The further revelations and developments in the case of poor Baby P have been held up in some sections of the media as further proof of the laxity and negligence of Haringey Social Services. Personally, I think that, if anything, the whole sorry mess only serves to illustrate further the dilemma that they must have found themselves in.
It is easy to be wise after the event in cases like this, and sack two or three people in a macho purge to disguise the futile hope that a line will be drawn and the faults in the system will somehow be mended by your actions. And it plays well with the press.
But, as I have said before (so many times, that I am in danger of sounding like a broken record) this is only tinkering around the edges, treating the symptoms, not the disease.
As a society, we have created a world where bad parenting and social and economic pressures and a lack of communal respect and responsibility, have all conspired to put vulnerable children at risk. While we work on solving these long-term problems, we must have an efficient and effective safety net in the form of social workers or similar, to police and protect those children in precarious situations. Yet, as I have said before (that cracked record again) whenever something goes wrong, the social workers are the first to get pilloried in the media. It seems to be one of those jobs like being a teacher, where everybody thinks that they can do it better than you.
This kind of thinking has now been officially endorsed by Lord Laming, with the proposal that social workers should be subject to the scrutiny of lay observers on their panels, with the unspoken suggestion that social workers need “real” people to teach them common sense and keep them on the straight and narrow.
When in fact, many of their seemingly bizarre decisions are only partially reported and are done because of statutory or legal constraints to which they are subject, and which “real” people would soon bleat about the lack of, if they weren’t there.
It’s no wonder then, that in the wake of the Baby P fiasco, the numbers of people wanting to be social workers has fallen faster than a hooker’s knickers, and dried up to the extent that the Government has now to consider pumping £60million that we can ill afford into a recruitment drive, to stop the system grinding to a halt. What an expensive mistake that Gaderene rush to judgement to appease the likes of The Daily Mail has proved to be!
I am not saying – and never have said – that Haringey Social Services were totally blameless in the Baby P affair. Clearly there seem to have been shortcomings. But we also have to acknowledge the root cause of these was systemic, rather than individual. This was obviously a very complicated case, we now learn, involving two overlapping instances of abuse, investigations about the mistreatment of not one but two children, an investigation that it seems got inevitably tangled up in itself and may even have hindered itself, owing to lack of communication and co-ordination between the various bodies involved.
I don’t know who it was, off the top, who said that "the truth is never pure and rarely ever simple", but it is a maxim we should do well to keep in mind whenever we ponder the sad fate of Baby P.
Showing posts with label childcare. Show all posts
Showing posts with label childcare. Show all posts
Sunday, 10 May 2009
Saturday, 11 April 2009
Passing the Baby
I know I have castigated the press recently for publishing attacks vilifying Sharon Shoesmith while her Employment Tribunal remains unheard (whatever you think of her and her actions, everyone should be entitled to a fair hearing without the likes of The Sun or the Daily Mail pre-judging the issue for us) but I could not let the news go unrecorded, that in fact Baby P's mother could have been prosecuted, but for an apparent fumble by the police in handing over his file when one officer left and eight weeks seemingly passed before it came to the notice of their replacement.
I am only posting this to observe that, although several media sources have made the point that this prosecution, had it gone ahead, would have given the social workers a stronger legal foothold for taking Baby P away, no-one as far as I can see from either Ofsted or Ed Balls's office has said words to the effect of "Oh, now we see, the situation was actually more complex than we first thought, there were obviously a number of contributing factors, and in fact our Gaderene Swine rush to judgement via the media may have been hasty and ill-advised"
Don't hold your breath.
I am only posting this to observe that, although several media sources have made the point that this prosecution, had it gone ahead, would have given the social workers a stronger legal foothold for taking Baby P away, no-one as far as I can see from either Ofsted or Ed Balls's office has said words to the effect of "Oh, now we see, the situation was actually more complex than we first thought, there were obviously a number of contributing factors, and in fact our Gaderene Swine rush to judgement via the media may have been hasty and ill-advised"
Don't hold your breath.
Wednesday, 11 March 2009
Sharon Shoesmith
Has taken my advice and is going to take Haringey council to a tribunal.
Watch this space. Meanwhile of course there have been other instances of child abuse reported in similar circumstances. And there will continue to be.
And now, this morning, the incredible news that Lord Laming, on his comeback tour, has suggested the heads of children's services at all local authorities should undergo compulsory re-training, including spending time with a deprived family.
They would be better off having training on how to survive being crucified in the press and hung out to dry by politicians anxious to protect their own substantial arses.
I note that yesterday, with her tribunal even as yet unheard, the Sun described Sharon Shoesmith as the "Baby P Bungler" on its front page. Whatever you might think of Miss S and the rights and wrongs of the case, everyone should be entitled to a fair hearing at an industrial tribunal without the Sun sticking its oar in.
Note to Ed Balls, it's the disease, not the symptoms.
