Child taken from womb? Truth into darkness....

[LakeDistrictBabe]

Ok, the old thread is nearly full. If you read the other three, I don't need to re-write everything again ;)

But you know I am referring to the case involving an Italian mother and the British social services.
Opinions welcome.

We have an 'adoption czar', and a 'social mobility czar' and countless other czars, but is there one single 'social services czar'?

We have an 'adoption czar' saying that there should be more adoptions, and who has said in the past that

"Many more children need to be taken into care at birth "

and that

"Only 70 babies were adopted last year compared with 4,000 in 1976. We need that figure to get back into the thousands so we need to quadruple it over the next few years – and quadruple it again "

But why is there no 'social services czar' who says that we need more money and time for social services and that we need more trained social services workers who can intervene and help and fix families?

Does that not fit with budgets and the deterministic philosophy of doom?

But why is there no 'social services czar' who says that we need more money and time for social services and that we need more trained social services workers who can intervene and help and fix families?

Possibilities...

No SS czar.

The profession has been so demonised nobody would want the job even if it existed ?

No gov. wants somebody to highlight the underfunded, understaffed situation in SS. Becuase they would much rather spend less money on it, not more ?

Fixing families

Maybe there is data that suggests that placing even more emphasis on "fixing families" rather than removal of children early on is a key cause of high numbers of poor outcomes ? In which case it wouldn't make sense for that to be an aim.

Bear in mind, I am really hazy on how czars came to pass and if/how they actually make any difference in the grand scheme of things.

'Are those words, as in that is how he himself would describe Baby P as an unruly teenager?'

I think those are his views, he said it saddened him and that the probability is that

I don't think that the probability was that at at all, and it saddens me that he thinks it was. It saddens me that there is no social services czar who can argue the case for more money for social services, but that there is money for adoption czars and social mobility czars etc.

Spero makes a good point (she does from time to time) that care proceedings do not necessarily lead to adoption. However, the managerial drive from Martin Narey et al has been pressurising the practitioners to go for adoption.

I do have a set of statistics that looks at the changes for under 5s from 1995 to 2012.

I have put this on google drive hopefully such that anyone can get to it. There are two worksheets.
drive.google.com/file/d/0BzMKhMcESE6uZVJJQ1AwSThsVWc/edit?usp=sharing

The basis upon which the statistics are prepared have changed over time, but in essence you can see a system whereby fewer and fewer children are returned to their parents as a proportion and also more children are taken into care.

"No gov. wants somebody to highlight the underfunded, understaffed situation in SS. Becuase they would much rather spend less money on it, not more ?"

But do they want an adoption czar ?

From John's figures, it looks like there were about 12,700 looked after children aged 4 and under between 2011 and 2012.

The really interesting figure would be how many of those were aged 1 and under, since it seems that Narey would like thousands of that age group per year to be adopted, if I understand his quote correctly.

nennypops asks:
"So with 58,000 children in foster care or children's homes etc, against under 4000 placements, you have to wonder why on earth councils would actually need to go to all the trouble JH imagines to take more children into care. Especially when they are harder to place such as mixed race children."

You need to look at the figures in more details. Basically you need to look at the flows in and out of care. (which is what the spreadsheet I linked to just does).

Some of the children in care are teenagers that there parents cannot handle and are placed into care under S20. Those are not children one would expect to leave care through adoption.

Similarly there are older children for whom adoption really is not a sensible option. Also there are younger children placed in care respite reasons whilst say a single parent is ill. Again this should not be considered as a target for adoption.

The flow figure of children compulsorily taken into care (of all ages)

These are the figures as at 31st March 2013 looking into the legal basis upon which children are in care:

All children looked after at 31 March 68,110

Care Orders 40,180
Interim care orders 11,540
Full care orders 28,640

Freed for adoption4 150

Placement Order granted5 9,240

Voluntary agreements under S20 CA 1989 18,190
(single placements)

Detained for child protection 30
Police protection 10
Emergency protection orders 20
Under Child Assessment Order x

Youth Justice legal statuses 320
On remand or committed for trial6 310
Detained under PACE7 x
Supervision order 10

Here are the age analyses
Age at 31 March (years) 68,110
Under 1 4,310
1 to 4 12,360
5 to 9 13,260
10 to 15 24,450
16 and over 13,730

However, it is as a proportion of the flows in and out of care that are the key statistical comparisons.

