Child Deaths In State Care: Massive Underreporting and the BBC's Massaging Of The Statistics

You know what really hacks me off? Four hundred years ago,we had witch hunts in this country.

Literally, men in black tunics and large hats would go around, in the name of the Church, hunting down… well, witches.

Witches were known for their uncanny ability to predict the future. What they were also well known for was getting it desperately wrong. I don’t know if they still mix optical organs and testicles from various small creatures in boiling spiced scrumpy, since I do not attend such meetings, but I wouldn’t be too surprised if they did. That, however, is about as “scientific” as the basis for the assumptions Social Services make and their dire predictions for children who stay with their biological families.

I think it’s just an excuse. Refer back to the sections on Bowlby and MSBP.

Having no scientific basis means nothing to these individuals, they’ll just cherry pick the worst-sounding statistics, minus the good stuff, and use that to dazzle the wider public and magistrates alike. Take, for example, this gleaned from Freedom of Information Act requests I made to CAFCASS, CORAM and several other agencies several months ago[1]:

I asked them how many children died in care. Regardless of cause, They said 98 in 2009. Personally I think even this was underestimating the numbers. In answer to the next question in the list, they claimed that there were 61,000 (give or take) children in care over the same period – again underestimating the numbers, there are over 100,000 children in Local Authority care.

Then I asked how many children total in the country. 11.5 million under 16's, approximately. About right. And how many of them had died?

5750 of them.

Any newspaper or TV caster would jump on that 5750 number – on its own, with no other supporting figures, least of all those given above – and bleat “OH NO, WHATEVER SHALL WE DO!?” paving the way for ever-more-draconian legislation empowering more and more kidnap and trafficking. The Local Authorities use this publicity – however utterly misplaced and inaccurate – to push their agenda and reinforce their assertions that every parent in the Land is an attention-seeking child beater, pederast, drunk, jobless, benefit-cheating, soccer junkie chav. But stop, there, just for a second and think about this.

Please?

Simple math tells me that out of 11.5 million children (persons under the age of 16) in Britain, 61,000 or so in local authority or private non-biological care (as at end Q2 2009) represents 0.53% of that population. Taken into account this proportion, the numbers would read as follows: 98 children in care have died in 2009 alone. 5750 have died outside the care system; this is not reflective of how bad the situation is until you draw the proportion back. 5750*0.0053=30.475.

A clear picture is starting to emerge, one in which any sane human being can see that a child is more than three times more likely to die in local authority or private nonbiological care than with biological parents. The facts (as I have managed to ascertain them) speak for themselves.

Ignorance is not an excuse nor is it a defence. Full disclosure of medical needs or issues, possible complications to old or recent injuries, etc., should happen but for reasons beyond my ability to grasp are not, at the cost of so many young lives.

I will grant, however, that some of these deaths are caused by congenital defects or disease (preventable or not) but these are generally spread in equal proportion across both groups, hence cannot in any way shape or form be used as a justification to kidnap.

PS: you can trust me, I’m wearing a suit.

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[1] Strangely, these FOIA requests, made on a public website, have since disappeared (I wonder if they knew what I was up to?); however, I was told by CAFCASS that the information is publicly available elsewhere, they were just being polite in giving me the numbers.