Monday 5th June, 2017.
Dear Theresa May and the Conservative Government of the United Kingdom,
This open letter – somewhat in the form of an essay – is designed to bring to the public’s attention a very serious issue which affects so many families, many of which are never able to speak for fear of repercussions, such as imprisonment – simply for speaking the truth. The issue, is that of the conduct of Social (Children’s) Services and the practices of the Family Courts and more specifically, forced adoption and the profiteering experienced by Local Authorities and Fostering / Adoption Agencies. This letter is timely, due to the ever so near General Election of 2017 – it is about time that the UK fully understood what is happening on a daily basis in this country: our children are being stolen, abused and sold on, like property or any other marketable commodity and it must stop, now.
Please note that evidence is referenced via footnotes at the bottom of this document.
Forced Adoption [1] in the UK appears to be big business, with thousands of children removed from families each year; many of them becoming subject to foster care or adoption. When children are adopted, the parents often do not know where they are going, to what kind of family, where in the country (that’s if they stay in the UK) and are unlikely to be fortunate enough to find them again at age 18. There are many questions to be asked here: should Forced Adoption still be legal in the UK? – is this part of the reason that Britain wants to leave the EU (so that it can continue its child trafficking without scrutiny)? – are children being sold off to the highest bidder? – are children being placed into paedophile rings or sold off for sex slavery? We find it interesting that Theresa May, as Home Secretary, lost investigation papers regarding a paedophile ring [2] and we cannot help but wonder if the UK trade is similar to that of Hollywood in the US [3] – perhaps that’s why May and Trump are jumping into bed together.
The UK is the only country in Europe where Forced Adoption is still legal [4] and on too many occasions, children are removed without enough evidence, via scare tactics (the use of a ‘voluntary’ arrangement known as a ‘section 20’) and by force, involving the Police. Children are terrified, parents are left devastated and many, are taken at birth. Can you imagine giving birth and before being able to breast feed or change the first nappy, that baby is taken away and placed with strangers? Women have described to us the feeling of leaving hospital “with an empty body and empty arms”. They have to make their own way home, are provided no support whatsoever and are expected to attend meetings or even Court within a matter of days; sometimes hours. Some women are unable to cope and end up taking their own lives and then this is used as evidence to back up Social Service’s position regarding having taken the child to begin with. They will state that the mother was unable to cope, or had mental health issues. Arguably, they are the lucky ones. What is left for those who stay? They attempt to fight the arbitrary system, struggling to obtain Legal Aid and simply hoping and praying that they find a legal team not part of the corrupt, evil system which seeks to destroy families. The Family Court system is biased and operates in secret, with parents too terrified to speak out against the injustice, much like Charities in the UK [5] which have been gagged by Tory legislation.
“In 2008, the Times newspaper ran a family justice campaign to open up the family courts. In a leading article, The Times said that it was ‘impossible to know the extent to which miscarriages of justice may be occurring, because the whole system is shrouded in secrecy’” [6] – as reported in the House of Commons (Library) Briefing paper in September 2015, entitled ‘Confidentiality and openness in the family courts: current rules and history of their reform’ [7]. The Government is well aware of its failings and yet appears to do nothing to address them.
The upper and middle classes are not exempt from Social Services involvement, however, how often does the public hear of the rich and famous having their children removed? It is not because they are better parents, that we can be rest assured – pictures of Kate Middleton have been circulated, depicting her telling off her son and addressing his behaviour. Kate, like any parent, has the responsibility to raise decent, respectable human beings and children must be loved, cared for and disciplined in appropriate ways; royalty, or not. The rich get away with not being targeted because with money and social connections, comes power – something this Conservative Government appears to be intent on maintaining. Yet, the poorer and weaker of society are accused of various failings, with little-to-no proof. The McCann family are a prime example of this elitism. The parents left their three children alone; one was taken and yet they faced no prosecution. Instead, they received millions in donations and the resources of the UK’s media and Police forces. Did they attempt to sedate the child for a quiet night, or was she stolen to order? We may never know, however, this highlights how the wealthy continue to prosper, despite doing wrong. The Independent in April 2017 reported that ten years after Madeline’s disappearance, there remained a huge number of unanswered questions [8]. Why has this never been properly investigated?