Watch this space. Meanwhile of course there have been other instances of child abuse reported in similar circumstances. And there will continue to be.
And now, this morning, the incredible news that Lord Laming, on his comeback tour, has suggested the heads of children's services at all local authorities should undergo compulsory re-training, including spending time with a deprived family.
They would be better off having training on how to survive being crucified in the press and hung out to dry by politicians anxious to protect their own substantial arses.
I note that yesterday, with her tribunal even as yet unheard, the Sun described Sharon Shoesmith as the "Baby P Bungler" on its front page. Whatever you might think of Miss S and the rights and wrongs of the case, everyone should be entitled to a fair hearing at an industrial tribunal without the Sun sticking its oar in.
Note to Ed Balls, it's the disease, not the symptoms.
Tuesday, 24 February 2009
Slug a Hoodie
Forgive me for pointing out once again the "Bleeding Obvious" in terms of glaring contradictions in would-be policy for our would-be Prime Minister, but I have just noticed this:
"DAVID CAMERON today warned young people that a Conservative government would impose curfews on yobs, axe cautions and lock up drunks.
Unveiling new moves to tackle crime, the Tory leader said children and adults would have to understand that under his premiership "you're not going to get away with it any more".
"If we win the next election, I want a loud and clear message to be heard by every kid who's getting into trouble and every kid who's thinking about it: It's the Conservatives you're dealing with now," Mr Cameron said. His remarks came as shadow home secretary Chris Grayling set out plans to reverse Labour's binge-drinking crisis, put more police on the streets and target gang ring-leaders.
In his first major speech since taking over his post, Mr Grayling said he would be "unashamedly tough" with youth crime."
So much for "hug a hoodie!"
Can a bandwagon actually DO a U-turn without crashing? I think not.
"DAVID CAMERON today warned young people that a Conservative government would impose curfews on yobs, axe cautions and lock up drunks.
Unveiling new moves to tackle crime, the Tory leader said children and adults would have to understand that under his premiership "you're not going to get away with it any more".
"If we win the next election, I want a loud and clear message to be heard by every kid who's getting into trouble and every kid who's thinking about it: It's the Conservatives you're dealing with now," Mr Cameron said. His remarks came as shadow home secretary Chris Grayling set out plans to reverse Labour's binge-drinking crisis, put more police on the streets and target gang ring-leaders.
In his first major speech since taking over his post, Mr Grayling said he would be "unashamedly tough" with youth crime."
So much for "hug a hoodie!"
Can a bandwagon actually DO a U-turn without crashing? I think not.
Monday, 9 February 2009
Children in Need?
The Tories have finally woken up to the issue I highlighted several blogs ago, namely that there is a shortage of social workers. No shit, Sherlock. Well done, Dave. They omitted to go on and elaborate further on the subject (confining themselves as usual to shroud-waving and jumping on bandwagons) so allow me to elaborate. There is a shortage of social workers because their workload is high, their wages are low (comparative to the responsibility they bear) and the resources are few. They are frequently damned if they do and damned if they don’t, and if they make a mistake, they are likely to find themselves crucified by the Sun and the Daily Mail, two papers who support the Tories but not, obviously, to the extent of campaigning for more social workers.
The editorial stance of both papers veers diametrically between castigating the likes of social workers for being part of the PC Brigade (without pausing to reflect that social workers are often themselves victims of the box-ticking, target driven, risk averse society rather than perpetrators of it) and scapegoating them when things go wrong. Never once do they make the connection that if you want more and better social workers, your council tax must go up, because they know this isn’t what their readers want to hear!
Children generally have a poor time of it these days, if Lord Layard is to be believed. But once again, Lord Layard’s diatribe is merely a litany of symptoms, not of diseases. The real root cause of the malaise which is destroying society is worship of the money-god. These days, your sole worth is judged by how much money you have. We live in a dog-eat-dog, every man for himself society where everyone wants fame, celebrity and money, now, without having to work for it, and without any responsibilities. It is this refusal by people to take responsibility for their own actions, the idea that it is always someone else’s fault, that leads to schools being closed at the first hint of snow. Local authorities would rather risk the wrath of a posse of angry parents (angry at being forced to take responsibility for their offspring!) than an expensive lawsuit for personal injury and negligence when little Johnny slips on the ice and breaks his leg, because it’s cheaper. All back to money again. Ironically, the kids who were sent home from school and who, as a result, were forced to spend some quality time with their parents, probably had a more fulfilling day as a result.
