One of the clauses of the CWS Bill that the Welsh Government are seeking to apply to Wales.

What are the problems with this?

Why doesn’t the Bill make meetings to be actually “mandatory”?

The Bill will not make it mandatory for a child to be “seen” by council staff even in the absence of concerns, as this would be a violation of human rights and therefore unlawful.

Just as the police do not and should not have the right to enter and search homes without due cause. The police cannot enter and investigate a home just because there are people living there, just on the off chance that may happen to notice something while there. It would be chilling to live in a society that gave the police powers to do such things.

Yet this is the very same situation that the Bill proposes to create – to create a system where the state can enter family homes and interview/inspect “just in case”, without prior cause, but where this is enforced and engineered by coercive mechanisms rather than direct mandates.

That’s what is happening here.

Effectively mandatory inspections and interviews with children to see if their parents are up to the job, even when there is no reason to believe they are not.

The Welsh government commissioned evaluation of EHE guidance spoke of the desire for “powers to compel” parents.

It would appear that Westminster realises, as have the Welsh Government previously, that it would be a human rights violation to mandate and “compel” parents to allow council staff into their homes to question and assess their children in the absence of cause for concern.

Don’t we have any powers already to see children if concerned?

Of course. 

These powers already exist for those who are appropriately skilled and trained.

“Powers to compel” and insist on seeing children at risk of harm already exist when the appropriate safeguarding threshold is reached.

Attempts to enforce “powers to compel” in ordinary everyday life would be to remove the threshold for safeguarding intervention. 

It’s the failure to use these existing powers that is the recurring theme that is evident when those who are pushing for the measures in this Bill repeatedly cite isolated cases to try to make a case for needing more powers.

 Citing these cases seemingly without realising that if those cases are evaluated correctly then the need for focussing resources on those in need rather than spreading resources more thinly attempting to surveil normal healthy families is evident.

Such powers to see and assess children when the threshold for intervention or investigation is reached are rightly only enacted by those with specific training, experience and skills sets to handle such sensitive and potentially damaging situations, by those who are trauma-informed and who recognise the risk of traumatising and damaging a child’s wellbeing and family relationships by attempting to intervene.

But the CWS Bill just says that councils may ask, it’s not a “must” – so can’t parents just say no?

You’d think so.

BUT

What happens if parents do exercise their lawful right to decline such a meeting?
Or “refuse” as the Bill revealingly calls this.

The Bill states that if parents “refuse” “requests” to not only visit the family home but also meet with/interview/evaluate the child in their own home, then this must be used in deciding whether or not to instigate legal proceedings such as SAOs against the family.

Note the conflicting use of terminology – an alleged “request” but with the threat of legal action against the parent if they “refuse”.

Councils are instructed to use this to consider whether to take legal action against them.

So – you can say “no” in theory  – but if you do, you’re likely to have legal action taken against you – or at least have the threat of it hanging over you.

Legal action that can under the measures of this Bill result in School Attendance Orders (SAOs), with not only subsequent fines but a criminal record and even imprisonment if continue to advocate for the child’s needs.

A criminal record for parents which would impact on parental careers and employment opportunities, on their capacity to provide financially for their family, on housing opportunities and the capacity to be able to provide a family home, on their reputation within society and the resulting social implications- all for seeking to advocate for their children in a system that forces such caring parents to take such risks as allowing themselves to be prosecuted for continuing with home education.

Threatening all those potential implications for the family, that are mandated by the CWS Bill if they do not comply with the demands of council staff, surely cannot be a “request” by anyone’s definition?

That would be government sanctioned coercion, intimidation and blackmail. Surely the people of Wales should not be treated in such ways? Especially for seeking to advocate and protect their children’s sense of safety and wellbeing as well as their education?

Will LAs actually do that?

We simply don’t know how each council employee will react.

But we do know how councils often overstep existing lawful remits and/or misuse existing powers now, and the present bill would empower them to take such actions should they choose.

