please help us! Ed Balls wants to treat a minority group as guilty until proven innocent...

[ommmward]

Please would you write to your MP and ask them to sign Early Day Motion 1785

Mr Ed Balls wants to give LA officials the power to enter private homes without any reason to think anything is amiss and to force children to submit to an interview on their own with LA staff. These are powers that even the police and social services don't have!!!!

He wants to do it because he is concerned that not having your child in an institutional setting (that's school now, but he could easily extend these plans to those who don't use nurseries or child minders) might be a cover for abuse. His planned legislation is a sledgehammer to crack a nut- he doesn't have evidence that Home Ed is being used as a cover for abuse and it will cost a great deal of our tax money to have LA staff coming to do welfare checks - but he hasn't even done an impact assessment!

So please write to your MP, tell them the planned EHE legislation is disproportionate, uncosted, and has no evidentiary basis, and please would they sign the EDM 1785.

If you don't HE you probably think this has nothing to do with you. But those with children not in child care are next in line for such heavy-handed state intrusion. We will support you when that time comes. Will you take 5 minures writing an email to support us HEers now?

you mean the children they found no evidence of FAQ? because that pisses me off as well, if everything in NHS etc has to be evidence based to justify spending public money how can Badman say he found no evidence that HE children were at increased risk, but just in case they are we should change x, y and z.

yea that'd be the ones

How many he families will there be in each LEA's area? I can't imagine that there will be huge amounts of extra work - but in any case that isn't the point of your argument, is it? You don't want official interference. Sorry... as a school governor I am one of a group of people acting as a 'critical friend' to a local primary school. A bunch of amateurs, for sure, but there to give an independent view and make sure that the school is functioning properly, including the all-important child protection perspective. I think he children should have someone looking out for them too, to try to avoid abused children slipping through the net away from the eyes of professionals who could help them.

If there isn't much extra work then how will abuse be spotted? Do you think an abused child will share their secrets with someone they've never met before just because they come to the house once a year (if its even the same person each year)

So either a good working relationship would need to be built up with every home educating family, or the whole thing is a joke. A publicity stunt so that the government LOOK like they are taking a stand on child abuse.

but the fact is the the LEA's school chlld protection policies obviously aren't working as children who are school educated are being abused and it's not being picked up.

"I think he children should have someone looking out for them too, to try to avoid abused children slipping through the net away from the eyes of professionals who could help them."

There is no evidence that HE children are being abused though is there?? But plenty of children who have hit the headlines (for sadly the wrong reason) who were educated at schools where abuse wasn't picked up.

Just adding this, in case anyone isn't able to write to an MP or sign the UK petition, or you have people you can forward them to in other countries.

This link is to a global petition about the UK situation.

(Also this link is to a Swedish petition, they are also facing a similar situation as the government are saying that their schools offer such a comprehensive and inclusive education that there is no need for home educating to be a legal option!)

Ofsted reports do the same thing to schools and CMs. Assume 'guilt' until 'innocence' is proved. All educational settings are in that position.

I would be all for this legislation if I home eded - it is the same as what could happen in a school and I think that if you are educationg your child properly and do not have anything to hide. You should be thinking that maybe this could pick up serious abuse in other families and be a little less up in arms and horrified and think that it could actually be a good thing - but then it is not human nature to look beyond the end of ones nose!

OrmIrian: schools and childminders are accountable to the parents. That is why they are inspected. Do you agree that ALL parents in the UK should be inspected as childminders are?

MadameCastafiore: The report stated OUTRIGHT that Badman had found no evidence that home education was being used to hide abuse. Do you think that it is right to make Law based on assumptions and the fear that it could happen one day?

OK, I'm prepared to stand up and say why I disagree with you.

I worked for many years in FE, within a socially and financially disadvantaged group. Once children reach 16, unless they are in full time education, the parents were unable to claim benefits for them. I saw, and taught, a significant number of children who had been removed from school and 'home educated'. These were the children of (frequently) illiterate immigrants with little or no English. By the time they came to me to be educated they had spent their whole lives inthe UK and were completly unable to speak English, let alone write or add up. Effectively they had been home helps for mothers overburdened with the weight of childrearing or had been put to work in home businesses. Needless to say, the vast majority of these children were girls. I also dealt with girls who came to college then disappeared without notice, only to reappear months later married and pregnant.

These are the children the legislation is trying to protect.

Slug, could you tell us were we would be able to get figures to support the statement that these children were removed from school and home educated. That is worrying because if they were removed from school the local authority would have been aware of them. Are you telling us that the local authority was aware of a child from an at-risk group being suddenly removed from school and yet did not make enquiries about the educational provision for the child as they are already legally entitled to do?

where not were

I worked in an area where children were frequently sent back their parent's home country, hence the disappearance from school. It's only when you question them closely that you realise the trip 'home' was for about 3 months, when they came back to the UK they frequently simply never went back to school.

I'm not prepared to say where it is because it's really quite sensitive information, could leave me open to all sorts of accusations, professional or otherwise, and not something I'm prepared to disclose over an open forum.