What has all this to do with Children In Need? Children In Need is, of course, the BBC’s annual jamboree for charity, in which Auntie Beeb puts on the motley for one day and raises money for “good causes”. It’s joined by Red Nose Day, a similar bun-fight, which is coming up next month. Rod Liddle has described Red Nose Day, in The Spectator two years ago, as a “bullying smugfest” … and that was before the BBC decided to set itself up as the arbiter of which children deserve charity help and which children don’t. (I’ll give you a clue: children in Gaza who have been traumatised, maimed or made homeless by Israel’s war crimes don’t deserve charity, according to the BBC, whereas programmes for youth outreach in Birmingham – that should really be provided by the government or local authority-funded social workers – do need to be funded by people willing to dress up like prats or sit in a bath of baked beans.)
Well, I for one will be boycotting Red Nose Day and Children In Need for the foreseeable. Both of them treat the symptoms and not the disease and, since the BBC’s insane decision not to show the D.E.C. Gaza appeal, for me, at any rate, they have a strong whiff of added hypocrisy which makes them even more unpalatable.
If the BBC, the Tory Party, Red Nose Day, Children In Need and anyone else who feels the need to postulate sanctimonious twaddle about the well-being of children, were really serious about the subject, they must acknowledge, and embrace, the following uncompromising truths:
More social workers, and better social workers, cost more money.
Well meaning as they may be, things like Children In Need and Red Nose Day only treat the symptoms, not the disease, in their belief that money can cure everything, and now the BBC has no moral authority as a peddler of charity anyway, post-Gaza.
What we really need is a return to a close-knit, mutually co-operative society based around adults (married or not, straight or gay) giving long-term loving care and development to help children have safe yet fulfilling lives.
The government should be providing much more to make this happen at home instead of giving overseas aid to questionable regimes that spend it on arms or weapons systems instead of on the recipients for whom it was intended, or to countries such as India which has the wherewithal within its own coffers to fund space programmes and nuclear weapons but not to feed the beggars of Mumbai, it seems.
That would be a start. Then we could all begin to rejoice at the prospect of no more “children in need”.
The editorial stance of both papers veers diametrically between castigating the likes of social workers for being part of the PC Brigade (without pausing to reflect that social workers are often themselves victims of the box-ticking, target driven, risk averse society rather than perpetrators of it) and scapegoating them when things go wrong. Never once do they make the connection that if you want more and better social workers, your council tax must go up, because they know this isn’t what their readers want to hear!
Children generally have a poor time of it these days, if Lord Layard is to be believed. But once again, Lord Layard’s diatribe is merely a litany of symptoms, not of diseases. The real root cause of the malaise which is destroying society is worship of the money-god. These days, your sole worth is judged by how much money you have. We live in a dog-eat-dog, every man for himself society where everyone wants fame, celebrity and money, now, without having to work for it, and without any responsibilities. It is this refusal by people to take responsibility for their own actions, the idea that it is always someone else’s fault, that leads to schools being closed at the first hint of snow. Local authorities would rather risk the wrath of a posse of angry parents (angry at being forced to take responsibility for their offspring!) than an expensive lawsuit for personal injury and negligence when little Johnny slips on the ice and breaks his leg, because it’s cheaper. All back to money again. Ironically, the kids who were sent home from school and who, as a result, were forced to spend some quality time with their parents, probably had a more fulfilling day as a result.
What has all this to do with Children In Need? Children In Need is, of course, the BBC’s annual jamboree for charity, in which Auntie Beeb puts on the motley for one day and raises money for “good causes”. It’s joined by Red Nose Day, a similar bun-fight, which is coming up next month. Rod Liddle has described Red Nose Day, in The Spectator two years ago, as a “bullying smugfest” … and that was before the BBC decided to set itself up as the arbiter of which children deserve charity help and which children don’t. (I’ll give you a clue: children in Gaza who have been traumatised, maimed or made homeless by Israel’s war crimes don’t deserve charity, according to the BBC, whereas programmes for youth outreach in Birmingham – that should really be provided by the government or local authority-funded social workers – do need to be funded by people willing to dress up like prats or sit in a bath of baked beans.)
Well, I for one will be boycotting Red Nose Day and Children In Need for the foreseeable. Both of them treat the symptoms and not the disease and, since the BBC’s insane decision not to show the D.E.C. Gaza appeal, for me, at any rate, they have a strong whiff of added hypocrisy which makes them even more unpalatable.
If the BBC, the Tory Party, Red Nose Day, Children In Need and anyone else who feels the need to postulate sanctimonious twaddle about the well-being of children, were really serious about the subject, they must acknowledge, and embrace, the following uncompromising truths:
More social workers, and better social workers, cost more money.
Well meaning as they may be, things like Children In Need and Red Nose Day only treat the symptoms, not the disease, in their belief that money can cure everything, and now the BBC has no moral authority as a peddler of charity anyway, post-Gaza.
What we really need is a return to a close-knit, mutually co-operative society based around adults (married or not, straight or gay) giving long-term loving care and development to help children have safe yet fulfilling lives.
