Category 5 does sound like the tricky one though - I think if you were in category 5 and someone raised a concern (if it hadn't occurred to you to talk to the form teacher, because you didn't get on, for instance), then that could cause offence fairly easily - possibly the idea of a 'one size fits all' standard interview might then look a lot rosier in comparison! Not that I'm saying therefore an interview is the only way.

I've not seen any other suggested alternatives, that was just thinking it through this morning. I agree it would be easy to feel that "someone" was picking on you if you were in category 5 and had to go through the process (whatever it was), but I still think that would be better than a blanket idea that everyone is a suspect. It would particularly benefit the category 1 families, who are most likely to feel hurt/angry about official involvement.

Personally, like most I think, I would have no problem at all if DS had been "interviewed", it's the legal precedent which is the worrying thing. I know there is nothing in this at the moment to say they will interfere more in HE as a result, but there is a very long and painful history between HE and some LAs (not all by any means) which makes it easy to predict that they would use this as the thin end of the wedge.

the general feeling on the HE email lists seems to be "why should we tell them how they could be doing their job better/more efficiently" in varying strengths. Very few people are interested in putting forward other means of identifying children at risk, mostly because everyone is busy HEing their own children, but also because in practically every area that's been tried, the LA have (at best) nodded, said thank you very much, and carried on as they were before (Milton Keynes is one of the very few exceptions).

Well, I've put in my response, with a version of what I said above in the "What should the government do to prevent it?" section. I agree it's not our responsibility to tell them how to safeguard children, but this thread really does show that people outside of HE don't see the problem with the idea of just interviewing the child when they are deregistered.

Interestingly, the actual consultation doesn't mention that idea at all, even though the press comments seem to be suggesting that's what they're going to do.