If the idea of council staff behaving incorrectly seems unlikely, then reflect on the case studies cited as a misfired attempt to justify the need for these measures.
One only has to consider the serial mistakes of many different employees and professionals in those cases to begin to appreciate that council staff can and do sometimes act inappropriately, unwisely, influenced by bias and discriminatory or inflexible attitudes or by misunderstandings.

But the Bill presumes that what council staff do is always in the best interests of the child, as if there is no potential for mistakes, misunderstanding, actions influenced by conscious or unconscious biases or prejudices.

Don’t forget, that’s all in the absence of any independent advocacy/appeals/complaints/mediation/tribunal process.

⭐️The Bill would not just permit but direct councils towards taking  legal action against families

simply for exercising a lawful right to decline the “request” of an allegedly non-mandatory meeting ⭐️

With no accountability for their actions either.

Honestly – you couldn’t make it up.

Indeed, we wish it was just made up.

Does this give the appearance of coercion?

Is this illogical?

Yet this is just part of the measures that the Senedd are being asked to give assent to.

But don’t schools have inspections?

Yes, they do- because they are accountable to parents.

The duty to ensure that a child receives a suitable education lies with the parent, not the state, not the council.

(Indeed, whilst governments and councils falsely claim they have this duty, they should be relieved that they don’t, as they would then be liable and able to be sued for all the times that children in their schools did not receive a suitable education, (and therefore could be quite swiftly bankrupted with all the resulting claims!)

So, inspections of schools are because they are accountable to parents, and to whoever funds them (parent or taxpayer). When the parent is the one both providing and paying for the education, then its nonsensical for them to report to themselves!

Where is the pressure for these measures coming from?

In terms of the Welsh Government, they appear to continue to be influenced by the former Children’s Commissioner for Wales Sally Holland’s reviews and comments,

Despite in 2022 the Welsh Government being delivered a legal rebuttal of her use of the UNCRC in attempting to justify her beliefs.

Won’t the threats of legal action be a deterrent to abusers or a way of helping find them?

Child abusers are already committing crimes that carry heavy custodial sentences.

So, would it seem logical to believe that the threat of fines for not cooperating with council policies and protocols is going to make them roll over and comply?

If there are any such abusers to find, their own consciences and the threat of substantial prison sentences are already ineffective. So the threat of fines for not complying with a “register”, or “refusing” a meeting, or whatever other attempts at oversight are hardly going to be an effective deterrent or tool for detection.

Child abusers are also master manipulators of hiding in plain sight – the case of poor Sara Shariff which is mistakenly cited as justification for these measures is just one of many examples of this. Abusers typically thrive on coercive control, they are masters of it, so any threats of coercive or manipulative tactics to try to “see” the child is simply playing into the way they operate, playing such tactics with those far more experienced and effective in using them.

Child abusers and indeed abusers in general as masters of hiding in plain sight would also not be readily detectable on any home visits.

Sara was seen in school for many years, known to social services, and the abuse was either not detected or not acted upon.

But won’t they be an effective screening tool “just in case” there’s something up in the family?

Apart from all the ethical, moral and legal issues around enforcing screening inspection of families in their home in the absence of grounds for concern,
under the proposals of this Bill, such visits would be conducted by relatively inexperienced staff, who may or may not be given with some basic training.

Interviews and meetings with children in cases of suspected abuse or neglect, especially if parents do not wish for such an interview, require extremely skilled, sensitive, experienced staff, the appropriate environments and back-up, the appropriate skills set to not only spot signs of abuse but do so in a way that minimises the trauma to all involved,

and in a way that allows any evidence to be gathered in a way that is no compromised for use in any subsequent legal proceedings,

in a way that is not leading or considered entrapment.

The proposed technique of using such visits a screening tool would have very low sensitivity and very low specificity.
The predictive values would be very poor.

In other words, they would be likely to be at high risk of appearing to find problems where there are none, and of missing problems if they are there.

The larger the sample size and the less frequent the occurrence that is being screened for (eg screening a large cohort of normal people for something that’s quite rare), the weaker and less effective the screening tool.

Isn’t just about protecting the “voice of the child”?

The whole point of having a voice is the ability to say “no”.