The government should be providing much more to make this happen at home instead of giving overseas aid to questionable regimes that spend it on arms or weapons systems instead of on the recipients for whom it was intended, or to countries such as India which has the wherewithal within its own coffers to fund space programmes and nuclear weapons but not to feed the beggars of Mumbai, it seems.
That would be a start. Then we could all begin to rejoice at the prospect of no more “children in need”.
Wednesday, 31 December 2008
It's (Not) That Man, Again!
In the second world war, there used to be a long-running radio series called ITMA which stood for “It’s that man again”. Such is the identikit interchangeability of the apparatchiks in the present government, that this was my first reaction on hearing of their intention to police, curb and generally censor what is available on the internet. I was confusing Andy Burnham with James Purnell. An easy mistake to make, since neither of them appear in many photos. (At least, not when the photo was taken, anyway.)
Andy Burnham has, apparently, spent £1,986.84 of taxpayers’ money on “media training” during 2008. Judging by his latest sally, we should be asking for a refund.
Now, no-one is defending the sick and illegal sites that show abuse happening to children, or adults for that matter, or animals. But these sites are generally illegal anyway and can be quickly shut down, and/or their adherents pursued through credit card records. Beyond this criminal hardcore, which I again stress is illegal, lies a whole hinterland of “softer” material which some would also wish to ban. There are compelling arguments both ways; those who maintain that pornography on the internet cheapens and demeans the status of women, versus those who argue that its presence sublimates a desire which exists anyway and which, were it not for the “safety valve” element of the internet, would manifest itself in other, darker, more concrete forms. I suspect that no one knows for sure.
The internet, though, can generally be relied upon to police these sites itself, and there are now increasingly sophisticated ways in which responsible adults can prevent children in their care from viewing it. The problem there is not the technology but the irresponsible adults. They could also take a look at the access children have to computer games, particularly violent ones with a pornographic tinge, rather than worrying about the chances of an impressionable teenager stumbling on a home movie of a chartered accountant from Droitwich bonking his wife.
But the government, of course, despite the fact that no-one “owns” the internet, is not content to let matters be. Oh, no.
“There is content that should just not be available to be viewed. That’s my view. Absolutely categorical,” says Mr Burnham, proposing a cinema-style rating system for sites.
Yes, well, we all think that, but the problem is, who decides what should just not be available? I would much rather rely on the collective weight of international law then the decision of one Andy Burnham or his civil servants. Plus, in one of his media interviews (£1,986.84, remember) Mr Burnham used the chilling word “unacceptable”.
This is the crux of the problem. Not “illegal”, which no-one would have an issue with, but “unacceptable”. When we get to the stage of people in government deciding what we can and can’t see on the internet on the basis of what is acceptable and “unacceptable”, then it’s time to worry. That is the thin end of a very large wedge. What is “unacceptable” can grow and change – once the government gets the power of veto over what is acceptable or unacceptable for you and I to look at on the web, then basically anything the government does not like could find itself on the “unacceptable” list. Sites criticizing government policy. Sites promoting animal welfare, even, if they contravene the government's unquestioning support for big pharma and vivisection.
Hermann Goering once memorably said, “When I hear someone mention ‘culture’, then I reach for my revolver” and I’m getting a similar twitchy feeling. Though in my case it would involve adding the words “secretary, Andy Burnham” into that sentence, at the appropriate point.
Andy Burnham has, apparently, spent £1,986.84 of taxpayers’ money on “media training” during 2008. Judging by his latest sally, we should be asking for a refund.
Now, no-one is defending the sick and illegal sites that show abuse happening to children, or adults for that matter, or animals. But these sites are generally illegal anyway and can be quickly shut down, and/or their adherents pursued through credit card records. Beyond this criminal hardcore, which I again stress is illegal, lies a whole hinterland of “softer” material which some would also wish to ban. There are compelling arguments both ways; those who maintain that pornography on the internet cheapens and demeans the status of women, versus those who argue that its presence sublimates a desire which exists anyway and which, were it not for the “safety valve” element of the internet, would manifest itself in other, darker, more concrete forms. I suspect that no one knows for sure.
The internet, though, can generally be relied upon to police these sites itself, and there are now increasingly sophisticated ways in which responsible adults can prevent children in their care from viewing it. The problem there is not the technology but the irresponsible adults. They could also take a look at the access children have to computer games, particularly violent ones with a pornographic tinge, rather than worrying about the chances of an impressionable teenager stumbling on a home movie of a chartered accountant from Droitwich bonking his wife.
But the government, of course, despite the fact that no-one “owns” the internet, is not content to let matters be. Oh, no.
“There is content that should just not be available to be viewed. That’s my view. Absolutely categorical,” says Mr Burnham, proposing a cinema-style rating system for sites.
Yes, well, we all think that, but the problem is, who decides what should just not be available? I would much rather rely on the collective weight of international law then the decision of one Andy Burnham or his civil servants. Plus, in one of his media interviews (£1,986.84, remember) Mr Burnham used the chilling word “unacceptable”.
