Scotland's child protection system described as 'racially biased'

The National

4 days ago

The claim by Black and migrant-led organisations in Scotland – Passion4Fusion and Project Esperanza – is backed by research launched in ­recent months.
It highlights claims that the child protection system is not providing families with enough ­support to stay together when they are struggling and is too quick to ­remove them.
These organisations said they had supported dozens of Black and ­racialised families who felt they had been culturally misunderstood or treated unfairly by the system over the last two years. Passion4Fusion said most of the cases of 76 families they had worked with over two years displayed 'elements' of racial bias from child protection.
Many of the parents were migrants, sometimes unfamiliar with Scottish laws and customs. In some cases ­support organisations had worked on, they claim parents did not know that smacking was illegal, or had ­different attitudes to leaving children alone, but had their children taken into care without the opportunity to modify their parenting.
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In others, the hostile ­immigration system was impacting ­parental mental health, according to the ­Scottish Refugee Council and ­Glasgow-based Women's Integration Network, but this was not ­understood by social workers and appropriate support was not offered.
Scottish policy dictates that ­children and parents should get the support they need to stay together, as long as it is considered safe for them to do so.
Most recent Scottish social work statistics record 828 Black and ­ethnic minority children as being in care as of July 31, 2024. But there are a ­further 1297 – 11% of those in care – where no ethnicity was recorded. In England, it is a legal requirement to record ethnicity but in Scotland, it is not.
The Ferret has been ­investigating claims that there are systemic issues with the child protection system in terms of racial and cultural issues for ­migrant families as part of a cross-border investigation with Scottish-based Migrant Women Press, as well as journalists in Romania and Italy.
Today, both Scottish publications ran the story of Nina, a mother ­originally from Southeast Africa, who had five children taken into care. We have changed her name to protect the identities of her children.
Following more than two months in immigration detention when her ­asylum claim was refused, ­concerns were raised about her ­mental ­wellbeing, leading to two of her ­children being taken into care under a voluntary agreement. Two further children and her new baby were ­later taken into care following historic ­concerns about her parenting.
But three of her children were later returned following an assessment that noted that cultural misunderstandings about her behaviour had played a part in several issues of concern.
Assessors acknowledged ­previous 'concerns about her parenting'. ­However, they also wrote that ­'behaviours when taken in the ­context of Nina's nationality and ­culture are immediately less ­alarming' and said an understanding of them would have allowed for 'intervention in a culturally sensitive manner'.
Her oldest daughter, now in her mid-twenties and living and ­working in England, remembers the relief of that decision to return her to her mother's care.
'If there hadn't been that ­assessment, everything could have been different,' she said. 'To me, it explained – she is not an evil ­mother. She was just trying to look after kids in the way that was normal in her culture.'
However, two of Nina's children taken into care remained there, their relationship with their mother ­having broken down. They went on to be ­permanently fostered, which meant Nina lost her parental rights.
The fostered daughter has ­constantly refused to have contact with her mother. Her fostered son took his own life as a young teen while in permanent foster care, where he had been for many years. Previous work by The Ferret has found that since 2021, 11 young people in the care system have completed suicide, the most common cause of death in this group.
Nina and her lawyer are calling for a Fatal Accident Inquiry so that her questions about the circumstances of his death can be answered. The Crown Office confirmed that it is still investigating and no decision will be taken until that concludes.
But Nina claims social work ­discriminated against her. She said: 'Once my life was a normal life. They took my kids. And now I am sitting here and my son is dead. I feel like he was kidnapped by social services, like there is no accountability. What went wrong? What was happening that nobody could see? Those are the questions I want answered.'
The Ferret and Migrant Women Press tried to get figures for the number of migrant children taken into care in Scotland over the last five years. Only nine local authorities provided figures, with six claiming no children had been taken into care.
West Lothian's figures were the highest provided with a total of 42 migrant children taken into care over five years, including 12 children from Nigeria, eight from Poland and eight from Romania and Slovakia. Two were taken into care at birth. Though some cases were 'ongoing', none of those children had been adopted.
