The Wardman Wire

Ed Balls about Children

This morning I have been gently simmering.

I have listened to the Right Honourable (!) Ed Balls MP suggesting that “it is time for a national debate about children’s’services“.

That is presumably (7 million children later) to deal with the consequences of the policies that have been implemented over 10 years by the Labour Government where Ed Balls was a key adviser, Prime Minister Gordon Brown was the only figure (apart from Blair) who could stop policies with a simple memo, and Tony Blair was the gaffer.

Anyway, to get to the point of this post.

Vanessa Brookes and Calderdale Council

Most readers should be aware of the Vanessa Brookes case (Ben Leapman in Telegraph, Camilla Cavendish in The Times), where an Audio Recording of a meeting with Social Services was posted on Youtube. As you can see, this recording has been removed.

The removal was done at the threat request of Calderdale Council. Quoting from the Telegraph article linked above, which was published on 20th August 2007):

Calderdale council, in West Yorkshire, last night accused them of breaching the Data Protection Act by recording its staff without their knowledge or consent. The council said it had begun legal action to have the recording removed from the YouTube website.

Brookes Tape now in the Public Domain

I note that the recording is now firmly in the public domain, and is available in multiple places on the Internet, such as:

• Mediafire. (launch page to .avi file)

• Corestore. (.wmv file) via Fassit

• Latest Youtube recording. This one is likely to vanish.

[Edit:I have decided to make the tape available here as well]

Download audio file - 9Mb.

Note: I have written permission from the copyright holder to publish this file.

There is very little Transparency

Calderdale Council are hiding behind the Data Protection Act, when they should be addressing the substantive issue - viz, why are they apparently attempting to remove a baby based on a mere suspicion. In a free society that is - very, very, simply - unacceptable without proper evidence.

And it symptomatic of a huge hidden problem - the needs and best interests of our children are being decided in secret, in fact under a legally mandated cloak of secrecy, with no checks and balances of public scrutiny.

The number of accounts of abuse by the system, and what looks like the failure to follow proper procedures, make me suspect that the responsibility under the Children Act (1989 revised 2004) to place the interests of children first is not being fulfilled. Or, at the very least, we cannot tell whether it is being fulfilled.

It is Time for some Openness

John Hemming MP has been doing excellent campaigning work on this question, and I positively encourage you to do what you can to support his work.

I hope that some brave MP will get hold of a transcript of the Brook’s tape and read it into the record in the House of Commons.

This question cannot drop, or in my opinion it will turn into a bigger scandal than the Welsh Children’s Homes from 10 years ago.

The tragedy would be that it would be perpetrated by a profession believing they were acting properly.

Post Script

And a quick PS.

This is post number 599 on this blog.

This evening number 600 (or 601 if a Guest Blogger jumps in first) will be about some major developments planned for the Wardman Wire as we move into the autumn political season.

Tags: john hemming mp, vanessa brookes, calderdale council, data protection, forced adoption, freedom of speech[tags]john hemming mp, vanessa brookes, calderdale council, data protection, forced adoption, freedom of speech[/tags]