What is increasingly evident, is the volume of families targeted which fall into the ‘poor’, ‘uneducated’, ‘weak’, ‘vulnerable’ and ‘underclass’ categories. So many parents do not know how to fight the system, simply because they do not read or write so well, or because they face so many other obstacles, that mounting a case against the State, is just a step too far. They also fear going to prison, as those in proceedings are ‘gagged’, unable to speak out against the brutality of Social Services, the manipulation of the truth, the mis-leading or plain fake and false evidence, the lies, the mis-recording, mis-representations and misunderstandings. Social Services will stop at nothing to take your child, especially if they are ‘special’ – they may be targeting a specific gender, race, eye colour or overall appearance and level of development. It is our view that many of these children are targeted and taken to order, so if you have something different, or special; you may have the fight of your life on your hands. No doubt, special kids fetch special prices.
Social Services collude and play games, employ cheap nasty tactics to catch parents out or dig up every aspect of their history to make a case for ‘future emotional harm’. Social Services will tell the Family Court that because a parent had a difficult upbringing, they will go on to be abusive or neglectful. They will paint a picture of a parent who is bound by the laws of ‘nurture’ and will repeat the mistakes of the previous generation. There is, some, academic evidence of such situations occurring; however, this is not always the case and so many parents who have been subject to abuse themselves or whom have suffered domestic violence from a previous relationship are in fact more conscious of the choices they make and their ability to parent. However, worryingly, many young mothers are targeted as The Guardian reported in January 2016 [9] – “The number of newborns taken away by family courts has increased 2.5 times in five years. Often cases involve the same vulnerable women, yet they get little help to break the pattern of repeated proceedings” (Tickle, 2016). It is very easy for authorities to go after young and single mothers who appear to have little support and they are blamed for being subject to domestic violence, rather than helped to move away from the situation and recover.
In 2014, the Association of Directors of Children’s Services stated, “By working together, families can receive the help and support that they need to ensure that the children stay in the family home, the preferred outcome wherever possible” [4]. However, it is evident from multiple sources and critical reports of the Troubled Families programme, that the Government believes it to be easier and cheaper to remove children early on, than to provide the help and support a family might need in order to succeed [10]; yet, they have spent something like £900 million on the programme [to October 2016] itself – does this make any sense at all? Does this sound like the kind of country you would wish to raise children? – where mental health, education and NHS services are being cut and millions of pounds are being spent in order to steal your children. Do Children’s Services provided adequate help? According to the ‘Critical and Radical Social Work’ Journal [10], “… New Labour’s concern with preventative work, or as it became to be known ‘early intervention’, was often implemented in authoritarian ways, this evidenced by family intervention projects run by Action for Children (see Garrett, 2009a [not referenced in this article]). Such projects were seen as an answer to ‘troubled and troublesome’ children and families, and involved outreach and residential components supposedly aimed at help and support, even if these were offered in rather authoritarian ways. Such initiatives can be seen in terms of dealing with those who were unable or unwilling to show a commitment to be self-activating and responsibilised neoliberal citizens by becoming ‘hardworking families’. However, there is the question of the morality of in effect forcing vulnerable families into projects under threats of eviction, losing benefits and having their children taken into care” (Rogowski, 2015). And how can we be sure that ‘early intervention’ is always justified? Children are placed on Children In Need or Child Protection Registers it would seem, at the drop of a hat, these procedures being precursors to a Public Law Outline – the process for taking parents to Court. And Court proceedings secure the removal of children and their subsequent placement with ‘nice’ families which are said to be able to do a better job.
In a report by Curtis and Burns (2016) entitled ‘Unit Costs of Health and Social Care 2016’ [12] the following information may be of interest to the general public:
“Based on the Section 251 outturn account for 2015/2016, the total expenditure on adoption services was £339,527,628.2. This comprises staff and overhead costs associated with adoption including the costs of social workers recruiting and assessing prospective adopters, supporting existing prospective adopters, and costs related to post-adoption support services. Support services can include: financial support; services to enable discussion groups for adoptive children/parents and birth parents or guardians; contact and mediation assistance; therapeutic services; counselling, advice and information. Provision of adoption support is based on assessed needs. Financial payments are made depending on the needs of the child and are means-tested. Expenditure on care placements for children with a placement order and waiting to be adopted is excluded, as are any direct social work costs for adopted children”.
