I shall return to the theme of my last post in a couple of days time. I want first to examine the kind of thing which can happen with home education and about which local authorities are anxious. This is the enforced isolation of a child from all other adults under circumstances that make abuse easy to carry out. I am not suggesting for a moment that this is common; only that it can and does happen in home educating families.
My own daughter, like many home educated children was actually more visible in the community than children at school. They saw us all the time in the library, shopkeepers knew us and we were familiar figures in the local streets, a tall irritable looking middle aged man with a little girl in tow. I dare say that this is usual in most of the home educating parents who comment here; their children are anything but invisible. This is fine, but let us now see how things can work in such a setup.
Sarah Richardson was four in 1993 and living with her mother and young brother in the north of England, when her mother’s boyfriend moved in. From the beginning, he was unkind to the two children. Two years later, when she was six, the family moved to a caravan in a remote location with no neighbours. Sarah was withdrawn from school at the same time, supposedly in order to be home educated. Shortly afterwards, her mother’s boyfriend began to sexually abuse and then rape her. The family kept on the move, always to out of the way places. This continued until Sarah was sixteen, when she left. What is interesting about this case is that the mother, who was also allegedly working part-time as a prostitute, was not some feckless traveller who was out of touch with ordinary society. In fact she was heavily involved with Education Otherwise. Her name was of course Lianne Smith.
As I said at the beginning, there is no reason to suppose that this sort of thing is common with home educators; only that it can and does happen. Keeping the children out of school and moving frequently from place to place in order to avoid prying neighbours or the possibility of the children making friends, is much easier when you are home educating. There are without doubt other families of this sort and it is this kind of thing which makes many local authorities anxious. Here were two people, one wicked and the other psychologically abnormal, who used home education as part of a lifestyle which facilitated abuse, both sexual and physical. The mother went on to have two children by her boyfriend, both of whom she killed.
Perhaps the next time that home educating parents ridicule the idea that home education could be used as a cover for abuse, they might pause and remember cases like this. Local authorities do not need to invent such scenarios; they are already happening. They may be uncommon, we have no way of knowing how frequently this sort of thing goes on, but wicked home educators do exist; even ones who are working in a voluntary capacity for Education Otherwise!
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Of course there are evil people in any group. But what is your solution? Do you think the Badman recommendations would have helped in this case, for instance? Would this family have registered with the LA and welcomed visits, or would they have fled abroad? And even if they had visits (and they may have had visits for all we know) why do you think the abuse would have been spotted? Only a few days ago you said that visits did not include safety and welfare checks despite the law stating that they should, so changing the law to make visits compulsory would have made no difference based on your conclusions.
ReplyDeleteIn the cases of abuse I know about (and I don't include this case as I know very little about it), LA visits happened but the abuse was reported by home educators or other professionals already involved with the family. Despite the large numbers of visits carried out across the country I've not heard of one instance of abuse being spotted during HE visits. If visits were an effective safeguard I would expect it to be known by now with the numbers involved.
LA officers would not spot abuse as most of them are crap at there job and only want to tick boxes.
ReplyDeletehome visit some one who wanted to abuse a child would 1 keep moving or if there allowed a visit which many problem family do yet still officers social services still do not spot the abuse often visiting loads of times but never finding the abuse! becuase an abuser will always find a way to get around it! the only way to stop abuse is to put video camera in every room in the house and watch it 24 hours a day you link the camera to the LA council office and keep all tapes. this is the only way to stop abuse! it would work but you have to check house so make sure there was no blind spots for camera and what if there have a garden i would suggest a camera be fitted onto the people your watching that way you know al lthe time then what there doing!
"In fact she was heavily involved with Education Otherwise."
ReplyDeleteShe was also working full time for social services. A very sad case. But Sarah didn't tell anyone about the abuse until she was 19, three years after starting college. And presumably she had opportunities to leave the home before then since her mother was working full time and she was caring for her baby sister. Do you really think she would have revealed abuse to a stranger visiting once a year for an hour or two?
Yes, the story of what happened to all of Lianne Smith's children is truly awful... and no, we can never be complacent and think that home educated children are never at risk of such things. However as posters above have said, it is unlikely that any system of home visits would have protected the children - any more than attendance at school protects many school children (many in the sense that most children who are abused are school educated).
ReplyDelete'She was also working full time for social services.'
ReplyDeleteThis is true and also sheds like on the attitudes of some local authorities; Staffordshire, for example. In October 2007, Lianne Smith was apointed Head of Children's Services for Staffs. Imagine their feelings when they discovered that their newly appointed Head had children being kept at home, one of whom was being knocked about and the other raped by her partner. the sort of thing to give one a jaded view about home edcuation perhaps. the next time people are slagging off Staffordshire for their policies about home education, it is worth remembering this.
' Do you really think she would have revealed abuse to a stranger visiting once a year for an hour or two?'
