Children are Safer in war torn Kabul than in Glasgow

Says,; Mak Sedwill Former British Ambassador for Afghanistan.

It is obvious to everyone else that the backbone and future of our nation depends upon how children are raised. If they are treated fairly with love and stability from their family including their extended family we will have caring citizens to carry on looking after the welfare of everyone else. This present Scottish Government talks a good game but does not back up its promises with action. They are ignoring the issue of the welfare of children.

Drugs and alcohol families are on the increase and our governments’ policy is to snatch the children groom them for adoption by alienating them from the rest of their family, telling them they are no longer wanted by their grandparents, cousins, uncles, aunts etc. All this does is make children isolated, bitter and resentful to their family and society in general. Too often this ends up with them being in care and perfect candidates for gangs that make us old people afraid to open our door or go out at night. The master plan of all this is to adopt them to strangers without the consent of any member of that child’s family. Dealing with the problem like this is only a short term solution. When the children that go through this trauma come back as the criminals and thugs of the future the problem has magnified. Can you see the cycle of events? We are going round in circles and each turn of the cycle is worse than the before.

Our Government is looking for quick fixes and has no real policies for families for the future. Three of their MSPs started to work for us when first elected, but abandoned the search for better conditions for children. Then this government ignored The Charter for Grandchildren, created by the previous Scottish Government, designed to ensure professionals that work in the children’s welfare system put children’s interests first. Unbelievably this does not happen in a lot of cases.

The Charter for Grandchildren is parent friendly and does not give grandparents any legal rights at all. It simply reminds professionals and families of the value of the relationship between children and extended family, grandparents in particular. If it is in the child’s best interest for their extended family to stop Social Services putting them needlessly into care or to strangers then that is what should happen instead of extracting them from their family which often ruins their lives forever.

We need our Government to care about our children NOW. Ignoring what actually happens to children from problem families is a ticking time-bomb waiting to blow many lives apart. The Charter for Grandchildren is a valuable document that MUST be supported for the sake of our future.