This is the crux of the problem. Not “illegal”, which no-one would have an issue with, but “unacceptable”. When we get to the stage of people in government deciding what we can and can’t see on the internet on the basis of what is acceptable and “unacceptable”, then it’s time to worry. That is the thin end of a very large wedge. What is “unacceptable” can grow and change – once the government gets the power of veto over what is acceptable or unacceptable for you and I to look at on the web, then basically anything the government does not like could find itself on the “unacceptable” list. Sites criticizing government policy. Sites promoting animal welfare, even, if they contravene the government's unquestioning support for big pharma and vivisection.
Hermann Goering once memorably said, “When I hear someone mention ‘culture’, then I reach for my revolver” and I’m getting a similar twitchy feeling. Though in my case it would involve adding the words “secretary, Andy Burnham” into that sentence, at the appropriate point.
Wednesday, 10 December 2008
Unfair Dismissal
I see that the witch-hunt for scapegoats over both the Baby P imbroglio and the Shannon Matthews case has gone up a notch, with the enforced departure of Sharon Shoesmith from Children's Services at Haringey, and the announcement of an enquiry into Kirklees social services.
By caving in to the mob mentality fostered by the likes of The Sun, the government has plumbed new depths. Thank God for the House of Commons committee today that showed up Ofsted as the hopeless boobies they are. Considering the crap job Ofsted have done in testing schools and fostering education by box-ticking in the pursuit of mindless targets, it is a mystery to me why anyone thought Ofsted could ever test anything.
I really hope Sharon Shoesmith sues for unfair dismissal.
By caving in to the mob mentality fostered by the likes of The Sun, the government has plumbed new depths. Thank God for the House of Commons committee today that showed up Ofsted as the hopeless boobies they are. Considering the crap job Ofsted have done in testing schools and fostering education by box-ticking in the pursuit of mindless targets, it is a mystery to me why anyone thought Ofsted could ever test anything.
I really hope Sharon Shoesmith sues for unfair dismissal.
Who Benefits?
Cui Bono used to be a latin tag used by lawyers when they were wanting to find out who was behind a certain set of nefarious circumstances. If they were unable to find out who was at the bottom of it, they were encouraged to look at who would benefit most. They were usually the guilty party.
The government, in the form of James Purnell, the man who did for photoshop what Ken Dodd did for tickling sticks, has been all over the media today, blethering on about how they are going to make people work for their benefits in future. I loved the quotation where he said, in effect that there was no room for freeloaders who "worked the system". There are 600-odd of them at Westminster - let's put them on workfare, thescrounging bastards!
Benefits are only the symptoms. Dewsbury Moor is the disease.I mean, fine, if people really do want to get a job and they can be helped to do so, and they will be better off, but personally I don't know where all the jobs are going to come from, even for able bodied people, when unemployment tops three million, as it will, mark my words - perhaps James Purnell could photoshop us a few
And I would feel much happier about it if I thought it was a genuine effort by government to right social wrongs, even though they ARE still treating the symptoms, not the disease, but I suspect it's more of a dog-whistle policy aimed at Middle England over the heads of Labour Backbenchers.
I often wonder what planet the government is on. They are inventing imaginary jobs in the same way as Hitler, cowering in his bunker, invented imaginary divisions coming to save him from the Russians. They can't really be that stupid, on a day when Woolies has gone tits up and people like Sony are announcing 8000 job losses worldwide, can they? Can they?
Who benefits? Certainly not those people already struggling who will now have the added stress of government agencies trying to harrass them to take on jobs that might make them £1.50 a week better off, just to tick a box and massage the unemployment stats.
The government, in the form of James Purnell, the man who did for photoshop what Ken Dodd did for tickling sticks, has been all over the media today, blethering on about how they are going to make people work for their benefits in future. I loved the quotation where he said, in effect that there was no room for freeloaders who "worked the system". There are 600-odd of them at Westminster - let's put them on workfare, thescrounging bastards!
Benefits are only the symptoms. Dewsbury Moor is the disease.I mean, fine, if people really do want to get a job and they can be helped to do so, and they will be better off, but personally I don't know where all the jobs are going to come from, even for able bodied people, when unemployment tops three million, as it will, mark my words - perhaps James Purnell could photoshop us a few
And I would feel much happier about it if I thought it was a genuine effort by government to right social wrongs, even though they ARE still treating the symptoms, not the disease, but I suspect it's more of a dog-whistle policy aimed at Middle England over the heads of Labour Backbenchers.
I often wonder what planet the government is on. They are inventing imaginary jobs in the same way as Hitler, cowering in his bunker, invented imaginary divisions coming to save him from the Russians. They can't really be that stupid, on a day when Woolies has gone tits up and people like Sony are announcing 8000 job losses worldwide, can they? Can they?
