{"id":4830,"date":"2012-11-26T21:36:46","date_gmt":"2012-11-26T21:36:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/?p=4830"},"modified":"2012-11-26T21:49:14","modified_gmt":"2012-11-26T21:49:14","slug":"yorkshire-council-admits-mistake-in-ukip-foster-row","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/yorkshire-council-admits-mistake-in-ukip-foster-row\/","title":{"rendered":"Yorkshire Council Admits Mistake in Ukip Foster Row"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Education Secretary, Michael Grove, condemned the decision as “indefensible.”<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A Yorkshire council today admitted it made a mistake in removing children from foster parents because the couple were members of the UK Independence Party. (Read the Times article about it here<\/strong><\/a>.)<\/p>\n

The children, a baby girl, a boy and an older girl, were removed from the foster couple by the Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council in South Yorkshire following allegations from social workers that the parents’ political affiliation was at odds with the children\u2019s European backgrounds. (The Ukip party favours Britain’s complete withdrawal from the EU.)<\/p>\n

The social worker in the case alleged that UKIP is a racist party and that the children\u2019s \u201ccultural and ethnic needs\u201d might be compromised by the foster parents. However, the council admitted that the South Yorkshire couple, a qualified nursery nurse and a former Royal Navy reservist, were good foster parents and provided proper care to the children.<\/p>\n

The children had been with the foster parents for about eight weeks. During this time they were encouraged to share their own folk songs and speak their native language, which the foster parents were attempting to learn.<\/p>\n

The Council’s admission of error occurred after Education Secretary, Michael Gove, condemned the decision as \u201cindefensible\u201d last weekend, leading to an investigation of the Council’s behaviour.<\/p>\n

In a statement earlier today, council leader Roger Stone commented that \u201cMembership of UKIP should not bar someone from fostering. The council places the highest priority on safeguarding children, and our overriding concern in all decisions about the children in our care is for their best interests.\u201d<\/p>\n

Labour leader, Ed Miliband also criticized the Council’s totalitarian actions. He was joined by Michael Grove, who heads the Government department responsible for children’s services. Mr Grove promised to investigate what happened and to \u201cdeal with\u201d the situation. He commented that<\/p>\n

\u201cRotherham\u2019s reasons for denying this family the chance to foster are indefensible. The ideology behind their decision is actively harmful to children. We should not allow considerations of ethnic or cultural background to prevent children being placed with loving and stable families\u2026. Any council which decides that supporting a mainstream UK political party disbars an individual from looking after children in care is sending a dreadful signal that will only decrease the number of loving homes available to children in need.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The couple have still not received the children back, nor have they been given a public apology. The wife told The Daily Telegraph: \u201cWe feel that we have personally been slandered and we would like a public apology from Rotherham. We would also like something in the form of a letter stating that they have got it wrong in this case and that it will not be on our records that we have had children removed from our care.We just want a clean slate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, this is not the first time that social workers and local councils have used their power as leverage over parents whose views are not politically correct. Last June we reported<\/strong><\/a> on the story of Toni McLeod, who has taken up residence in Ireland to try to escape the tentacles of Durham County Council. Durham council is attempting to gain custody of Mrs. McLeod\u2019s baby because of her allegedly anti-Muslim views.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Find out how to join Christian Voice and stand up for the King of kings (clicking on the link below does not commit you to join)<\/strong>
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<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Yorkshire council today admitted it made a mistake in removing children from foster parents because the couple were members of the UK Independence Party. (Read the Times article about it here.) The children, a baby girl, a boy and an older girl, were removed from the foster couple by the Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,144,82],"tags":[632,634,635,633],"class_list":["post-4830","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-european-union","category-freedom-of-speech","category-politics","tag-michael-grove","tag-roger-ston","tag-rotherham-metropolitan-borough-council","tag-ukip"],"aioseo_notices":[],"rttpg_featured_image_url":null,"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Robin","author_link":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/author\/robin\/"},"rttpg_comment":8,"rttpg_category":"European Union<\/a> Freedom of Speech<\/a> Politics<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"A Yorkshire council today admitted it made a mistake in removing children from foster parents because the couple were members of the UK Independence Party. (Read the Times article about it here.) The children, a baby girl, a boy and an older girl, were removed from the foster couple by the Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4830","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4830"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4830\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4830"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}