So, in the interests of having our facts straight, were these children deregistered from school - the parents handing in a letter stating that they were now home educating? Or did the children just leave the country? And as an at risk group did no-one in the LA think it was worth following up?

The missing girls issue is well known in some areas.

The problem is, if I start going into too much detail I can easily be acused of racism or other. What I do know is:
Education of girls within the community I worked was not seen as a priority
Sending girls 'home' then not reregistering them at school was a known phenomona.
There were people within the community who would help parents with any paperwork associated removing their children from school.
These people would also help with the reintroduction of the children into mainstream schooling around their 16th birthday.
Some of the 'private' schools had some fairly dubious practices with regard to attendance data.
Children were turning up at college aged 16, having been in full time education in the Uk for their whole lives (allegedly) but were completely illiterate in any language.

When you are standing at the bottom of the cliff with the ambulance it's enough to do what you can for the victims you recover. Personally I would prefer it if less children fell through the gaps. However, if parents who perfectly legitimately HE their children object to any form of regulation on the basis that 'they are doing a good job' (which I have no doubt most of them are) then they should at least consider the fate of those for whom HE is just an excuse for exploitation.

That didn't answer my question Slug. If these girls are not being removed to home educated then all the regulation you can think of for genuine home educators will not make a difference. The people it effects WILL be the ones who are genuinely home educating. And the bad practice shown by LA official now isn't going to change just because they have shiny new powers.

What we need to know to make a judgement on what could be done for these girls is what happened between the people in the community helping de-register and re-introduce the children. Because the LA is entitled to make enquiries now, and if they did and this was missed - how was it missed?

Another agreeing that HE should have some checks. It's about the children, not the parents.

99.9% of HErs may be doing a great job but as a society we should look out for the other 0.1%.

Once again, HE does have checks. If it comes to it a HE parent can need to prove that they are providing an education suitable for the child's age, ability and aptitude in court. Although that is the last step of the process.

what checks do he'rs currently have? Are they compulsory or voluntary?

HE is monitored in a very similar way to child welfare. There is an assumption that parents are fit to care for their children unless someone has reason to think otherwise.

The same applies to education, if it is thought that a child is not being educated then the LA gets involved.

I'm sure that you wouldn't say every single family in the country should have annual social services inspections, because some children are abused. Would you? It would waste huge sums of money, and make it harder to spot the children genuinely at risk.

That is what is proposed now for education - instead of a system that intervenes when there is reason to be concerned, this will waste huge sums of money and make it harder for LAs to concentrate on children genuinely at risk of not being educated. Did you know that they are not doing an impact assessment on these proposals because they don't think it will cost any more than the LAs already spend. So they'll have no extra resources to waste time visiting families who are doing fine. Where will the money to help the children who really need help come from?

So how do the current checks actually work?

Are they at regular intervals, does the LA come to visit and then get involved if they are not happy?

The point is, Anastasia, is that many of the girls, an a few of the boys too, are 'Home Educated' with the legalities done by the nice man who is a friend of the father's cousin (or whatever).

Yes, the local LEA is appalingly inefficient, yes the local council is notoriously corrupt. However it does happen, and in frighteningly large numbers in some sections of the community. A commun ity that sees no wrong with the practise and actively colludes in it is hardly likely to report suspicions to Social Services or the LEA, especially if the people they may report to come from the same community.

"I'm sure that you wouldn't say every single family in the country should have annual social services inspections, because some children are abused. Would you? It would waste huge sums of money, and make it harder to spot the children genuinely at risk."

I'm not saying that at all. I'm mereley pointing out that HE removes children from the vision of the additional services that schools provide access to. For example, DD has been recommended for speech therapy by the school. We didn't pick this up, despite me being a teacher and DH being a health professional. The school picked this up, sent her for hearing tests and arranged speech therapy. That's at the minor end of the spectrum. I would hope that home visits would pick up children who are failing to learn anything of academic merit. Some of those girls I taught could cook up a storm, make clothes and change nappies like a professional, but literate? Pah! Not necessary.

Slug apologies for butting in, but why were these girls then going to college? What changed that college seemed attractive where school had been deemed not worthwhile? Had the girls opted to go at that point? Were their families okay with that?

"Yes, the local LEA is appalingly inefficient, yes the local council is notoriously corrupt. However it does happen, and in frighteningly large numbers in some sections of the community. A commun ity that sees no wrong with the practise and actively colludes in it is hardly likely to report suspicions to Social Services or the LEA, especially if the people they may report to come from the same community."

But the LA knew the children existed. They knew they were in a high risk group. I assume they made enquiries about the children; this is important because if the proper procedure wasn't being followed in the past why would that change just because the law does? The LA will still screw up because they're inefficient. The children who need it still wont get enough help.

Do you mind me asking what age the children tend to be withdrawn in the first place? I'm assuming young children wouldn't be much help at home and they'd be sent to school? Is there a 'danger' age range?