Who benefits? Certainly not those people already struggling who will now have the added stress of government agencies trying to harrass them to take on jobs that might make them £1.50 a week better off, just to tick a box and massage the unemployment stats.
Sunday, 7 December 2008
Rusty lane Redux
I realise that last week, my anger about the continued existence of Dewsbury Moor may have led me into incoherence. The reference to Rusty Lane, West Bromwich, comes from a stirring passage in English Journey by J B Priestley (1936).
It's one of those touchstone texts, along with George Orwell's The Road To Wigan Pier, which I keep coming back to, every time I feel I am going soft and maybe David Cameron has some kind of point.
Anyway, here's the full text of the passage:
The whole neighbourhood is mean and squalid, but this particular street seemed the worst of all. It would not matter very much - though it would matter - if only metal were kept there; but it happens that people live there, children are born there and grow up there. I saw some of them.
I was being shown one of the warehouses, where steel plates were stacked in the chill gloom, and we heard a bang and rattle on the roof. The boys, it seems, were throwing stones again. They were always throwing stones on that roof. We went out to find them, but only found three frightened little girls, who looked at us with round eyes in wet smudgy faces. No, they hadn't done it, the boys had done it, and the boys had just run away. Where they could run to, I cannot imagine. They need not have run away for me, because I could not blame them if they threw stones and stones and smashed every pane of glass for miles. Nobody can blame them if they grow up to smash everything that can be smashed.
There ought to be no more of those lunches and dinners, at which political and financial and industrial gentlemen congratulate one another, until something is done about Rusty Lane, and about West Bromwich. While they still exist in their foul shape, it is idle to congratulate ourselves about anything. They make the whole pomp of government here a miserable farce. The Crown, Lords and Commons are the Crown, Lords and Commons of Rusty Lane, West Bromwich... and if there is another economic conference, let it meet there, in one of the warehouses, and be fed with bread and margarine and slabs of brawn. The delegates have seen one England, Mayfair in the season. Let them see another England next time, West Bromwich out of the season. Out of all seasons, except the winter of our discontent.
Amen
It's one of those touchstone texts, along with George Orwell's The Road To Wigan Pier, which I keep coming back to, every time I feel I am going soft and maybe David Cameron has some kind of point.
Anyway, here's the full text of the passage:
The whole neighbourhood is mean and squalid, but this particular street seemed the worst of all. It would not matter very much - though it would matter - if only metal were kept there; but it happens that people live there, children are born there and grow up there. I saw some of them.
I was being shown one of the warehouses, where steel plates were stacked in the chill gloom, and we heard a bang and rattle on the roof. The boys, it seems, were throwing stones again. They were always throwing stones on that roof. We went out to find them, but only found three frightened little girls, who looked at us with round eyes in wet smudgy faces. No, they hadn't done it, the boys had done it, and the boys had just run away. Where they could run to, I cannot imagine. They need not have run away for me, because I could not blame them if they threw stones and stones and smashed every pane of glass for miles. Nobody can blame them if they grow up to smash everything that can be smashed.
There ought to be no more of those lunches and dinners, at which political and financial and industrial gentlemen congratulate one another, until something is done about Rusty Lane, and about West Bromwich. While they still exist in their foul shape, it is idle to congratulate ourselves about anything. They make the whole pomp of government here a miserable farce. The Crown, Lords and Commons are the Crown, Lords and Commons of Rusty Lane, West Bromwich... and if there is another economic conference, let it meet there, in one of the warehouses, and be fed with bread and margarine and slabs of brawn. The delegates have seen one England, Mayfair in the season. Let them see another England next time, West Bromwich out of the season. Out of all seasons, except the winter of our discontent.
Amen
Thursday, 4 December 2008
Sympathy for the Devil?
I know this will probably count as "sympathy for the devil" and it's very easy to put the boot into Karen Matthews now she's on the floor, but I think the question we should be asking right now is how, in Great Britain, yes, that's GREAT Britain, in the 21st century, we allow such places as Dewsbury Moor and such societies/communities to exist?
I go every day to South Yorkshire and I see similar places. Places where unemployment has been the main industry since the pits closed. I can quite easily understand how - to someone like Karen Matthews and Mike Donovan, someone with limited skills and no abilities, someone who has never known anything but the crushing boredom of the benefits culture, it might seem a plausible wheeze to do what they did, and to people like them, £50,000 reward money is the equivalent of a lottery win - enough to get themselves and the kids away from Dewsbury Moor forever.
Just because I understand it, doesn't mean I condone it. I can understand why Margaret Thatcher felt the need to wage class war instead of being Prime Minister for the whole of our country, it doesn't mean I agree with her. What Matthews and Donovan did to that girl was terrible, shameful, and they must be punished, and what happened to Shannon will scar her for life, but what a desperate hole-in-the-wall existence, what a corner must they have been driven to, to even consider this as a "way out". And how bad must Dewsbury Moor be, if this is a "way out".
