Vulnerable children locked up and ‘gravely damaged by the state’, England’s former top family judge warns
Sir James Munby says measure reflects government’s ‘shocking moral failure’ to help those with complex needs
Vulnerable children with complex needs are being locked away in unregulated placements and are being “gravely damaged by the state” while their parents are driven to despair, according to England’s former top family judge. Sir James Munby terms the lack of provision of safe and therapeutic homes “a shocking moral failure”.
According to the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory, the number of applications for “deprivation of liberty” orders for children suffering from psychological and behavioural difficulties reached 1,368 last year.
Writing in the Observer, Munby, the immediate past president of the family division of the high court, said that soaring applications for this draconian measure were a sad reflection of the catastrophic failure to support children whose complex needs frequently lead to self-harm and suicide attempts.
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In 2021, the supreme court called the plight of these children “a scandal containing all the ingredients for a tragedy”. Persistent efforts over years by journalists to publicise the escalating crisis mean no one can ever claim the scandal is a hidden one, Munby writes, citing the recent “shocking” investigation by the BBC, which interviewed children on their “heartbreaking” experiences of being forcibly detained in unsuitable placements under deprivation of liberty orders.
The Observer recently reported on hundreds of very vulnerable children being sent to unregulated homes because of a chronic shortage of secure local authority units.
Meanwhile, the government has done nothing of any substance or value to help these most vulnerable children, Munby says.
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