Drug Court Welcomed - Letter to Minister - what about sibling marriages? - Why is Scotland different?

10.28.00pm GMT Wed 30th Jan 2008

"The establishment of this court is a step in the right direction," said "I tabled a Commons Motion in June 2006 EDM No 1629. Which said:

That this House notes the report in The Telegraph on 31st May that 14 babies have been removed from one mother following care proceedings and that frequently over five new born babies are removed from a single mother; questions as to whether this is a properly ethical practice and whether it contravenes many codes of human rights; and calls for the Government to encourage local authorities to keep families together rather than split them up to satisfy targets for adoptions from care.

"It is important to remember that these cases involve a sequence of removing baby after baby at birth from a mother. This has happened not only where drugs are involved, but also where mothers are Epileptic or a bit slow. The secrecy of the courts prevents me from giving individual cases".

"Human nature then results in mothers getting pregant again and the cycle starting again."

"There is an important difference between England and Scotland. In Scotland they don't assume that because one child has been removed the parents cannot change. In England there has to date been major resistance to allowing parents to keep children once one or more have been removed."

"In practise there are a substantial number of cases where the local authority's case is really fragile and would not stand up to proper scrutiny. It is this that leads to the large number of false positives and false negatives that cause the system to fail to protect children. However, this is concealed by the secrecy of the family courts."

"We must use the opportunity of the Children and Young People Bill to increase the accountability of the system so that it becomes more robust."

"These cases where the children have been separately adopted means that there are groups of 14-15 children who are siblings who are being brought up in separate families. That raises the spectre suggested by Lord Alton of them potentially marrying without knowing that in fact they are siblings. The government needs to give this issue some serious consideration."