Be that the ability to say “no” when things are being planned, as in the consideration of this legislation.

Or to say “no” when they are about to happen, as in whenever a council employee “requests” to enter their home and speak to them.

This bill does not allow children to say “no” on either front.

Are school children being asked if they want to be home educated and legal steps taken to ensure that if they say yes?

Parents are the ones to advocate for and express the voice of the child when they are not old enough to do so.

So the Bill is based on the intrinsic presumption that they do not unless a council employee says they do.

Can such home visits do harm?

Yes.

If there were children being abused, such visits would have the potential to place any child who was being abused under even greater coercion and risk of harm under the pressure to perform and hide the abuse during visits.

And for the “vast majority” of, if not all home educated children, in healthy loving family homes, this is an effectively mandatory intrusion into private family life, into children’s safe spaces, under threat of legal action against the family.

The negative impact of surveillance and unnecessary intrusion into family life are well recognised in professional circles and practice.

However, the measures in this Bill ignore and negate that experience and insight and instead would be likely to increase such damage.

Some families can and do choose to home visits with council staff regarding their home education. That is their parental choice, to do what the feel is the most appropriate option for their family. But making these effectively mandatory completely changes the dynamic and footing for even what were once voluntary visits. And many families would not truly choose such meetings, they would feel coerced under threat of legal action.

Effectively enforcing visits with strangers into their homes, their safe spaces, sends children the message



that their parents need to be “checked up on” regularly,

that they need to be on a “register”,

that they need to perform and “measure up”, that they need to impress a stranger,

or be forced into school environments against their will and their needs,

that they need to have extensive information stored about them by strangers-

That would have a profoundly negative impact on their wellbeing and on the inherently trust-based parent-child relationship.

The measures of the Bill show no awareness or appreciation of this negative impact on wellbeing and family life of children.

It also shows no understanding of trauma-informed practice for the many where school was such a negative, damaging and traumatic experience,

or where removal from their home educating lives and journeys would be a thing of threat and dread for so many children even in the absence of a past history of school trauma.

If the concept of school trauma seems a strange one, please do engage with home educators who have experience in managing this.

Would effectively enforcing meetings as if mandatory have a negative effect on society?

The measures don’t show any awareness of the negative impact in society of classing a demographic as needing to be registered and put under surveillance purely because of their personal choices of parenting styles and approaches to education.

Stigmatising minority groups and perpetuating negative stereotypes about them is hardly an inclusive approach to diversity in the community

but rather increases discrimination and division in society.

That is counter to the claims the Prime Minister made this week in his discriminatory and poorly informed comments that the government at Westminster conflated home educators with “extremists”, stating a desire to be “tougher” on home educators, making them jump over a “raise(d) bar” in the alleged interests of “integration”.

True integration is not based on suspicion and smear tactics,

it is respecting and honouring the views and lifestyles of “minority groups”, not state-promoted discrimination and stigmatisation

What’s the alternative?

One can never guarantee to detect every possible case of abuse or neglect, whatever approaches one takes. Even if one were to fit surveillance cameras into every home, it wouldn’t prevent or detect all abuse. But would open up a whole new range of risks and damage, as well as infringement of rights.

If the purpose of this Bill is to safeguard children from abuse or neglect,

which is not the real reason according to the Prime Minister,

but if it were,

the fundamental mantra to have at the forefront of the mind in attempting to safeguard is:

above all, do no harm”.

A culture that is built on respect,

On opening doors not closing or obstructing them,

On communication not stigmatisation,

On the opportunities of seeking early help and support without negative repercussions or creating situations of learned helplessness,

On genuine voluntary support and encouragement not draconian non-consensual imposition and control,

 The cultivation of such a culture would be profoundly beneficial to the wellbeing not just of home educating families but society as a whole.

This would be profoundly impactful to the wellbeing of children (and indeed to that of parents and council staff too).
This, combined with using what scare resources are available to allow empowered, trained, experienced staff to focus on those children who need them most, rather than wasting time and money stigmatising and damaging loving healthy families.

Surely at least part of each reader here would recognise the benefit of such an alternative.