A better question might be, would this abuse have been possible if the children had been living a normal life and attending school, rather than being hidden away in a caravan?
'However as posters above have said, it is unlikely that any system of home visits would have protected the children'
ReplyDeleteParents that expect a visit or know that the local authority will be knocking on the door, might be less apt to mistreat children.
'I've not heard of one instance of abuse being spotted during HE visits. If visits were an effective safeguard I would expect it to be known by now with the numbers involved.'
ReplyDeletePossibly because the only people who allow visits are the ones who are not knocking their kids about or raping them?
"A better question might be, would this abuse have been possible if the children had been living a normal life and attending school, rather than being hidden away in a caravan?"
ReplyDeleteYes. It happens all the time. The vast majority of children who are sexually abused never report it as children and attend school. Get real!
Webb says -Parents that expect a visit or know that the local authority will be knocking on the door, might be less apt to mistreat children.
ReplyDeleteThat is bull crap those parents would just not answer the door!
old Webb says-A better question might be, would this abuse have been possible if the children had been living a normal life and attending school, rather than being hidden away in a caravan?
ReplyDeleteloads of kids are abused and go to school its very rare there tell any one at school.
Home visits wont help webb it be a waste of tax payers money.
Never heard of the term 'denialism' have you?
DeletePossibly because the only people who allow visits are the ones who are not knocking their kids about or raping them?
ReplyDeletethat is talking so much crap again webbb just cos you dont have a home visit does not mean you are doing what you said!
Abuse is not always physical or sexual it's quite a diverse form of subjugation.
DeleteYou could be sitting your kids in front of a computer software package for hours on end in the hope they'll reach Grandmaster level.
hello julie where you been last few days? did you miss me? lOL
ReplyDeletewe still keeping up the fight against Hampshire LEA
And here's the evidence that you are a vexatious litigant. You're nothing more than a stalker, a link to your comments from this blog should be sent to HCC as evidence.
Delete"A better question might be, would this abuse have been possible if the children had been living a normal life and attending school, rather than being hidden away in a caravan?"
ReplyDeleteYes. It happens all the time. The vast majority of children who are sexually abused never report it as children and attend school. Get real!
I'm not so sure. One of the children was being punched in the face and his sister said;
'My mum didn’t stay in the room when he beat us, but she knew what he was doing. Chris would have black eyes'
This sort of thing is definitely easier to conceal if you are living in a caravan in the middle of nowhere, as opposed to an ordinary street and with the kid going to school.
"researchers say that many more cases of maltreatment — particularly of sexual abuse — are never even suspected, and the victimized children never come forward to report the assaults."
Deletehttp://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1863650,00.html
"Children are most likely to tell their peers or their mothers about experiences of abuse and
least likely to tell a professional."
"Across all these studies, few chose to tell a professional: less than 10 per cent in each of these samples"
http://www.nspcc.org.uk/Inform/research/briefings/children_disclosing_sexual_abuse_pdf_wdf75964.pdf
"Of those who experienced contact sexual abuse by an adult, in over 1 in 3 cases (34 per cent) nobody else knew."
http://www.nspcc.org.uk/Inform/research/findings/child_abuse_neglect_research_PDF_wdf84181.pdf
Webb says-This sort of thing is definitely easier to conceal if you are living in a caravan in the middle of nowhere, as opposed to an ordinary street and with the kid going to school.
ReplyDeletethats not true it may be harder to conceal if your in a caravan as people find it strange that children are living like that and not going to school i say you have more chance of being reported to SS or LA
children dont always report abuse to a school some do but many dont yet some tell many many years later but its to late then!
your problem is you want to find abuse in home education and you want to poke your nose into people private houses to search for abuse the best way to stop ALL abuse is to have a video camera fitted on every one so you can watch them 24 hours a day!
'Children are most likely to tell their peers or their mothers about experiences of abuse and
ReplyDeleteleast likely to tell a professional."
Yes, but of course when a child is being kept under conditions which means she has no peers, then she cannot confide in them. This is precisely what I was drawing attention to.
But revealing abuse to peers doesn't mean that adults are then told. In the majority of cases it stops there according to adult survivors.
Delete'But revealing abuse to peers doesn't mean that adults are then told. In the majority of cases it stops there according to adult survivors.'
ReplyDeleteThis certainly does happen. However, let's ask again; in which of these two circumstances is child abuse most likely to come to light? In children living normal lives, attending school each day or for children kept away from contact with everybody? Child abuse may not be commoner with home educated children, but it would be easier to conceal it if it were happening.
Yes, but what's your point? What's your solution? You normally suggest an annual home visit to HE families. Do you really think that would help given the research we've discussed?
ReplyDeleteUnless you are suggesting that we have all children are chipped and tracked, and cameras installed in all houses, building and streets there will always be undetected abuse. The likely benefits of annual inspections (probably nil) mean that the money should be saved and used where it will actually help children effectively, paying people like your wife to respond correctly to information provided to them by the public, relatives and other professionals.
