10. Appealing to the UK Government
If we consider the situation in the UK apart from the European dimension, then everything seems hopeless:
- Letters to Ministers result in “the law is clear: Social Services are meant to keep families together.” Edward Timpson wrote this to myself, Belinda McKenzie and also to the Chairperson of the Petitions Committee. The problem is, of course, that the secretive family courts are ignoring this law.
- Our Portfolio of Nine Cases submitted to the Education Committee in January 2012 was ignored.
- Annual demonstrations outside Downing Street didn’t make a difference.
- Our Petition Children Placed in Foster Care ‘put in the bag’ by John Hemming MP was published in Hansard, but didn’t get a response.
- To the contrary, our voluntary attempts to help US mother Melissa Laird get her son back from Barnet Council were punished with a court order where we were supposed to pay for the costs of the private barrister hired by the Treasury Solicitor.
- In 2009, Jack Straw MP made it illegal for minors (under 18s) to report any abuse they were suffering in care homes. Illegal.
Ian Josephs, the veteran McKenzie Friend kept saying exposure, exposure, exposure…
However, Christopher Booker is the only journalist who keeps the topic alive in his weekly column in The Telegraph.
- But: First Slovakia, then Latvia and now Lithuania:
European Countries unite against ChildSnatching ‘Legitimised’ in Secret FamilyCourts.
Maybe the tide is turning, maybe the trend is changing.
But only maybe.
