Parents or babysitters?

Are we really failing our children? Do we care? Inner-city gun culture and murder, binge drinking, teenage pregnancy, latch-key kids, drug use and abuse – what’s our reaction? Do we shrug and turn away or hug a hoodie?

When the Children’s Commissioner, Salisbury’s very own Sir Al Aynsley Green, the United Nations and the Leader of the Conservative Party all agree something is badly wrong with the welfare of our children, we’d better sort it out.

Walking on eggshells
Recently I have visited three local groups of people who are grappling with some of the challenges facing our young people – and affecting all of us.

I started with a briefing from the professionals at the sharp end of the adoption issue – the Adoption and Fostering team at Wiltshire County Council. They are wonderful people – walking on egg-shells while public policy and media battles rage above their heads. They are hampered by a shortage of social workers. Every time there’s a high-profile case of something going badly wrong, good people are put off joining the profession. Some of the Wiltshire teams are up to 40% short of staff. The Council is recruiting social workers from South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Germany and France. What does this say about how much the English care for our most fragile children and families?

Home and away
In Wiltshire, 295 children are in foster care. They and their new families need a lot of support. This is provided by 80 field social workers who, on behalf of the rest of us, underpin the whole process, always putting the needs of the children first. About twenty children a year are legally adopted. This is a deep and complex process and no child is ever placed for adoption without rigorous assessment and matching.

Of course it is better if children who have already suffered the trauma of family breakdown can be fostered or adopted within a traditional family. About 30 Wiltshire children who have specific disabilities are cared for in special homes outside the county. Sadly, a further twelve children have to live in three children’s homes. Have you considered adopting or fostering a child? Please visit www.wiltshire.gov.uk/adoption.

It has always been legal for children to be adopted by one person, whether gay, lesbian or heterosexual and whether or not in a partnership. Previously a couple could not be granted joint legal liability for the child unless they were married. Now they can – and that is what all the fuss is about, believe it or not.

Very occasionally a child is placed in a single-sex home. Just three in Wiltshire. There is no evidence that the outcomes for children are less good if they are raised in same-sex families. There is no evidence that children brought up in gay or lesbian households will themselves turn out to be gay or lesbian.

It’s a hard life
Next I visited Salisbury District Hospital for an update from the contraceptive and reproductive health team. When we make laws in Parliament, the impact of public policy reaches every corner of life. You may not want to know this – but I think you should. Binge drinking leads to sex which is usually unprotected. Aggravated by body-piercing, this too often leads to the spread of the human papiloma virus which can cause cancer of the mouth and throat and to warts in sensitive places. Why? Because kids think oral sex is safe sex. They may not get pregnant but they may well catch something very nasty instead. That is very bad news and we should address the problem with more and better sex education.

The good news is that locally, teenage pregnancies have fallen. Incidentally, older people are getting more promiscuous and abortions are on the increase in the 25-35 age group. It is clearly time to dust down our prejudices!

Parental responsibility
Finally, I visited the Bridge Project. This is an inter-denominational Christian charity supported by 37 local churches. Their staff work with 59 local schools, assisting with religious education and with kids who refuse to go to school. I joined a RE class at Salisbury High School. Does God exist? The skill with which two young men held the attention of those kids was remarkable. What’s more, they got them thinking beyond sex, booze, smokes, drugs and football – about the meaning of life, no less.

We moved on to The Factory in Dews Road to attend a course on anger management for young people either excluded from school or refusing to attend. More young staff from The Bridge (www.the-bridge.org.uk) were alongside young people in trouble, offering them time, care, respect, values and hope.

From all this I conclude that we seem to have forgotten that the primary duty to care for children lies not with the state nor with the school but with the parents, the child’s progenitors. Until the state realises this, its interventions will always and only be remedial. If we were once a nation of shopkeepers, we have now become a nation of babysitters.

Robert Key MP
18th February 2007