Panorama - I want my baby back

[BeyondTheLimitsOfAcceptability]

Anyone watching?

This promoting of the idea that SS want to steal babies makes me very uneasy...

If JH is so passionate about this, can you explain why he doesn't use his position as an MP to improve the system by campaigning for adequate funding for social services, and adequate legal aid for lawyers representing parents?

Im not friends with John. Ive never met him.

@timetoask - there is a very definite campaign online to not take your kids to doctors for bumps/bruises unless absolutely necessary. Quite frankly I wouldnt either if I had young kids.

wizard pic you say
Jill McCartan's child could easily be returned. She's about 3. People adopt three year olds. No problemo on that one!

Can you really see 'no problem' with this?

Do you think there might be a really negative impact on the child which we have to at least consider?

@nennypops - I thought Id answered that - many of the cases files/letters are online. I have spoken in depth to many people also and seen other documents. I am not blind to biased parents but I promise you some of the stuff is absolutely shocking.

The belief that reports are seen beforehand by parents and are not in part falsified is just not true. Im not saying this is commonplace but it does happen.

And am I right in assuming from your earlier answers that you can offer me no kind of proof for your assertion that 'thousands' of children have been wrongfully adopted, you are instead just picking a figure out of the air because it 'seems right'?

@Spero not at 3, no. It looks like a wrongful adoption. Do you believe she should be able to keep her other child?

@spero it's a figure based on probability on seen evidence in many cases and projected over 24/25 years. Where would you put the figure?

wizardpic, have a read of this case.

Do you think the mother was right to flee the UK in this case?

Her daughter is now five. Do you think her daughter has escaped from emotional harm thanks to her mother's actions? Or do you think her mother in fact inflicted even more emotional harm upon her?

www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2013/1434.html

Proof would be nice here wizard if you are going to continue to allege these things.

Spreo he doesn't give a shiny shite about the kids. This is an exercise to make the parent's come out smelling of roses, silly!

wizard, I asked where online the documents are.

I missed that. I have a three year old, he is a little person, not a baby who cant protest. The idea of just handing back a three year old is certainly not focussing on what is best for the child. I'll guess you don't have children then wizard?

Where would I put the figure?

As we are apparently all ok with just pulling figures out of our bottoms, here comes mine.

Cases of children wrongfully adopted, taken from loving families to fulfil LA adoption targets: NIL

Cases where serious mistakes were made on misunderstanding of medical evidence: I know of 3

Cases where social workers made bad decisions due to over work or incompetence or bad attitude: probably 25% of my case load.

Oh but Spero you aren't playing properly - you KNOW of 3. Don't let the facts stand in the way of a good story!

Wizardpic - a mother is very angry with me on twitter this morning. She invited me to google her to find out how much she loved her kids and how wrong it was that they were taken.

So I did google. Her six year old had a hot iron applied to his neck. Mother says it was a 'silly accident'.

I will welcome increased openness in the family courts and then people who have abused their children will have to accept that all the facts of their abuse are in the public domain and they can't hide behind 'secrecy' anymore and try to pin the blame on a corrupt system.

But I do feel very sad for this woman. She was apparently a child in care herself and was not protected in the way she should have been. The state failed her.

We do need to do something about this.

Wittering on about forced adoptions and cash bounties for babies is absolutely 100% NOT the way to go about it.

BeyondTheLimitsOfAcceptability I have 4 children

So do you think one of your children aged 3 years could have easily moved to live with another family?

Do you think there would have been quite a lot of work done and support given to make that an easy transition.

Or do you really think there is 'no problemo' ?

I really do wonder how the public is going to react to all of the horror stories we will see daily as a result of this. I just hope it doesn't normalise it to the point it doesn't affect us any more.

I do wonder if the abusers who have their kids taken away really understand why what they did was wrong. As you say Spero some people have had to suffer similar themselves, and the boundary is simply not there any more for them to navigate as a parent. Forcing them into the spotlight doesn't help anyone, other than the SS who will finally be able to show off their side of the cases and tell the public just how evil some parents are.

So think about your children when they were 3. Do you really think they would have suffered no ill effects if they were taken from your care at that age and given to a couple of people who were strangers to them?

@Spero

Of your estimate at figures!!

1. very unquaintifiable)
2. Im pretty sure there are more than 3 (you may only have dealt with 3)
3. 25% is a huge figure and potentially catastrophic

But we should not get hung up on the medical evidence issue. It's a very tiny number of cases that have led to adoption

@nennypops @spero

Not at all - it would have been devestating. However, as a parent, if it had happened to me. I would have fought till their 16th birthday to challenge it.

The documentary made it clear last night that prison does not scare parents who feel wronged. How do you think they feel?

She doesn't have to decide if any particular mother harmed her child.

What she has to be satisfied with is as a citizen of this country, can she have faith and confidence in doctors to properly report and for judges to uphold the law?

I have just read the court of appeal judgement. The medical evidence was impressive and unanimous. There was no basis for re-opening the case. So her application to appeal was dismissed.

Which bit of this are you unhappy with?

But you said, wizard, that removing a child from adoptive parents at the age of 3 would be "no problemo". Can we assume that you accept that it is a massive problem?

@spero - you're absolutely right - there's a spiral with people in care as kids and who have been abused. Their children are removed for the 'froeh' reason. This is a cycle that needs breaking.

Young people should not be losing children because they have been in care themselves and are damaged (possibly). It's a self-perpetuating cycle of misery.

No, I didn't say I had dealt with 3.

I KNOW of 3. There is the Webster case and one of the Vitamin D cases, but the parents did get their baby back in the end. I don't know of anything else comparable to the Webster case where they lost all 3 children for good.

that is terrible, I accept.

for the record, I have never dealt with a case where I thought there was a serious miscarriage of justice arising from corruption or incompetence I have in my career only appealed a handful of times when I thought the Judge had got the wrong emphasis on the evidence.

I think there is two ways of looking at that. You can dismiss me as a stupid stooge of the system who allows corruption to slip by unchallenged, or you can think that maybe there aren't actually 1000s of wrongful forced adoptions going on.

I was talking about this case - a 3 year old wrongly taken