For children under 5 in the year to 31st March 2012 (they have not done the 2013 figures).
5,800 children left care. 2,300 were adopted, 500 had a residency order and 870 had an SGO. These are the categories that fell into the "adoption target" as it was defined for 2007 and 2008. ie 3670/5800 hit the target ie 63%.

That actually is a really high number of the potential candidates.

claig: there are two sheets. Look at the second one. That is the most important one.

I think those are his views

I've now read the article you posted the link to, and in order to seek some kind of basis to work put "what's what" I did a bit a googling. The first thing I found was this, from a few day prior to your article

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2008/nov/18/youngpeople-prisonsandprobation

So personally i am less sure than you that his use of terms was indicative of his personal views. I think that he may well have used those terms as a hook to garner attention, and highlight how we categorise small children as innocent victims, but then lable their older selves as almost less than human. Managing to forget that the "damage being done" we wring our hands over when a small child is at the sharp end, doesn't magically disappear to leave an unscarred child the second they lose most of their baby teeth.

We do the same with parents. Castigating them roundly in derogative terms. Forgetting that it is not unusual for the former children of chaotic, dysfunctional, emotionally unhealthy, violent homes to gorw up as a product of their early enviroment, going on to recreate similar family dynamics for their own children.

---
Sorry but...are you not going a bit off topic here?

Because it seems like the childsnatching conspiracy in UK is back again.

I appreciate you want to post your opinions about the topic but you might want to post another thread with the title "Evil SS in UK snatch children" and gather there instead of staying on this one, which doesn't concern any snatching at the moment (apart from John Hemming's mind, but that's another matter).

I'm off, collecting stuff for an article.

But do they want an adoption czar ?

Possibly (I am a bit hazy about this czar thing, happened well after I left the country)

Children in care = expensive, poor outcomes associated with long term "looked after" status.

Children adopted out of care = costs cut, better outcomes associated with adoption in comparision with "looked after status"

@Carpe

Given the OT attitude, I am posting here a petition about the idiotic sentence of Corte di Cassazione concerning an Italian SS who sexually abused a child (please sign, if possible, we need as many signatures as possible):

secure.avaaz.org/it/petition/Presidente_della_Repubblica_italiana_Appello_contro_la_sentenza_45179_del_8_novembre_2013_della_Corte_di_Cassaz/?tTDDAgb

I am sorry if some people will think what I am about to post is simply a continuation of my 'personal' spat with JH or an attack on the man not the issues.

I do not agree it is either of those. I think this is a very important issue of general importance.

My next post will be a cut and paste of an email I have just sent to Stacey Lane of Essex County Council.

I would like to remind JH that he is subject to the rule of law, just like the rest of us, and his choice to repeatedly breach injunctions relating to anonymity may have very serious consequences for a vulnerable child.

Dear Ms Lane

I apologise for contacting you directly if you are unable to assist with this, but I am not sure who is the best person to contact. If this is not within your remit, I trust you will be able to forward this email to the relevant person.

On 4th December 2013 Mr Justice Charles made an order restricting identification of the child d.o.b. 24.08.12 who has been the subject of considerable media interest in the last week or so. Your email address is given in the order as person to whom inquiries should be directed.

Yesterday I was contacted by a number of users of the mumsnet forum to say that Mr John Hemming MP had posted the text from an Italian judgment on 13th December 2013 at 21.47 which named both the child and one or both of her sisters. The child’s name is distinctive and both first and middle names were posted.

The thread is ongoing and can be found at www.mumsnet.com/Talk/in_the_news/1938715-Child-taken-from-womb-Truth-into-darkness?

That post was deleted quickly but was up long enough for at least two native Italian speakers to notice it and be concerned. I have been sent copies of screen shots which I will forward to you directly after this email.

I note from para 17 of the order of 4th December that it expires on 4pm on 13th December. I do not know if a subsequent order in the same terms was made; if it was it appears that Mr Hemming’s posts would be in clear breach of that order.

That this poster is indeed John Hemming MP is not in doubt; during the course of various threads on the mumsnet forum about this matter including the one cited above, in which I have participated, he has chosen to email me directly a document from employment tribunal proceedings purporting to ‘prove’ a social worker was sacked for not recommending reunification of mother and child. That document also contained the unredacted name of a social work Manager.

There is an enormous amount of concern expressed on the thread, which I share, that an elected MP should behave in this way – in possible defiance of a court order and apparently giving no thought or concern whatsoever to the impact on the child of making her identity widely known. Therefore I thought it important to inform you.

fucking hell Lake

The "a woman wearing jeans cannot be raped" motivo has got some serious competition for "takes prize for top judical vergogna ever"

I'll sign.

