I just found this press release about a Scottish grandparent group. It seems they have the same kinds of problems that we here in the USA do, regarding rights to be with grandchildren and interference by CPS in what should be normal and natural family relationships. - LJM
…
The Campaign For Legal Right Of Contact between Grandparents/grandchildren.
Why grandparents worry about their grandchildren when the one sided unfair family laws of today leave them open to abuse. The social services and NSPCC cannot cope with the rise in child abuse and how grandparents could fill that gap.
Source: Grandparents Apart Self Help Group Scotland
May 27, 2007 09:24:45
(PRLog.Org) – Press release. Immediate. 27th May 2007
As you can imagine this campaign is a very emotional one. If you have not suffered the problem of being cut off from someone you love you cannot envisage the devastation and heartbreak it causes.
I’ve been told “that will never happen to me.†I thought that too, but it did happen; fate can be very cruel when a member of your family unexpectedly dies. It can change family life for ever. Not only is this campaign an emotional one but is a very serious and frightening one for our children. The following are problems for children that the governments of the past have failed to address.
One sided unfair laws that give one resident parent complete legal control over children’s lives. A control that has been proven time and again to be abused, by using children as weapons and to blackmail grandparents into giving money or into buying this or that or you won’t see your grandchildren and the children are told terrible untrue things (called alienation) about their grandparents. Just about everybody knows somebody this has happened to. Is it any wonder children have no respect when they grow up with all the lies and deceit they are taught.
It is estimated that there are 100,000 alcohol and 60,000 drug related homes that children live in. Now a full blown alcoholic or drug addict can be very devious and care little for the real welfare of children. In their desire to satisfy their habit they will readily use the children in blackmail to keep their supplies going. The one sided unfair family laws are on their side, a restraining order can be very easily obtained to ban anyone who is thought to be a threat to their exposure and if no one is allowed contact with the children abuse goes on unnoticed, until it really gets out of hand. Meanwhile the children can be going through hell all this time.
The Social Services.
There are more and more badly abused children being taken into care by social services from the homes I described earlier and grandparents have been banned from. Children that need love and family comfort which grandparents could supply if they were not regarded as irrelevant persons by social services. This service is bursting at the seams to cope and have resorted to treating children as business commodities, giving workers huge bonuses to get children adopted as quickly and as cheaply as possible rather than looking after the children’s real welfare with their grandparents.
This type of treatment only cares for the physical body of a child and does not take into account the child’s emotional, mental or even spiritual side. It is well know that children that go through the social system are underachievers and are often very disruptive because the child as a whole is not considered.
One of our grannies (I cannot name her as the case is ongoing) calls me regularly to keep me up to date, is broken hearted today. A sheriff gave her contact 2 hrs every eight weeks with her 4 year old grandson who is in foster care. On the last visit her grandson was taking her hand and giving her big hugs and kisses and asking “where do you live, is it a house you live in, can I come and see you.†The shock came after her last visit when the SS called her and told her that all contact was stopped. A hearing of the children’s panel had been called and it was by their recommendation.
The reason given by SS was the boy was very disruptive and upset when he left the granny and would not speak to the foster dad or the social worker.
Although the granny had a court order to see him the SS had taken it upon themselves to stop contact with the magic saying, ‘To continue contact is not in the child’s best interest.’
Adoption without consent.
Later I got a phone call to say the social services had adopted this grannies grandson without letting her or her daughter (the child’s mother) know anything about it. She was phoning the social worker to check that her meeting with him the next day was still on when she was told.
The heartbroken Gran said “I knew something was wrong when I got put through right away and didn’t get the usual rubbish, she is not at her desk, or she is not in. I was so shocked at her attitude when she said, Have you not heard the adoption went through 3 weeks ago. I asked her if I was to see him again, the answer was, what do you think, then I don’t think so, he is adopted you know” he is not now a cared for child. How much bonus was paid for ruining that child’s life?.
The granny had just received a letter from the sheriff clerk to tell her she would be getting a court date soon for the hearing to continue her contact with the boy. Even the sheriff court had no idea this has happened and her solicitor is totally shocked.
Grandparents Apart Self Help Group Scotland
22 Alness crescent
Glasgow G52 1 PJ