The report goes on to say: “At 29 September 2016, 7,520 children had a placement order and a further 60 were freed for adoption; 3,580 children had been placed for adoption. There were 5,360 looked-after children adopted during the year ending 31 March 2015. A placement order is dispensed by the court and authorises the local authority to find, match and place a child with prospective adopters, and is revoked once the adoption order is made. Placement orders replaced freeing orders on 30 December 2005”. Are we not concerned with these figures? Are we asking the right questions in terms of why so many more children are being taken into care and thousands are considered to be in situations that are unrecoverable, whereby permanent removal is the only option left? Arguably, it may be due to greater awareness and reporting and following the ‘Baby P’ case, most Social Workers are on tenter hooks - no wonder there is a 15.1% turnover in staff. What the report also details, is that, “Accounts submitted to the Charity Commission 2007-08 suggest VAAs [Voluntary Adoption Agencies] contribute about £3.5 million to adoption services from income received from donations, legacies and investments’ (Selwyn, 2011, p.427 [not referenced in this article]). The organisation ‘First 4 Adoption’ states that no profit is ‘permitted’ upon the exchange of a child, although Local Authority costs are covered [13]. Yet, ‘Adoption UK Charity’ – one of 45 Ofsted registered Adoption Agencies in the UK – made, as we understand it, £5 million profit in 2015/16. Interestingly, ‘Adoption UK’ as registered in 1984 was removed from the Register of Charities in February 2017 and its funds were ‘transferred’. We understand these two named organisations to be one and the same. Adoption UK [14] charges a membership fee of £80. They have over 11,000 members which at a minimum has generated £880,000 per annum in total income. As part of this membership you get: “Access to our Children Who Wait family-finding service - view profiles of children waiting for adoption or long-term fostering, in our monthly publication or online service” (Adoption UK, 2017). Therefore, for a few quid, you can browse a catalogue and pick and choose your child. A great service for paedophiles – it removes all the leg-work! Oh, and on top of this, you can give the child back if it doesn’t work out!
Af far back as June 2010, The Telegraph reported on ‘Big money to be made in the adoption trade’ (Booker, 2017) and highlighted concerns over Forced Adoption [15]. Bob Geldof commented that the taking of children was “state-sanctioned kidnap” and there are instances where parents are arrested and held like terror suspects, without proper justification or charge. Some, have even been arrested, harassed, assaulted and thrown into mental health institutions for speaking out, such as Carol Woods for example [16]. Whistle-blowers are made out to be crazy, or spurious charges are formed. Take Natasha Devon, MBE, for example. The Mental Health Tsar who was recruited by the Government to tackle children’s mental health issues, yet released a few months later for challenging them and their policies [17]. Is this how a first-world, democratic society operates? It clearly is, as Theresa May proposes to significantly monitor internet traffic and restrict content [18]. This announcement came off the back of terror attacks in Manchester and London; however, others have accused her of wanting to restrict communications regarding speaking out against the State.
Social Services, it would seem, are a law unto themselves. They require very little evidence to open a case and not much more in Court. The Family court operates on the ‘balance of probabilities’ which unlike the Criminal Court, does not allow for forensic investigation, truly ‘expert’ witnesses or for further exploration of a possible explanation. Take for example a mark on the face or head, a pink or purple mark or bruise which a parent cannot explain. A doctor will err on the side of caution by stating the injury is ‘non-accidental’, despite the parents offering up a potential explanation, though admit to not being present to witness any such injury being caused. The case moves to PLO (Public Law Outline) and onto Court proceedings and if your child is young enough – i.e. under 5 – they will be ‘twin-tracked’ for adoption. You see, it’s easy to place under 5’s, as new families waiting to adopt want them; they cute and cuddly and less likely to remember their real family. New memories can be formed and the biological families phased out. Only a small percentage of over 5’s are placed for adoption – no wonder ‘early intervention’ is considered critical. Some adoptive parents chose never to reveal the true nature of their relationship and many children are cheated out of knowing who they and where they come from. Can you imagine a child who doesn’t seem to ‘fit’ and who feels that something just isn’t right, but they cannot seem to put their finger on it? Said child may develop anxiety or depression, or both; may further develop other mental health issues, may not mix well at school and generally struggle with relationships. They may also feel that they have been ‘born into the wrong family’ and truth be told, they were never supposed to be in that family at all; however, some Judge, once upon a time, decided it a good idea to remove the child and place it elsewhere as opposed to helping and supporting the birth parents and other family members. That, or the child was bought and paid for, in order to fulfil a desire due to being unable to conceive or carry a baby to term. Some women are less fertile now – a sign of the times due to stress, disease and lifestyle – and some choose to pursue a career and leave it too late. This is not a sexist argument and there is nothing wrong with wanting to have it all. Unfortunately, there comes a point when a live, healthy baby is no longer a viable option and alternatives are sought. If you are wealthy, then your options are increased. And of course, where there is demand, supply will be found – no different to any other ‘stock’.
