Children’s voices, experiences and trauma ignored

In the range of measures contained in these clauses

And in the lack of opportunity for their input in the development of them.

.

There is a profound lack of trauma-informed understanding in these measures

Kept or forced back into an unhealthy or abusive environment.

The Bill would risk children being forced into school environment that may be abusive physically, sexually, emotionally and psychologically, With removal of the rights and duties of parents to protect their children by removing them from an abusive environment.

The risk of harm from intrusive and effectively mandatory home visits, the risk of harm from the surveillance of themselves and their learning trajectories, is almost indescribable.
Please do engage with home educators with lived experience to develop increased appreciation and awareness of trauma-responses

Does not protect from abuse, but worsens the situation for any abused children.

As also addressed in another article on this site,

Abusers are already committing serious criminal offences that carry heavy custodial sentences, so threats of fines for noncompliance with registers are hardly a deterrent.

But abusers are masters at hiding in plain sight. If abusers can get children to behave in ways that hide abuse when they are in school for so much of their time, they can certainly do so for any “home visits”. And the coercion to do so and hide any abuse can put children at greater risk.
Measures are likely to push any vulnerable children further away from statutory services, as the Welsh Government has previously acknowledged when deciding that mandatory registration was not a safe option.

The measures risk keeping any abused children in an environment that has failed to protect them rather than using opportunities for reassessment and intervention if required.

If the abuse comes from the school environment in some way, the measures in the bill would risk keeping them in an abusive environment or situation.

Danger of damage to their reputation

Treating home educating families with suspicion, including in periodic monitoring and welfare checks in the absence of concern,

Casting doubt on the word of parents and on their capacity to care for their children

All cause profound damage to the wellbeing of children and of the home educating communities that they thrive in.

Danger of the profound implications of suspicion and mistrust

Damage to parent child relationship. The parent is no longer able to be their advocate and protector in their eyes- damages that implicit trust that children need to have in their parents

Danger of discrimination due to disability

Please see this article for more information on how the Bill would discriminate against children because of disability.

Measures can deprive children of their right to a suitable education, when:

• Deregistration is delayed in pilot areas for mandatory meetings on deregistration.
• Permission to deregister is refused, or while waiting for permission, for “certain children”.
• Loss of external educationally and socially enriching opportunities because of deterrents placed to external education providers by the Bill
• Impact of monitoring with a school-centric focus, or requirement of adult-made future plans, 
• Impact of requirement for future plans at such deregistration meeting impairing rights to child-led educational approaches. See the latter part of this article for more on the impact of any requirement to provide future plans.
• Children with IDPs have no right to request this is revoked and would have to attend the named school on the IDP, even if they were removed because provision was not suitable or considered safe.
  
  

Danger of poverty  

Parents are already taking on the full financial responsibility for their children’s education when home educating,

The Bill adds the increased threat of additional fines:

Fines for parents while the child remains on the school role but unable to attend or when attending will mean they do not have a suitable education. 

Fines for parents even for making clerical errors or failing to meet tight time schedules

Danger of loss of parents to imprisonment if parents try to advocate for their children through the courts and are unsuccessful, with all the negative consequences for a family when the parent is given a criminal record.

Impairment of protective children’s rights

CWS Bill risks obstruction of:

Article 12 – right to have their voices heard – including their right to say “no” to measures at the development of these policies or when staff try to enact them in person.

Articles 13, 14 and 15 – freedom of expression, freedom of thought, belief and religion, and freedom of association.

Article 16 – right to privacy of family life is most certainly overridden with effectively mandatory home visits to interview the child.

Article 24 if families feel forced to exercise caution in their engagement with NHS health and other services, as part of the perpetuation of the culture of suspicion and erosion of rights created by the Bill.

Article 27 – significant financial implications for families,

including

Risks of fines even for clerical errors or delays in meeting tight time schedules for provision of information, even when it is already known that a child is EHE and not CME.
Risk of costly court cases when parents are left with no other way to have wrongly placed SAOs removed but to allow  themselves to be prosecuted for noncompliance resulting in a court hearing,

Even the risk of parental imprisonment.  

Increased cost of educational provision if used due to the administrative burden and duties placed on them by the Bill, alongside loss of some of the provision due to this deterrent factor with lack of choice often resulting in only more expensive options being accessible or available. Article 28 when their right to the education of their choice and that that suits them best is obstructed, delayed or prevented because of school-centric bias.

Is the title Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill therefore appropriate?

It does not promote wellbeing,

It creates obstacles to wellbeing and education,  

It creates a whole range of risks to children’s safety, wellbeing and education.

Alongside the irony that the Bill is entitled “Schools” not “Education” Bill.
which would appear to betray a degree of institutional bias, given the clauses it contains.