So now Karen Matthews will serve many years in prison, her food will be spat in, Michael Donovan will never be the partner she wanted him to be, he will spend many years in prison, watching his back, as a "nonce", and the family is broken up for ever, those poor kids.
All these people have souls and all these people are now suffering in their own way. There are no winners here.But while we're all putting the boot in to Karen Matthews, Mike Donovan, and the social workers, no doubt, eventually, if Jeremy Vine has anything to do with it, we need to also ask
WHAT IS WRONG WITH OUR SOCIETY??????????????
AND HOW MUCH LONGER, seventy two years after J.B.Priestley first described this sort of society in his English Journey ARE WE GOING TO HAVE RUSTY LANE,WEST BROMWICH???????????
I go every day to South Yorkshire and I see similar places. Places where unemployment has been the main industry since the pits closed. I can quite easily understand how - to someone like Karen Matthews and Mike Donovan, someone with limited skills and no abilities, someone who has never known anything but the crushing boredom of the benefits culture, it might seem a plausible wheeze to do what they did, and to people like them, £50,000 reward money is the equivalent of a lottery win - enough to get themselves and the kids away from Dewsbury Moor forever.
Just because I understand it, doesn't mean I condone it. I can understand why Margaret Thatcher felt the need to wage class war instead of being Prime Minister for the whole of our country, it doesn't mean I agree with her. What Matthews and Donovan did to that girl was terrible, shameful, and they must be punished, and what happened to Shannon will scar her for life, but what a desperate hole-in-the-wall existence, what a corner must they have been driven to, to even consider this as a "way out". And how bad must Dewsbury Moor be, if this is a "way out".
So now Karen Matthews will serve many years in prison, her food will be spat in, Michael Donovan will never be the partner she wanted him to be, he will spend many years in prison, watching his back, as a "nonce", and the family is broken up for ever, those poor kids.
All these people have souls and all these people are now suffering in their own way. There are no winners here.But while we're all putting the boot in to Karen Matthews, Mike Donovan, and the social workers, no doubt, eventually, if Jeremy Vine has anything to do with it, we need to also ask
WHAT IS WRONG WITH OUR SOCIETY??????????????
AND HOW MUCH LONGER, seventy two years after J.B.Priestley first described this sort of society in his English Journey ARE WE GOING TO HAVE RUSTY LANE,WEST BROMWICH???????????
Wednesday, 12 November 2008
Don't slam the stable door on social workers
The tragic death of Baby P at the hands of his carers is of course an appalling crime. I think everyone would agree that it should never happen again. Which is why it depresses me almost beyond belief to see people using the murder as a political football, and the social worker in question being potentially castigated in the media, and by definition, all social workers.
I know a social worker. Not the sort that has to make difficult, almost impossible, desicions about child welfare, instead she looks after two guys who can't fend for themselves very well. She works 24 hour shifts, including sleepovers, and when she is on call she has to watch out for things like self-harming, and to try and engage with them, oh, and if one of them has an epileptic fit in the middle of the night, she has to administer rectal valium.
She has an acre of paperwork to fill in, mostly to cover the arses of the people in the management structure above her. Risk assessments, individual learning plans, you name it. And, for all of this, last year, she earned under £16,000. Social Work is one of those jobs like being a teacher, where everyone thinks they can do it better than you. You wouldn't dream of standing over a heart surgeon while he was performing an operation on your auntie and saying "Oi, you've sewn that bit up wonky" - but everyone feels that they can do Social Work and everybody thinks they can teach, egged on by government initiatives to foster "choice" in the public services - choice that people really, actually, don't want. They want public services that work and deliver, not to have to choose between two dysfunctional underfunded public services (often contracted out to the private sector, because we all know how good the private sector is at running things, I mean we have only got to look at the financial services industry .... er...oh.)
While today's shenanigans at Prime Minister's Question Time between Broon and Cameron were vaguely entertaining, sort of a bout of "PMT at PMQ's", they will do nothing to help save future Baby Ps. Why the government feels it can run Haringey social services better than the people who are currently running it beats me (unless they have discovered a secret pot of money) and Cameron of course will not hesitate to jump on any passing bandwagon, especially one that allows him to indulge in a little bit of shroud-waving.
So, once again we hear the sound of stable doors shutting all over Westminster with a resounding clang. There will be an enquiry, involving Ofsted, the Chief Constable, Lord Somebody and probably the Keeper of the Queen's Privy Seal, for all I know.
