No exploitative images of sad weans here
By Professor John Robertson OBA
Today headlining across BBC Scotland from Susanne Allan and under a concerned face:
A woman has been paid an out-of-court settlement from a council after her adoption of a two-year-old boy broke down. Karen Maguire won the six-figure payout from South Lanarkshire Council last year after her lawyer argued it failed to provide her with enough background information on the child and did not support her during the placement.
Once more, another dose of misery first thing (followed by sick fishermen today), with no facts, no context to help you make sense of the world, just a wee tabloid story to reinforce your anxiety and put you off ever voting for real change.
And of course, politicised to implicate the SNP in government:
She would like to see more funded support from the Scottish government, national guidelines for adoption and better monitoring of the number of adoption breakdowns.
and:
The Scottish government said it was committed to ensuring adoptees and adoptive families could access the support they need.
Why should the Scottish Government provide more support? Wouldn’t that be a South Lanarkshire Council job? Who are they anyway?
Labour or Labour with someone, but not the SNP of course, since 1996.
Joe Fagan has been council leader since May 2022. Did Susanne give him a wee call?
Did Susanne consider checking any facts to put her story into context like a first-year journalism student would have to do to get a bare pass?
From Scotland’s Adoption Register‘s 2024 report:
It should be noted that the trend for fewer adoptions in Scotland continues to reflect the UK wide experience of lower numbers of children moving to adoptive families. However, where Scotland differs from Wales, Northern Ireland and England, is in the continuation of more Scottish prospective adopters than Scottish children waiting.
https://scotlandsadoptionregister.org.uk/adoption-statistics-quarterly-reports/
That’ll be good news then?
The OBA – https://scotsindependent.scot/?page_id=116
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Talking-up Scotland 
“the ACTUAL [good] news is that only Scotland”
Indeed.
Here’s another example of “the ACTUAL [good] news is that only Scotland”.
It concerns Knife Crime.
That is knife crime is now greatly reduced because of an initiative in Scotland to treat it as a health issue.
Surely , as a successful initiative, this is worthy of England emulating as they have a serious problem with deaths from Knife crimes.
Well England will now , via Keir Starmer and Idris Elba, launch a new anti Knife crime coalition.
“The coalition will work with experts to develop an understanding of what causes young people to be dragged into knife crime”
The Daily Mail promotes that it is to “tackle a nationwide stabbing epidemic”
Elba said “We need to tackle the root causes of knife crime, not just the symptoms,”
He also added: “The coalition is a positive step toward rehabilitating our communities from the inside out.”
Starmer said “”We will take this moment to come together as a country – politicians, families of victims, young people themselves, community leaders and tech companies – to halve knife crime and take back our streets.”
In Scotland the “No Knives Better Lives” initiative is a “youth engagement programme that aims to prevent violence and knife carrying amongst young people”
“The NKBL programme is delivered at a local level by all 32 local authority areas across Scotland, and is supported by the National NKBL Delivery Team based at YouthLink Scotland. It provides resources, support and training to partners, including Police Scotland and youth workers, working with young people in an empowering way to deliver violence prevention messages and activities”
It was reported in 2019 that “In London, a Violence Reduction Unit is now up and running in a bid to tackle the number of teenagers dying as a result of knife crime. It is based on a ground-breaking approach used in Scotland“
“Scotland’s Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) was set up to stem the tide of knife crime Its key message was that gang-related stabbings and slashings were not just a policing issue but a public health issue”.
“The unit’s motto was a simple one: “Violence is preventable, not inevitable.”
“Over the years the VRU has worked closely with partners in the NHS, education and social work. It has stressed the importance of positive role models and its projects have been shaped by statistics”.
So surely in Keir Starmer launching his coalition with Mr Elba in this anti Knife crime campaign he could at least consider emulating the successful initiative in Scotland that is being rolled out, as an approach, in London also.
Or he , Starmer, could at least acknowledge and praise what has happened in Scotland as a nation that is currently, as a nation, still a part of his UK that he is the actual PM for.
Instead it appears, so far, as if this new launch is to be seen as ‘groundbreaking’ and one that Starmer stated was needed as this apparently was he said a ” national crisis that we will tackle head-on” (“national” but not as in being the whole UK is Mr Starmer).
Lives lost by Knife crime is a tragedy for any family .
However what is amazing is that the powers that be in politics at a UK level seem determined to not explore or try the same Scottish approach within all of the areas in England that still have a massive problem with knife crime deaths.
Instead we have Keir Starmer launching an anti Knife campaign with a celebrity where once again he , Starmer, sees a (political) opportunity for him to look good in relation to a topic considered to be , very much within England , something that is at “crisis” level and so is very much a huge concern to many people in England.
However as a tragic and growing problem it seems to be one that is not being either addressed , diminished or having any workable solution presented by any UK PM or any UK Home Secretary.
Where none seem inclined to (just for once) admit that Scotland has a workable and successful solution to a problem as they, UK politicians, can never ever be seen to either admit that as a fact, praise that or us and then copy us or indeed be seen to copy anything successful which comes from Scotland and is seeing positive results.
God forbid.
Instead we have another UK PM be seen in another PR exercise which I am sure is most definitely not a PR exercise for Mr Elba but is instead an area where he, Mr Elba, is seeing a disproportionate amount of young Black males senselessly dying because their UK government(s) are failing to tackle this serious problem (via not putting their money where the mouths are. As talk is cheap it appears).
Let’s see where this ‘pledge’ from Starmer ends up.
I do hope, like his other pledges, it does not end up being binned. (for the sake of all of those young people senselessly dying of knife crime in England especially when Scotland has a workable and successful solution that we have adopted to try and stem the flow of knife deaths in Scotland of our young people).
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Scotland actually has the worst success rate for adoptions in the UK, according to the Adoption UK Barometer Report which was not mentioned in the report.
40% of Adoptive Families are experiencing Severe Challenges
22% of Adoptive Families are coping well
78% are not coping well.
After 10 years of fighting for recognition that she was gaslit, unsupported and villified by the community for “geein’ the wean back”, I doubt that a six figure sum will have much left after legal fees (but I am assuming).
In England there is the Adoption Support Fund for accessing professional supports (£5k per annum). In Scotland we have a 47 month waiting list to access CAHMS, where our most vulnerable children (who have been adopted) and have the experienced the worst start in life are left with new parents who have waited up to two years for a child to adopt with no training, no support and blamed when behaviours and conditions materialise after the child has experienced trauma through abuse, neglect or exposure to drugs or alcohol.
I am so proud that someone has stood up to a local authority that is “playing” as an adoption agency to remove children from their expense ledger.
i doubt this subject will be promoted during Adoption Week in October 16th to October 22nd as the subject does not promote adoption.
Oh, and prospective adopter rates are falling nationwide according to Adoption UK but there are less adoptions owing to kinship carers looking after children.
Finally, adoption breakdowns peaked in Scotland in recent years at 25%.
I am so proud that Karen MaGuire fought for 10 years to get the subject some recognition in the media and unfortunately only “money talks”.
No one wants to discuss the Scottish Adoption Crisis.
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