Barrister Sarah Phillimore and the NSPCC

[christinarossetti19]

Sarah Phillimore has reported the NSPCC to the charities commission, as they refused to confirm that either the allegations made about wanking@work are false or that they are investigating matter.

As she says, this is another Oxfam or Kids Company waiting to happen. Thank you Sarah for devoting your expertise to this.

twitter.com/SVPhillimore

Bringeth it on. Contribution ready and waiting.

All power to your elbow. Massive thanks.

The Nspcc is in a unique position in that it has statutory powers to remove a child at risk. As such it is even more important that they have proper safeguarding procedures in place including in regard to staff.

Thank you, Spero! Please keep us posted. I will definitely contribute to a crowdfunder and I spit on those who trash female rights.

ptah!

Good on you Spero
My gran used to say, it's not hard to fight when you know you're right.
Ok not 100% right but I applaud the sentiment.

You know you're right.

Mumsnet FWR at your shoulder Spiro.

Thank you so much Spero

Also up for crowdfunding and I know many many more women who will be.

So glad you are doing this. I've never felt such a combination of fear, disillusionment and disbelief as I have over the last few years.

In any job I have held, many of them in the public sector, behaviour such as linking a highly sexual blog to my workplace, in any way at all, would be grounds for dismissal. Not just because of the sexual aspects but because of a failure of professional judgement.

For the bigger issue is that an organisation can be so insulated from reality that instead of investigating this complaint, they have defended their employee. This points to a massive lack of judgement on the part of the organisation as well as the individual.

I’m old enough and cranky enough, to be perfectly happy with kink-shaming in a public context. That this employee, and the organisation, doesn’t recognise the erosion of professional and accountable boundaries this event represents, suggests much bigger organisational problems are likely to be discoverable. If their judgment is so flawed here, what else are they fucking up?

Children’s charities, all organisations working with children, by their nature, generally are, and should be, conservative and very cautious. The protection of children is not a sphere for testing society’s sexual boundaries.

I am glad that they will be held to account.

I don't kid myself that legal action is going to achieve anything much. but what WOULD I hope get people talking was if we could raise a significant amount of money and promote a wider public debate about the appalling response of the NSPCC.

Definitely Spero. Get sunlight on it. Push for responses, dialogue, explanation. Let the silence speak.

You can count me in for a contribution to the crowd funder too spero

Thank you for all you are doing. I cant believe what's become of the nspcc. Children need and deserve better they cant protect themselves

Slightly confused about this. I thought the employee that linked to these videos from LinkedIn. How come there isn't any evidence then?

The point here is not what this employee did or didn't do.
The point is the response - or lack of it - from the NSPCC

If the allegations are fake - say so
If you don't know if the allegations are fake - investigate

What you DO NOT do is slur anyone who is concerned as 'homophobe' or any other kind of phobe. Putting particular people or groups as above and beyond scrutiny in child protection is what gave us Jimmy Savile.

I have no idea what this man did or didn't do. The screenshots I have seen have been concerning, but I am not an idiot and I know how easily these things can be faked. But this whole thing goes way, way, way beyond the activities of any individual. The NSPCC's response has revealed themselves to be an organisation that has lost its way. As it is an organisation, I am told, with a £140 million yearly income and statutory powers to bring care proceedings, I chose to find this deeply concerning.

Others may not. That is their right. You can always chose to look the other way or do or say nothing. I don't mind what people do, as long as they don't get in my way.

Can we mobilise via our various school/PTA links as well? NSPCC fundraising (as well as NSPCC school outreach) is prolific in schools. Is there a letter or link I could share with our school governors and PTA.

I think the crowd funder will be best way to mobilise.

The Charities Commission say they need 30 days to respond.

I am going to bet a large sum of money on fact that they either fail to respond or fob me off. If so, I am going to crowd fund for specialist advice on where to go with this - JR the CC? Go after the NSPCC via charities legislation or the Privy Council?

I am not naive enough to think that legal action will cure this. What I think WILL cure this is getting enough mainstream attention that journalists cannot ignore this. A light has to be shone on the operation of the NSPCC and why on earth they thought their response to this was the way to go.

Date in my diary is July 15th. I hope to see you all again then.

Spero, I will definitely chip in to your crowd funder when it's launched.

