Senator apologises after devastating Varley Report on Jersey Care Service failings

Devastating report criticises Jersey care services

Health Minister apologises

Story ignored by island's other online media

The BBC reported on 17th June 2016 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-jersey-36532561) that children were left in harmful situations by a range of problems with Jersey care services, according to damning and disturbing reports seen by the BBC. The documents show that half of children assessed were not taken away from harmful situations in good time, Jersey's service "failed to consider" the needs of young people, and children left in the community received care below minimum standards in some cases, as recently as last year.

The 2015 report was commissioned by the then temporary head of children's services Jo Olsson and produced by former Ofsted inspector Mary Varley. Details only came out during the Independent Jersey Care Inquiry in April 2016, and were only released to the BBC some 4 months after a Freedom of Information request.

Mrs Varley's findings:

•     Poor practice; "basic building blocks" of management oversight were not in place
•     Failures to respond appropriately to allegations of physical and emotional abuse by three children
•     Half of the children sampled who were taken into care had experienced "significant" delays in being removed from situations where they were being harmed
•     A large proportion of children being harmed in the community - perhaps by their own family members - were still being let down as recently as 2015

The Jersey Care Leavers Association said the reports highlighted lessons that should have been learnt a long time ago.

Jersey's minister for health and social services, Senator Andrew Green, was interviewed live on BBC Radio at 7:11-7:19am on the 17th June, admitted the report was devastating and apologised - "We did, as a society, let the young people down".

"I have to apologise again to those from the past, I can't undo it, I'm really sorry."

This blogger wonders why a reputable report finds such failings, the current Health Minister apologises, but the rest of the media turns a blind eye and no-one seems to be talking about it... and yet if you turn the clock back to 2007 you may recall the Health Minister of the time, poll-topping Senator Stuart Syvret, was hounded out of office for exposing exactly the same kind of findings concerning the failings of Jersey's care services! When will the island ever wake up and admit that Senator Syvret was correct? A highly intelligent, articulate and capable man, genuinely caring and not out to feather his own nest, in a position of power with an ear to the ground hearing exactly what was going on, and STILL the establishment and local trolls seek to discredit him for trying to bring serious problems to the fore and address them? Difficult not to despair, sometimes :(




In the other media, there is still nothing online from the JEP, so that, as usual, we're keeping this to ourselves and not washing our dirty linen in public (i.e. covering it up).
ITV Channel Islands mentioned the initial story the week earlier http://www.itv.com/news/channel/2016-06-07/childrens-services-do-not-fully-understand-needs-of-vulnerable-jersey-youngsters/
and Channel 103 too http://www.channel103.com/care-issues-for-vulnerable-children/

The JEP did cover the story in print, after the BBC's initial story the week before the minister's apology  :

.. but nothing online, and will there be any mention of the apology?

Department of Expensive Cock-Ups

How often does a States department have to change its name?

States Main Roads Department
Department of Public Buildings and Works
Public Works (Dept)
Public Services
Transport and Technical Services
Department for Infrastructure

I feel I really don't have to say any more!

Leah McGrath Goodman loses cred

I saw this on Clever Trevor's blog comments, after having read about it already on my usual daily news sites.

"It would appear that Leah McGrath Goodman has either just broken one of the biggest stories on the planet, or seriously overplayed her hand.

http://mag.newsweek.com/2014/03/14/bitcoin-satoshi-nakamoto.html

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/mar/07/satoshi-nakamoto-denies-inventing-bitcoin

On the sites where people get to comment, there has been a strong backlash against Leah, saying this was a very low thing to do. On one site I even found a predictable reference to HDLG :

"The journalist was sniffing around the island of Jersey because of alleged financial malfeasance and, more bizarrely, supposedly murdered children at the now infamous Haut la Garenne childrens home. I know from my reading on this matter that this is abject bollocks, and made me question her wisdom."
http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/1/2014/03/06/bitcoin_inventor_satoshi_nakamoto_revealed/

( a second story on The Register is about Nakamono's denial : http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/03/07/nakamono_man_denies_inventing_bitcoin/ )

The evidence for him being the inventor seems to be a matter of opinion, hardly anything concrete. Even if he was behind BTC, what right does Leah have to expose him? From being a champion of truth and justice, it seems she has immediately sunken to gutter press levels of self interest. So that's a big "Whoops!" and a blow for the cause of the abuse victims. How sad.

Coastal crash - more sloppy reporting

The story from Channel 103 radio -

"Three teenagers are being treated in hospital after the car they were in plunged over a cliff in St Martin.

It went over the side of the road between Anne Port and Archirondel just before midnight.

It came to rest upside down against a tree - which stopped it rolling over the sea wall onto the rocks below.

Paramedics and firefighters attended, and two boys aged 19 and 17, and a 15 year old girl were taken to A&E.

The driver suffered a suspected broken wrist but the two passengers are believed to have suffered more serious injuries, although Police have told us they're not critical.

Watch Commander Chris Love said. "These 3 youths have been involved in a very serious incident. However, it would have been a lot worse had their vehicle rolled from its final resting place onto the rocks below."

"Had that been the case specialised rescue equipment and extra resources would have been called for. Emergency crews would have been faced with a more difficult and prolonged extrication, increasing the risk of injuries already sustained"

BBC Jersey also says "between Archirondel and Anne Port".

Only Channel TV correctly reported "near Archirondel".

If you're a radio listener you'd think it had happened near the BBQ area on the headland near La Crete quarry. The only recent damage to the roadside banks that I can see is actually well before that area.

It looks like, heading from St.Catherine's towards Gorey, the driver took this bend (by the old Les Arches) too fast, over-corrected, and failed to straighten up quickly enough to stay on the road.



It's actually on a straight, just after the left-hander, and not where previous accidents have happened at the headland farther on, or just past Jeffrey's Leap on the other side of Anne Port!

On some news website comments pages people are criticising the lack of barriers here, and it does appear to be in the same place (from the same direction) as another from 2010 (BBC).

All in all I'm left with the sour taste of sloppy journalism again - there was no mention of the direction in which they were travelling, or the precise location. And it's sensationalism again too, accidents happen all over the island, but just because it's on a coastal road and NEARLY ended up in greater fall onto rocks, this somehow seems more spectacular and may be more likely to lead to knee-jerk over-reaction.

The fact that several accidents in this region in recent years have all been survived without death shows how much safer it is to crash here compared to hitting walls and large trees at the roadside elsewhere!