As Eileen Munro, reader in social policy at the LSE, says, ‘If you’re looking for a needle in a haystack [serious abuse], then you are going to make things much harder by making the haystack even bigger'. And as Ken McLaughlin, author of Social work, politics and society: From radicalism to orthodoxy, says, ‘If we are encouraged to see abuse everywhere, we lose the ability to focus on those areas where suspicion is warranted.’
The needle in the haystack is like the elephant in the room, bullshit bingo.
DeleteThe fact is a double murder has been carried out by a volunteer for EO, and the alarm bells are ringing.
'Yes, but what's your point?'
ReplyDeleteTo draw attention to the sort of things which happen with home education and make local authorities uneasy. Also to speculate that if wicked and cruel parents knew that they would have somebody poking around, somebody to whom they could not refuse entry to their home, it might have the effect of discouraging them from behaving in wicked and cruel ways.
So do you think that all family homes should be visited annually? Since the majority of parents who act in wicked and cruel ways currently use schools, and since few children disclose to professionals, these parents obviously still need to be discouraged from their wicked and cruel behaviour.
ReplyDeleteThe vast majority of parents are not wicked and cruel, so the vast majority of visits will be a total waste of money. Much better to spend the money on employing extra social workers since they are likely to help far more children. Do you really think that, pound for pound, routine visits of thousands of law abiding families by ex-teachers (who experience shows are likely to miss signs of abuse where it exists) compares well to targeted visits by skilled social workers?
It may result in different children being helped, but in the end the money supply is not endless and it seems likely that far more will be helped by the second option. Eileen Munro of the 'haystack' quote, the Transitional Chair for The College of Social Work's Children’s Faculty, the organisation that represents and supports the social work profession, certainly seems to take this view from what I've read, so I'll bow to her greater knowledge and agree to differ with you (how's that for an appeal to authority? ;-)).
Sarah Richardson did report the abuse to her mother. Lianne Smith was dismissive of her daughter's allegations.
ReplyDeleteMartin and Lianne Smith were abusive and homicidal and home educators(EO volunteers).
ReplyDeleteThere is no getting away from those facts.
That is why HE is under such scrutiny.
Are the two local authorities that employed her under the same scrutiny, since they actually employed her full time and gave her access to other people's children?
DeleteSome actions just cannot be foreseen without a crystal ball. There are murderers in all groups and professions, so finding one within HE is not a surprise and does not justify increased scrutiny unless there is evidence to suggest that EO should have known she was crazy and likely to murder children. And since her employers did not know, despite the checks they would have carried out, I doubt they stood a chance.
'The vast majority of parents are not wicked and cruel, so the vast majority of visits will be a total waste of money.'
ReplyDeleteI agree with this. The post was to try and get people to understand local authority concerns, not to say that I thought they were justified.
Simon.
I still don't see why they would need this case to cause concern. It's obvious that some home educating parents are going to be harming their children. They are just a section of the wider community so why would they be immune to something that exists everywhere? They must be idiots if they need particular cases in order to see this.
Delete'I still don't see why they would need this case to cause concern.'
ReplyDeleteBecause it's not merely about abuse, it's a double murder and sexual abuse case. It was a double murder carried out by a prominent volunteer for Education Otherwise. The abuse as a case on it's own, wasn't an isolated case there were and had been others.
EO has been very irresponsible and denialist regarding these issues. Perhaps their volunteers need regular and rigorous scrutiny and effective training by recognised agencies. Perhaps EO need to take down their pro forma download pages.
Oh, you mean like the checks carried out by local authorities when they employ people who will have contact with children? Like the checks they carry out on people like Lianne Smith? Twice. Really, your prejudices are blinding you to reality.
Delete'prominent volunteer for Education Otherwise' So prominent that few of us had heard of her.
ReplyDelete"EO has been very irresponsible and denialist regarding these issues."
ReplyDeleteDescribe how EO have been irresponsible and denialist, any more than her employers, Cumbria and Staffordshire local authorities. Organisations can only do so much to protect themselves against criminals. CRB checks, for instance, only reveal convicted criminals, not those that are as yet uncovered.
Organisations such as EO could do a whole lot more to protect children from abuse.
DeleteActually, I don't think one can blame EO for Lianne Smith - her own actions are to blame; I know EO has taken some stick in the past for not having CRB's done on volunteers - - which although I think should be done as a matter of course wouldn't have made the slightest difference here since she would have had them for her work with social services!
ReplyDelete'A society which does not protect it's children is a sick society.'
ReplyDeleteRoman Catholic Priest Josep Calm(Lloret de Mar)
Nobody has suggested that children shouldn't be protected. The disagreement is about how best it can be achieved. Which method provides the best value for the available money and saves the most children? I think that your way, visiting tens of thousands of HE families every year, would be a poor use of available resources and cause more children to be harmed. You disagree. Nobody is saying that children should not be protected.
Delete