But nobody wants to talk about the real problem, the lack of that secret little pot of money. Everybody's happy to talk about the symptoms, but not the disease. Until social work is properly funded and resourced, you will always have the situation where potentially, a harrassed, lowly and inexperienced public official can make a mistake with tragic consequences. Unless the downtrodden underclass that we seem to be determined to create with our modern way of life with its relentless obsession with money, fame, celebrity and success as expressed by material possessions, all have a miraculous personality transplant overnight, you will still have kids at risk because of the breakup of what Mrs Thatcher once derided as being non-existent - "society". And it's that mismatch between the growing need and the diminishing resources, coupled with a culture of targets and box ticking which has been fostered and inspired by this government almost to the exclusion of common sense, that causes the problem.
It's a common assertion, especially around the dinner tables of middle England, that the public sector is overstaffed and feather-bedded. It's true, there is some wasteful and totally unecessary spending in public life - MP's expenses, for instance, are a complete scandal. There is no way we should be paying David Cameron's mortgage! But, given that MPs aren't about to sacrifice their salary and expenses to make Haringey social services better funded, then there's only one other option: if you want a social services which really makes a difference because the caseload is not overwhelming and the people who work there are properly-rewarded public sector careerists, then the answer is a simple one - higher council taxes, but that is precisely the thing the angry mob fuelled by the likes of the Daily Mail, the Sun, and the News of the World refuse to countenance. You can't rebuild the ravages of sixty years of social decay on the cheap.
And so poor little Baby P, who was, it seems, sometimes treated like a real football in life, will continue to be kicked around after death by the politicians and the media, in a bizarre competition to see who can wring their hands the most and spout the biggest load of sanctimonious claptrap.
I know a social worker. Not the sort that has to make difficult, almost impossible, desicions about child welfare, instead she looks after two guys who can't fend for themselves very well. She works 24 hour shifts, including sleepovers, and when she is on call she has to watch out for things like self-harming, and to try and engage with them, oh, and if one of them has an epileptic fit in the middle of the night, she has to administer rectal valium.
She has an acre of paperwork to fill in, mostly to cover the arses of the people in the management structure above her. Risk assessments, individual learning plans, you name it. And, for all of this, last year, she earned under £16,000. Social Work is one of those jobs like being a teacher, where everyone thinks they can do it better than you. You wouldn't dream of standing over a heart surgeon while he was performing an operation on your auntie and saying "Oi, you've sewn that bit up wonky" - but everyone feels that they can do Social Work and everybody thinks they can teach, egged on by government initiatives to foster "choice" in the public services - choice that people really, actually, don't want. They want public services that work and deliver, not to have to choose between two dysfunctional underfunded public services (often contracted out to the private sector, because we all know how good the private sector is at running things, I mean we have only got to look at the financial services industry .... er...oh.)
While today's shenanigans at Prime Minister's Question Time between Broon and Cameron were vaguely entertaining, sort of a bout of "PMT at PMQ's", they will do nothing to help save future Baby Ps. Why the government feels it can run Haringey social services better than the people who are currently running it beats me (unless they have discovered a secret pot of money) and Cameron of course will not hesitate to jump on any passing bandwagon, especially one that allows him to indulge in a little bit of shroud-waving.
So, once again we hear the sound of stable doors shutting all over Westminster with a resounding clang. There will be an enquiry, involving Ofsted, the Chief Constable, Lord Somebody and probably the Keeper of the Queen's Privy Seal, for all I know.
But nobody wants to talk about the real problem, the lack of that secret little pot of money. Everybody's happy to talk about the symptoms, but not the disease. Until social work is properly funded and resourced, you will always have the situation where potentially, a harrassed, lowly and inexperienced public official can make a mistake with tragic consequences. Unless the downtrodden underclass that we seem to be determined to create with our modern way of life with its relentless obsession with money, fame, celebrity and success as expressed by material possessions, all have a miraculous personality transplant overnight, you will still have kids at risk because of the breakup of what Mrs Thatcher once derided as being non-existent - "society". And it's that mismatch between the growing need and the diminishing resources, coupled with a culture of targets and box ticking which has been fostered and inspired by this government almost to the exclusion of common sense, that causes the problem.
It's a common assertion, especially around the dinner tables of middle England, that the public sector is overstaffed and feather-bedded. It's true, there is some wasteful and totally unecessary spending in public life - MP's expenses, for instance, are a complete scandal. There is no way we should be paying David Cameron's mortgage! But, given that MPs aren't about to sacrifice their salary and expenses to make Haringey social services better funded, then there's only one other option: if you want a social services which really makes a difference because the caseload is not overwhelming and the people who work there are properly-rewarded public sector careerists, then the answer is a simple one - higher council taxes, but that is precisely the thing the angry mob fuelled by the likes of the Daily Mail, the Sun, and the News of the World refuse to countenance. You can't rebuild the ravages of sixty years of social decay on the cheap.
And so poor little Baby P, who was, it seems, sometimes treated like a real football in life, will continue to be kicked around after death by the politicians and the media, in a bizarre competition to see who can wring their hands the most and spout the biggest load of sanctimonious claptrap.
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