{"id":10836,"date":"2017-07-13T14:53:54","date_gmt":"2017-07-13T13:53:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/?p=10836"},"modified":"2017-07-17T13:08:09","modified_gmt":"2017-07-17T12:08:09","slug":"medway-council-took-children-home-untidy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/medway-council-took-children-home-untidy\/","title":{"rendered":"Medway Council took children because home ‘untidy’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Councillor<\/a>
Councillor Alan Jarrett, leader of Medway Council<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A local authority took two children into care because a house was ‘untidy’, a mother has told Christian Voice.<\/p>\n

And now, seven years later, Medway Council are trying to send the mother to prison for speaking out about her case. \u00a0This is despite both children now being over eighteen. \u00a0Care proceedings end at eighteen.<\/p>\n

Medway Council harmed boy with violent video games<\/h2>\n

Medway Council have a history of such intimidatory tactics against parents who refuse to play by the rules. \u00a0Last month they brought contempt of court proceedings against a father for naming council employees on social media. \u00a0Judge Richard Scarratt gave him 56 days suspended<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

In January this year Medway Council also applied to send Eugene Lukjanenko to prison for naming his son. \u00a0Judge Richard gave him his first 56 days, also suspended. \u00a0Mr Lukjanenko says he was speaking out against the injustice he says both he and his son have suffered at the hands of Medway Council.<\/p>\n

According to friends of the family, Mr Lukjanenko’s son suffered horrific emotional abuse at the hands of Medway Council after being taken into care following a one-off altercation with a neighbour’s child.<\/p>\n

\"Medway<\/a>
Medway Council allowed ‘J’ to watch video games which inspired Norwegian neo-Nazi Anders Breivik<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If there was ever a case for a local authority working with a parent to keep a family together, this was it. \u00a0But instead, Medway Council took J into care at huge cost to the taxpayer.<\/p>\n

Whether that is down to resources or ideology we do not know.<\/p>\n

Moreover, they encouraged him to watch violent video games<\/a><\/strong>, including one played by Norwegian neo-nazi Anders Breivik.<\/p>\n

We cannot name Mr Lukjanenko’s son without being in contempt of court ourselves. \u00a0As he is a minor, we do not wish to anyway.<\/p>\n

We are only able to name\u00a0Mr Lukjanenko because Medway brought committal proceedings against him.<\/p>\n

‘Hired gun’ psychologist says home-schooling causes ‘harm’<\/h2>\n
\"Edward<\/a>
Edward Elliott has represented Medway Council in at least two contempt of court cases against aggrieved parents.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In the present case, that of the mother, we are at liberty to name all parties, but will wait until next week’s court case before doing so. \u00a0In the meantime, Medway’s barrister, Edward Elliott, boasts about his involvement in the Council’s committal proceedings<\/a><\/strong> against the mother. \u00a0He calls her ‘SR’ which is how we shall refer to her.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, some disturbing factors of SR’s case should concern all of us. \u00a0Medway’s case at the final hearing on 4th March 2010 was that SR had harmed her two youngest children by pulling them out of school. \u00a0Her daughter ‘C’ has special needs, while her son ‘D’ is above average intelligence.<\/p>\n

Medway Council hired chartered psychologist Mr Graham Flatman to dig up dirt on the family. \u00a0His comments should alarm every home-schooling parent in the land. \u00a0He contended SR ‘had provided (‘D’) only with a limited and possibly distorted social experience’ and had \u2018missed the opportunities offered by school for extended social contacts, extra curricular activities and the benefit of experiencing how a society of children and adults can function’. \u00a0He concluded, \u2018He had therefore suffered harm.’ On this point, District Judge Graham Green found otherwise.<\/p>\n

It is legal to home-school in the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n

Uncooperative with professionals<\/h2>\n
\"Expert<\/a>
Expert Witness Graham Flatman. His reports cost the taxpayer around \u00a36,000 each and he can write six per month, so he has every reason to look cheerful.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Having failed on home schooling, Medway turned on SR herself. \u00a0Mr Flatman said she was\u00a0\u2018narcissistic’. \u00a0She had \u2018no insight into the harm and neglect the children have suffered’. \u00a0He said she ‘should not have the responsibility of caring for her children unless she progresses through treatment and support’. \u00a0What ‘treatment’? \u00a0He did not say. \u00a0Could it involve keeping SR away from looking glasses and pools of water<\/a><\/strong>? \u00a0Whatever treatment it might be, Mr Flatman will not be providing it. \u00a0He is far too busy writing reports for the family court<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Mr Flatman also said SR, a single parent, was uncooperative with the professionals. \u00a0These are people who wanted to remove her children from the family home. \u00a0Many reasonable people might also be assessed as having \u2018distorted and paranoid belief systems about authority figures’ in such circumstances.<\/p>\n