And fwiw I agree with Martin Narey.

There are a lot of families who can't be 'fixed' or can only be fixed at a cost of between £50-£100K in six month residential therapeutic places.

As I keep repeating on these threads; we get the child protection system we are prepared to pay for.

And we are clearly not prepared to pay for this as a society. Because we don't. Instead we vote for a government who cuts funding to essential family and mental health services.

If some of you would just direct one tenth of the energy you reserve for investigating conspiracies, into agitating and campaigning for change, it might be different.

@Spero:

WELL DONE!!!!

@Carpe

Yes, new lowest point in Italian justice system. Utterly disgusting. I guess this is the kind of SS worker that Hemming & Co want to hand the baby to.
Congrats.

Thank you for all your efforts Spero

It is very much appreciated from my side of the Alps.

Thanks.

What angers me is that he perpetuates misinformation using his status as MP to give his views credibility.

If he wants to resign as an MP he may campaign as a private individual how he wishes - so long as he doesn't break any laws.

This may be difficult for him as he does seem to believe he is above not only facts and evidence, but also the law.

I actually disagreed with Martin Narey when he said those number of baby adoptions need to be in the thousands. I disagreed because whilst I most certainly AGREE that children need to be adopted earlier and not left in care for years, and whilst I agree that some children need to b removed from their families much sooner as babies, I don't know where he was getting his numbers from. He also said that (all) teen mothers should be encouraged to consider giving up their babies for adoption a few years ago, and I profoundly disagred with that as well

However I completely agree with him about his Baby P comments

claig can I ask what you're basing your belief that Peter would not have likely become a troubled teenager on?

Sadly, my own knowledge and experience over many years, is that children who have been badly abused and neglected, nearly always have emotional issues and frequently also behavioural difficulties. Narey made a very valid point in that we see children like Peter as victims when they are babies, but when they grow up, perhaps in a stable adoptive home, and have emotional, behavioural, social difficulties, society sees them as 'naughty', 'bad' children because people cling to the naive belief that serious abuse and neglect does not harm brain development and the childs ability to function/attach etc, that 'love' can fix this kind of damage and that babies who are abused magically won't be affected by it which is absolute bollocks.

I do believe that if Peter had survived he would have been a troubled child with at least some emotional issues, who would have needed a lot of support. And teenagerhood is a time many children who already have emotional difficulties, find VERY hard and get into trouble in

Great email Spero

Hoping for a good response to it

Ideally I would like him to stay off this site and restrict himself to prowling around FASSIT and the like where hopefully he will have less ready access to vulnerable people.

Hoping for a good response to it

The email does not deal with the substantive arguments in respect of children in care being wrongly put up for adoption.

Really?????!

Lilka, I agree with you in disagreeing with Narey on those statements he made too.

'claig can I ask what you're basing your belief that Peter would not have likely become a troubled teenager on?'

Because I don't believe in that sort of determinism. I think that if, as Spero said, there were more resources given to social services, if there were more staff who were not overworked and under resourced, if there was more longterm intervention and help by social services and if there were residential therapeutic practices, like Spero suggested, then nothing is inevitable and nothing is determined.

I believe that experienced social services professionals should be making decisions and influencing policy for care and adoption, rather than czars from outside of social services. I don't believe that czars are best placed to know how many families can be fixed or can best determine how many babies should be adopted per year or taken at birth. I think that should be something for social services professionals to decide based on detailed understandings of the families involved.

These are some of Martin Narey's quotes

"Many more children need to be taken into care at birth "

...

"Only 70 babies were adopted last year compared with 4,000 in 1976. We need that figure to get back into the thousands so we need to quadruple it over the next few years – and quadruple it again "

This is what Martin Narey is quoted as saying in a newspaper article in 2009

"The philosophy is that we should do everything possible to deflect children from the dreadful consequences of being looked after. Regrettably I have contributed to that. Shortly after I arrived at Barnardo's from running the Prison and Probation Services, and after meeting so many prisoners who had been in care, I spoke scathingly about its inadequacy. Three years on, I regret having been so simplistic. I knew little of the challenges facing local authorities and I was yet to recognise the very high calibre and commitment of those who lead children's services. "

I would rather have a czar who had worked in social services for a lifetime as I feel they would be less likely to make simplistic statements.