Yesterday’s news was awash with the conviction of Khyra Ishaq’ mother for her killing. No one watching could remain unmoved by what this child endured during her short life. Another Victoria Climbié, unfortunately.
Various people were interviewed and the usual hand wringing indulged in. The inevitable line was trotted out – “what can be done to ensure that nothing like this happens again?”. The answer, frankly, is “nothing”. For no matter what measures are taken, there will always be the odd one that will slip through the net. The only way to be sure that children are sufficiently monitored to prevent all such tragedies will involve a blanket level of state surveillance that makes the telescreen appear positively benign. Risk exists. We have to balance that against the liberty of the innocent majority. To do otherwise is absurd. But, then, look at the people we are dealing with. Absurd doesn’t even begin to cut it. Besides, who watches the watchers?
Much was made by Graham Badman and the odious hobgoblin Ed Balls about Khyra being taken out of education and home educated. You can see where this is going, can’t you? If the authorities have the right to enter the home and interview children – alone, if possible – as recommended in the Badman Report, then this could have been prevented, they assert. Because Khrya’s mother and step father took her out of school and apparently home educated and used that as a shield to hide the abuse, it follows in these peoples minds, that others are doing likewise.
Balls and co distrust home education and want the local authority to register and monitor home educators – ostensibly to check for abuse – but deep down, they hate the idea that children have been removed from the state indoctrination scheme and more free thinkers is the last thing they want. There is something deeply obscene about ministers and their hangers on who will use one tragedy to justify yet more surveillance of the innocent majority.
Perhaps the question they should be asking is why a depressive mother and schizophrenic step-father were granted custody in preference to the biological father?
It’s worth noting, since you seem to have missed this point, that she wasn’t taken out of school and home educated. She simply stopped going to school and became, officially, a truant for several months.
This case has nothing at all to do with home education, unless your name is Badman or Balls and don’t mind using and distorting a tragedy like this to further your political agenda.
Ciaran, I didn’t miss it. My reference was rather subtle though. In this sentence:
the “apparently” linked to Renegade Parent here where just that point is explained.
“For no matter what measures are taken, there will always be the odd one that will slip through the net. “
The problem appears to have been that, once again, that net proved to be full of holes so big an oil tanker could have got through them.
The social workers assigned to her were met with obstruction at every turn, and so they….gave up.
In contrast, they pursued Kerry Robertson all the way from Fife to another country.
Why?
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Apologies, yeah, you didn’t miss the point at all. I missed you not missing it. Still, doesn’t hurt to repeat it. I wonder how many times you’d have to say it to get through to the likes of Balls and Badman?
JuliaM, you make a good point. Although the blame for this tragedy lies wholly with the parents, you do wonder how the SS can claim need more powers in order to prevent this kind of thing, yet time and again they’re proven to a) not use the ones they do have, and b) have more than enough to hound innocent parents and kidnap their children when it suits them.
It’s truer to say that Khyra Ishaq was killed by Lord Laming than by home education. If Laming’s recommendation to dismantle the child protection register had not been followed, Khyra would have stood a better chance of Social Services recognising her need for protection.
Instead, Badman and Balls would have 80,000 children – the vast majority of whom are perfectly happy and well cared for – added to Social Services’ books, to be visited and scrutinised at least once a year, regardless of how responsible their parents are found to be at visit after visit. The ludicrous workload and the inevitable thousands of false positives will make other Khyras near impossible to find amid the haystack, almost guaranteeing further deaths. But “if it dooms just one child…”
Indeed not.
Heidi, this mindset is found everywhere. In my own profession there is no risk based quality control. Everyone is seen as an equal risk and must be monitored equally. It’s absurd, unnecessarily costly and fails in its primary duty of improving quality. I have mentioned this repeatedly, but does anyone listen?
As is usual, the solution when looking for a needle in a haystack is to build a bigger haystack…
And what about the father? He’s the one who buggered off overseas leaving his daughter with her schizo mother and a nutter for a step father, which he must have known from he local mosque.
He than stands up in front of the cameras and lambastes SS. He should be standing trial as well. Its about time people started facing up to their responsibilities, its not like there was a court order banning him from seeing his child. If he’d made one visit a week he would have seen what was going on.
It really does get my goat to see people like him implying that we are uncivilised.
JuliaM, do you think that bit about the mosque might be a clue why SS didn’t follow up with all the might of the law? Thought so.
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I heard someone (Badman?) on the Today Programme this morning trying to pin this on home-educators, which as has been pointed out above is as ridiculous as it is disgusting. The control-freaks have been looking everywhere for a case they can use to point at home-educators and make connections between this and abuse. The fabians hate home-schoolers for obvious reasons.
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“JuliaM, do you think that bit about the mosque might be a clue why SS didn’t follow up with all the might of the law?”
It’s possible. But I suspect the fact that Kerry’s baby was a newborn (and thus eminently desirable for adoption) played a bigger part…
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TT it could well have been Badman. He was on the BBC indulging in the same innuendo.
I love how the man who wants to restrict freedom for parents to teach their children outside of the wretched state system is called ‘Badman’.