I found my conversation with the news agency really frightening actually. She just said 'no paper will touch this'. And I was saying but why? but why? The actual story is beyond doubt - whatever this individual did or didn't do in the toilets, the NSPCC basically told anyone worried to 'fuck off bigot'.

That, in a nutshell, is it. And it's why I find this so gobsmacking and so sinister. Think of how far out on a limb James Kirkup and Janice Turner have gone in particular on this issue in general. So why are the NSPCC teflon? Not to touch this issue... Well, what the fuck strings are the NSPCC pulling to manage such a cover up?

It makes me think (I could of course be wrong, I hope I'm wrong) that they are covering up a scandal of Savile proportions here.

Thank you.

The NSPCC response seems to be a symptom of a much large problem within the public and third sectors. I am happy to donate to help shine a light on the thinking behind the inappropriate response.

Bring it spero

I’ll chip in on a crowdfunder too, Spero.

Definitely in for a crowdfunded. Would it help to have more reports to the charity commission? Have a list of charities I would like to report as am sure they are breaching the rules...

Umm the videos were definitely real. I saw them. They were still available in cache, not sure if they still are: I kind of don't wish to look again.

Thanks Spero

The point is the response - or lack of it - from the NSPCC

If the allegations are fake - say so
If you don't know if the allegations are fake - investigate

This.

I think the tweet where they said it was a personnel matter and they wouldn't comment further was terrible.

All it did was look like it was acknowledging there was a problem, they were aware of the problem but were going to keep it hush hush.

It poured petrol on the flames of the comments online and makes it look like something has happened and they are trying to cover it up, in the eyes of anyone who had been following the story.

That in itself raises questions of transparency and public trust.

It's possible there isn't 'anything to see here' but this particular tweet certainly makes it look like there is, because it acknowledges but fails to resolve concerns.

That's newsworthy in its own right.

Charities need to be above board but they also need to be seen to be acting in ways consistent with being above board.

Otherwise you get a bunch of rumours which fester and don't help anyone at all, because trust has been lost.

I presume the issue is not the reality of the videos, Sunset (I've seen the still which was enough for me), but whether it was indeed his workplace at the NSPCC, and whether he himself made the connection between the wanking videos and his place of work.

My understanding is that the videos were readily stumbled upon accidentally from his LinkedIn page (since edited) and that he himself had pretty much admitted on his Twitter feed what had happened.

But I guess the press do have to be very careful what they say about him and whether he did indeed blur the boundaries between private and work life, because so far a lot of this is speculation. They're the sort of accusations which, if provably true, should lead to sacking.

But as Spero says the actual story is the NSPCC's response.

They ought to have said "cannot comment on confidential personnel matter during an ongoing investigation", rinse and repeat.

Instead they leapt straight to "shut the fuck up bigots", which frankly (specially in the context of the Oxfam whistleblowers an scandals over sexual abuse) makes me and a lot of others think "cover up, much?" and "what the hell else are you covering up?" and "corporate policies on safeguarding gone to shit in the country's largest children's charity, the only one with statutory powers."

That's the story. And it shouldn't be swept under the carpet.

Happy to contribute.

Would also chip in for a crowdfunder.

Totally agree with your interpretation of this, Spero.

The question is what did NSPCC do when they became aware of a potential safeguarding issue?

They issued this statement in public on Twitter:

twitter.com/NSPCC/status/1138860884737044480

"We absolutely won’t tolerate bullying of any kind against our people. Supporting staff is a priority, and we're offering various support to staff including counselling . We’re also reporting these to Twitter and recommend you do too".

So:

• They immediately called the simple act of raising of a safeguarding issue "bullying"

• They said that supporting staff is a priority. I thought protecting children was their priority, so how do they balance protecting children with supporting staff who have concerns raised against them?

• They asked for others to delete evidence of the safeguarding issue.

We need to ask whether that was an appropriate public response to a safeguarding issue. If the NSPCC is confident that it acted correctly, then they can explain why it made the statement that it did. And whether it has acted on the safeguarding concerns raised.

Also agree that merely shining a light on this issue is hugely important, irrespective of the likelihood of legal action succeeding.

Legal action will garner media attention, and I also hope that other professionals in child protection will become aware of the issue and speak out.

Thanks Sarah. I will contribute as much as I can. I’m assuming the MSM won’t touch this because an investigation is in place. If not and if they are carrying on as usual, then this whole situation is even more sinister than at first appears. So important, as you say, to keep insisting on a response from them.