Five councils, including ­Edinburgh, refused to give details due to the small number of children involved, which they argued could identify them. But 11 out of the 32 local ­authorities – more than a third – said they were ­unable to provide the ­information without looking through individual files, or did not record data on ­whether children taken into care had migrant parents or not.
'While information on ­nationality and ethnicity may be provided on a voluntary basis, where this is the case, it is often only contained in observational notes and may not be ­provided at all,' admitted Glasgow City ­Council, one of the authorities which did not hold figures.
Concerns about the disproportionate intervention of social work in Black families are long-running and widespread.
In 2021, the BBC ­reported on the case of a Nigerian victim of ­trafficking, living in an ­Italian ­migrant shelter, who was threatened with ­having her son taken into care. Those ­running the shelter were ­apparently ­concerned by her so-called 'African' ways of bringing up her son, which included carrying him on her back and encouraging him to eat by putting food in his mouth.
The 2023 Indian film Mrs ­Chatterjee vs Norway documented the real-life story of Anurup ­Bhattacharya and Sagarika Chakraborty, an Indian immigrant couple whose children were taken away by Norwegian authorities in 2011. Other cases have been documented in Germany and Sweden.
Conversely, concerns have previously been raised that fears of being perceived as racist have stopped ­social workers stepping in to prevent abuse. The murder of eight-year-old ­Victoria Climbié (below) from the Ivory Coast 25 years ago, by her great aunt and her boyfriend, is said to be ­instrumental in current social work practice.
But some claim that case has led to prejudice.
Helene Rodger, project director and co-founder of Passion4Fusion, said: 'A lot of the families we support come to the attention of social services due to physical chastisement'. She doesn't excuse it, but said this needs to be seen in context especially for new Scots. 'In a lot of African countries, it is quite normal for it to be used as a form of discipline not harm,' Rodger added.
'We were parented like that. In Scotland, it's only been illegal since 2020. Often it's teachers or neighbours who contact social services.'
She claimed migrants should be given clearer information so they know it is against the law to smack their children, with social workers trained to better understand the different cultural contexts. Black social workers and foster carers should be recruited, she claimed.
As part of its report, They Took My Child Too – launched at the Scottish Parliament in May – Passion4Fusion surveyed more than 100 parents, community members and professionals with experience of the social work system. Almost three-quarters believed that there was a 'culture gap' for families and social work, while 93% 'agreed or strongly agreed' that more culturally sensitive child protection services would improve the welfare of Black and brown children.
Esther Muchena, manager of Scottish Refugee Council's Family Rights Service, said involvement with child protection has sometimes been caused by different cultural norms where parents might leave a child at home alone, unaware of the laws.
'That is the type of behaviour that can be corrected,' Muchena said. 'In our experience working with women accessing our services, the issues are never about the woman not being capable enough. The root issue in our cases is usually because of the pressures of navigating a complex asylum process, which can cause poor parental mental health. Women in this position have to fight to survive while keeping their families together.'
Victoria Nyanga-Ndiaye, founder of Project Esperanza, shares that view. The Edinburgh-based charity is currently working with over 40 migrant families with child protection involvement, though not all of them have children in care.
The majority of the families she is supporting have come to the attention of social work as a result of perceptions of neglect, she said. She supports international students struggling to balance study with work and childcare, along with families with no recourse to public funds, due to their immigration status, who are struggling to cope.
But the social workers, who should be there to help, often simply do not understand the cultural issues, are misinformed, under-trained and under-resourced to best help these families, Nyanga-Ndiaye said. 'I think the system is actually designed that way,' she added. 'It's designed for hardship.'
A Scottish Government spokesperson said:'[[Scottish Government]] guidance on child protection in Scotland makes clear that cultural respect and understanding must be consistently applied in all child care and protection practices.
'The guidance sets out that professionals should learn about the culture or faith of the child and family and seek advice if necessary. They should also be culturally sensitive while keeping focus on the child's experience and potential harm.'