13th August 2008
HOME SECRETARY CALLS FOR HUGE EXPANSION OF GOVERNMENT INTO FAMILY LIFE
Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, announced plans to identify children as young as 5 as potential criminals.
In what the Times has called ‘a huge expansion of state intervention in family life’, Ms. Smith said that parents who are not looking after their children properly should be made to sign contracts forcing them to exercise more control.
‘I believe it is about identifying families in which you are going to intervene at an early stage, where you will expect certain behaviour and if that does not happen there will be sanctions.’
Read full article HERE.
WRITE: Identifying children who might become criminals or parents who might become abusive goes against one of the fundamental pillars of our judicial system: that a person is innocent until proven guilty. Ms Smith’s proposals are chilling, especially when we remember that last year Fran Lyon, a Northumberland mother, was told by social services that her first child would be taken from her within 30 minutes of birth and handed over to the local authority simply because she might harm the child after it was born. In another case, reported in the Daily Mail, one mother's son was adopted on the grounds that there was a chance she might shout at him when he was older.
If Ms. Smith’s plans go through, we can expect to see an increase of cases where children are removed from parents on the basis of ‘risk’ rather than actual abuse. Write to your MP opposing these measures.
LICENSED TO HUG
The relationship between adults and children is becoming increasingly sullied with suspicion and fear as a result of child protection laws, a recent study has shown.
The study, conducted by the independent think-tank Civitas, found that youngsters are increasingly at risk as responsible adults are afraid to intervene and help them for fear of being labeled as pedophiles.
‘Since the establishment of the Criminal Records Bureau in 2002, more than a third of British adults have had to get a certificate to say they are safe to be near children, and the numbers affected are increasing’ warns the study. Soon a quarter of all British adults will have to pass the 'paedophile test' before being allowed to interact with any child except their own.
Titled ‘Licensed to Hug’, the report reveals that since 2002 the Criminal Records Bureau has conducted 15 million CRB checks, costing the taxpayer over half a billion pounds. Those who have not been certified as ‘safe’ are often afraid to comfort a toddler who fell over, intervene in a playground fight, assist a lost child or offer basic first aid to someone else’s child in a public park. The report cites the case of
Cleveland
coastguard Paul Waugh, who climbed down a cliff in high winds to rescue a child and then resigned after being severely reprimanded for breaching health and safety regulations.
The report cited another example of a woman who could not kiss her daughter goodbye on a school trip because she had not been vetted.
The Civitas report calls for the torrent of politically correct child protection laws, which treat every adult as a potential child-abuser, to be relaxed.
The Home Office said that from October 2009, a new Independent Safeguarding Authority would be created to tighten the rules even further. It will require any adult coming into contact with children their work or voluntary groups to be investigated.
For more information see:
BBC - Today Programme
BBC Online
Daily Telegraph - Front Page
Daily Telegraph - Education
Daily Telegraph - Op-ed
The Guardian
Daily Mail
New Statesman
HUNDREDS OF INNOCENT CITIZENS BRANDED CRIMINALS BY CRB ‘MISTAKE’
The Criminal Records Bureau has mistakenly identified hundreds of innocent citizens as criminals.
The CRB was set up by the Government to give background checks for people working with children.
In a damaging expose of government inefficiency, the Telegraph revealed that in the year leading up to February 2008, 680 people were issued with incorrect information after being vetting by the CRB.
‘People applying to take up jobs as teachers, nurses, childminders and even those volunteering to work with youth groups are likely to have been among those falsely accused of wrongdoing by the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB)’ revealed Christopher Hope in the Daily Telegraph. Caroline Gammell reported the case of Amanda Hodgson, a 36-year-old, law-abiding mother of three, who was told that she had a ‘criminal past'’ after she applied for a post as a welfare assistant at her local primary school. ‘She was told she had a criminal record stretching back 18 years, including three convictions for assaulting police officers, and the only way to clear her name was to get her fingerprints checked against every unsolved crime in the country.’
In another case, a mother was told that she cannot take her son to school anymore until her details have been checked by the Criminal Record Bureau. Jayne Jones had been taking her 14-year-old epileptic son to school every day in a taxi, along with equipment that is required whenever he has a fit. She said: ‘It's crazy that I have to be CRB checked before I can ride in a taxi with my own son.’
The government is currently planning a colossal expansion of the CRB, in which one in every four of the adult population in
England
will have to be vetted and registered on the CRB’s database.
GOVERNMENT PLANS MASSIVE SURVEILLANCE OF CHILDREN
In addition to expanding the CRB database, Government is planning to massively increase its surveillance of children, according to a report produced by the activist organizations ‘Action on Rights for Children’, ‘Liberty’, ‘Open Rights Group’ and ‘No2ID.’
Every 14-year-old child in
England
and
Wales
will be on the planned database. It will contain data on everything from the child’s exam results to difficulties within the family.
Journalist Henry Porter raised concerns about the project by pointing out that ‘by the time they all reach adulthood, the databases will have merged to give the state complete access to their most personal information. No child will be able to escape his past, or the judgment and watchfulness of the bureaucrats who may decide their destiny.’ (Read Mr. Porter’s entire article HERE)