Indeed, it seems Medway Council were intent on forcing SR’s children back into school. \u00a0The mother has a suspicion\u00a0that Council employees were disgruntled she had chosen to home-school her two youngest children. \u00a0In her view, care proceedings were a retaliation. \u00a0Indeed, Medway applied to the family court for an Emergency Protection Order in February 2010. \u00a0Moreover, the Council did this in secret without SR’s knowledge. \u00a0Social worker Janet Western-Mullins then ambushed her with the order and a riot van full of police officers at her home.<\/p>\n

Social worker ‘had no evidence’<\/h2>\n
\"Mark<\/a>
Mark Noble was a detective police inspector before going private as a safeguarding manager. He said the case against SR was ‘laughable’.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Miss Western-Mullins told the court in her statement there was a \u2018long history of reported squalid conditions’ at SR’s home. \u00a0But she then had to admit these were based on one referral from a workman and a report from Medway Housing association in Feb 2008. \u00a0She had actually \u2018gone no further than the front room of SRt’s home’. \u00a0She apologised for the exaggeration and \u2018agreed that she had no evidence to support that assumption’.<\/p>\n

But a police officer,\u00a0Detective Constable Alexandra Smith, gave unchallenged subjective evidence supporting Medway. \u00a0She said the garden \u2018was a mess’, and there was \u2018a litter tray smelling strongly of urine in the hallway.’<\/p>\n

Astonishingly, and on this scant evidence, and despite SR having raised her three other children without incident, Judge Green found\u00a0that the conditions of the home were \u2018significant’ and \u2018harmful to the children’. \u00a0He made a final care order.<\/p>\n

SR tells us that one Mark Noble, then a detective inspector in Kent Police, expressed what we shall politely call ‘reservations’ about Alex Smith’s evidence. \u00a0He reportedly said the case was ‘laughable’. \u00a0Mr Noble now\u00a0offers his services on LinkedIn<\/a><\/strong> as a ‘safeguarding manager’,<\/p>\n

We shall look back at this with shame<\/h2>\n
\"Councillor<\/a>
Councillor David Wildey is Mayor of Medway Council.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This is just the latest example of a council’s social services department putting more effort into securing a care order than helping a family stay together. \u00a0Again a Council uses a ‘hired gun’ psychologist to damn the parent. \u00a0We see a care order based on the most nebulous crossing of the Children Act ‘threshold’. \u00a0And yet again we have Medway Council trying to send a parent to prison for exposing what she sees as the injustice she and her family have suffered.<\/p>\n

Indeed, in case after case, parents tell this writer stories which speak of institutional, systemic injustice. \u00a0In years to come, British people will look back at what the family courts did with shame. \u00a0A senior judge will write a report about the parents who were deprived of their children without committing a crime. \u00a0Politicians will make speeches of apology to the children condemned to local authority care and its poor outcomes.<\/p>\n

Venue and Scripture<\/h2>\n

Medway Council will try to send SR to prison at Maidstone County Court . \u00a0The address is Barker Road, ME16 8EQ. \u00a0Judge Richard Polden will hear the case on Monday 17th July 2017 at 10.00am in open court . \u00a0The rules say the hearing must be heard in public<\/a><\/strong> unless there are ‘exceptional circumstances’.<\/p>\n

An embarrassed Medway Council will want to maintain secrecy. \u00a0Accordingly, we shall expect an application from them to hear the case in private. \u00a0And we shall expect Judge Polden to dismiss it.<\/p>\n

Scripture says:\u00a0Exodus 23:6 Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor in his cause.<\/strong> \u00a0And:<\/p>\n

Ezekiel 45:9 Thus saith the Lord GOD; Let it suffice you, O princes of Israel: remove violence and spoil, and execute judgment and justice, take away your exactions from my people, saith the Lord GOD. <\/strong><\/p>\n

We were asking Medway Councillors for comments on this story as we went to press.<\/p>\n

Click on the links below to share this shocking story:<\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

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A local authority took two children into care because a house was ‘untidy’, a mother has told Christian Voice. And now, seven years later, Medway Council are trying to send the mother to prison for speaking out about her case. \u00a0This is despite both children now being over eighteen. \u00a0Care proceedings end at eighteen. Medway 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Policing & Crime<\/a> Social Services & Child Abduction<\/a> UK Christian Constitution<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"A local authority took two children into care because a house was ‘untidy’, a mother has told Christian Voice. And now, seven years later, Medway Council are trying to send the mother to prison for speaking out about her case. \u00a0This is despite both children now being over eighteen. \u00a0Care proceedings end at eighteen. 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