What is even more frightening, is the possibility of children being taken for even more sinister means – think ‘The Island’, meets, ‘The Matrix’. Are babies and children being taken for their body parts? How much would you pay for a heart, lungs, a liver or some kidneys? Organ donation is on-going dilemma and this provides such an easy solution – take children from weak, vulnerable families who are unable to fight back and use them for spare parts. Modern society has conditioned people not to think. They get up, go to work, pay the bills, buy things they don’t need, get in debt, have a family and consume mindless entertainment. The education system is like a conveyor belt, churning out people to complete work and tasks, to maintain income for the bourgeoisie. And, if you had millions in the bank, how much would you pay to save your child’s life? The rich and famous can buy anything they like, including children.
In conclusion, with so much money being spent on programmes which do not work and Adoption; coupled with the Family Law Courts operating in complete secrecy - where parents ‘convicted’ on little or no evidence - the general public would like to know, what are you going to do about it? This Government is driving parents to drink, drugs, or mental health concerns, where before, these never were an issue. Some parents are advised to leave the country before a case gets to Court and if a pregnant woman suddenly becomes subject to Social Services involvement, she is advised to give birth outside of the UK – and better still, in a non-Hague Convention country. Parents and families live in fear every day. They fear that knock at the door, attending school to collect their children only to find they have been taken. A fear of giving birth in the UK, knowing that Social Workers are right outside the door, ready to take the newborn before it has barely taken a breath. A fear that because a parent was raised in care, they are automatically considered to have a ‘troubled’ past and therefore, will experience Social Services involvement as soon as they become pregnant – yet another excuse to take a child and sell it on. Most often targeted, are the vulnerable and those considered ‘problem’ families. Is this process an attempt to rid the ‘underclass’ of the next generation of ‘scum bag’ kids, to recycle them and pass them off to ‘nice’ families – ‘class cleansing’ one could call it. Is this an attempt to reduce down the number of people claiming benefits, to save the Government bill; just like selling off housing stock to housing associations reduce the financial burden? There is significant evidence which highlights the issues of poverty, health care and status, access to education and housing, in relation to social mobility and social outcomes – feel free to examine any number of reports by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation [19] and the New Policy Institute [20] – there is simply too much to cover in this one letter/essay. Additionally, look for reports on the Government website under Department of Education or Department for Communities and Local Government – the reports are hidden in places you may not expect to find them. We encourage people to dig and to do their own research. Simply search for ‘Forced Adoption’ too and see where it takes you.
However, needless to say, children in the UK are being failed by the Government and its policies and hundreds of thousands of parents know the truth – children are being stolen for financial gain and class cleansing. IT MUST STOP. We hope that with a Labour win this election, something can be done about tackling all of these issues, leading to better and brighter futures for our children.
Please note: this letter was not written by any member of a political party or any NGO. We are an independent emerging organisation which seeks to speak the truth and bring the authorities to account over Forced Adoption – follow us on Twitter @lsrjustice3
[1] forced-adoption.com/
[2] rt.com/uk/170784-missing-files-westminster-pedophile/
[3] themindunleashed.com/2017/05/hollywood-insider-speaks-claims-global-pedophile-ring-controls-hollywood.html
[4] forced-adoption.com/#insideout
[5] theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/29/charities-gag-law-stops-them-speaking-out-tory-social-care-plans
[6] thetimes.co.uk/article/a-conspiracy-of-silence-pnrrptpslfx
[7] researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/CBP-7306
[8] independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/48-questions-kate-mccann-refused-to-answer-madeleine-disappearance-portugal-a7710111.html
[9] theguardian.com/social-care-network/2016/jan/07/young-mothers-trapped-cycle-babies-removed
[10] independent.co.uk/voices/troubled-families-programme-report-damning-failed-biggest-problem-disastrous-policy-a7367736.html
[11] ingentaconnect.com/contentone/tpp/crsw/2015/00000003/00000001/art00004
[12] ‘Unit Costs of Health and Social Care 2016’, published by Personal Social Services Research Unit, The University of Kent.
[13] first4adoption.org.uk/find-an-adoption-agency/vaa-or-la/
[14] adoptionuk.org/join
[15] telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/7840626/Big-money-to-be-made-in-the-adoption-trade.html
[16] youtube.com/watch?v=CN8dvWXyK-s
[17] theguardian.com/society/2016/may/13/sacked-childrens-mental-health-tzar-natasha-devon-i-was-proper-angry
[18] independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theresa-may-internet-regulated-london-bridge-terror-attack-google-facebook-whatsapp-borough-security-a7771896.html
[19] jrf.org.uk/
[20] npi.org.uk/
