Latest news with #AndrewMcFarlane
New Statesman
21-05-2025
- General
- New Statesman
Britain is failing children in care
Illustration by Gary Waters / Ikon Images There is no denying that, for so many looked-after children, growing up in care can be brutal and traumatic. I should know. I was looked after for most of my childhood, shunted between a range of foster homes in south-east London, as well as doing a stint in a residential care home with pre-teen boys of a similar age. In my case, it was necessary. But what concerns me is children being placed into care when it's avoidable – when there's a better alternative. The number of looked-after children in England is high – more than 80,000. And although statistics from the Department for Education show that only a small proportion of children in care are there due to being in 'low income' homes, that doesn't disprove that poverty is a significant factor for children entering the system. The UK's most senior family court judge, Andrew McFarlane, cites poverty as a key reason. It's also the case that poverty is often the trigger behind some of the other reasons children are placed into care – issues such as neglect and abuse. It demands concern that poverty can play such a vicious role in upending the life of a vulnerable child. Shouldn't the levers of the state be robust enough to prevent a child from being ripped apart from loved family members? Just as concerning are the distances some of them are being sent to live, away from their homes and that which they hold dear. According to research from Become, a charity for care leavers, one in five children in care in England is placed more than 20 miles from their family, friends, school and wider community. When the care system works, it can save the life of a child and steer them on to a positive path. I had the fortune of being supported by some incredible foster carers, care-home workers and social workers, all of whom played a critical role in my development and self-esteem. The fact remains, however, that many children in care are being let down. At its worst, time spent in care can compound trauma, deepen a child's sense of abandonment and diminish their life chances. Placing a child into the care system should only ever be a last resort. A greater emphasis should be placed on preventative measures, keeping families together wherever it's safe and possible to do so. A few years ago, I presented a BBC3 documentary, Split Up in Care, about the frequency of siblings being separated in the care system; it was rooted in my experience of sibling estrangement. I explored how some local authorities were pioneering preventative strategies. During the pandemic, Derby City Council introduced a rapid-response team to support vulnerable families and prevent more children from entering the system. In 15 months, they helped 60 families to stay together and prevented 50 sibling groups from being split up. While such measures form part of the solution, we must also recognise the challenge that leaving care presents for thousands of young people. Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe Despite a string of school suspensions and one exclusion, I studied history at the University of Cambridge. It was something my local authority celebrated: a care-experienced student had been accepted into Oxbridge. To them, it was a case of social care having 'worked well'. Yet, despite me being on the receiving end of platitudes and adulation, the reality of leaving care was tumultuous. My foster family let me go when I was 18. As well as studying for my A-levels, I had to prepare for independent living and moving into a council flat. Alongside sorting out student bursaries and loans, I also had to bid for council properties and budget for home furnishings. I should have been able to focus solely on my education, but that 'luxury' was never afforded to me. Perhaps most challenging was that I wouldn't receive funding for both student accommodation and a London council flat. I could either stay in London and get a council flat, or go to Cambridge and lose my bidding priority for the flat. This was problematic because my Cambridge college didn't offer year-round accommodation. Only after I contacted my local MP did I receive the support to both attend my university of choice and have a home. Why should any teenager have to be so resilient? So overwhelming were the pressures of leaving care that I nearly declined my Cambridge offer. How many young people, on the cusp of leaving care, are giving up on their ambitions and potential because of the immediacy of survival? University and other forms of higher education are not being pursued by many leaving care. I'd suggest this is not due to a lack of interest or ability, but the suffocating demands care leavers face when it comes to independence. The chance to dream is a privilege that many leaving care aren't given. This stunted potential affects society deeply, including care-experienced people forming large proportions of the homeless, young offending and adult offending populations. In 2022, the Welsh government piloted a basic income scheme for those leaving care. While its success is yet to be determined, one must appreciate the effort made to ease the pressure on those confronting the brutality of adulthood and independence. So many in care have known poverty – we must offer them a route out of it. The case for better support for those leaving care is beyond clear. Hopefully, our authorities are prudent enough to ensure that the children's care system ends up doing what it says on the tin: caring. Ashley John-Baptiste is the author of 'Looked After: A Childhood in Care' (Hodder) [See also: The brain behind Labour's EU deal] Related
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Validation Cloud Debuts Mavrik-1 AI Engine on Hedera to Democratize DeFi Data Analysis and Web3
Crypto infrastructure company Validation Cloud announced Tuesday the debut of Hedera-based AI engine Mavrik-1 that lets users and developers get DeFi market insights by asking queries in plain English. Despite DeFi's promise in revolutionizing finance, its complexity has long acted as barrier against widespread adoption. For DeFi users, the learning curve is steep, requiring knowledge of complex terminologies such as liquidity mining, impermanent loss and staking. Many Defi platforms require users to interact with command-line interfaces and complex web applications. With Mavrik-1, users can ask questions like "Which trading pairs have the largest spreads and which stablecoin has the highest on-chaintransaction volume?." Imagine chatting with your personal AI advisor. The ability to seek information via natural language queries represents democratization of data analysis and marks a shift in how investors interact with the blockchain protocols. "This is a pivotal moment for the Hedera ecosystem,' Viv Diwakar, Chief Information Officer at Hedera Foundation, said in a press release shared with CoinDesk. 'Validation Cloud's Data x AI platform brings an entirely new way to engage with blockchain data. It's a novel experience that unlocks usability and insight for builders, enterprises, and users in our ecosystem.' Validation Cloud is the AI platform powering Web3 finance, delivering products across Data x AI, Staking, and Node API. Mavrik-1 is deeply integrated with the Hedera-based DeFi applications, such as hUSDC, Karate Combat, and leading DeFi applications, the press release said. It is specially trained for blockchain environments, ensuring contextually relevant responses to queries. "We built Mavrik because you shouldn't need a PhD in Web3 to access and understand what's happening on-chain," said Andrew McFarlane, CTO of Validation Cloud. "By surfacing real-time intelligence in natural language, we're making Web3 accessible to everyone." The launch on Hedera is the first step, which will be followed by integrations with other blockchains and a full public rollout, dubbed Mavrik 2, later this year. Hedera debuted in 2021 and is a leaderless proof-of-stake network with aBFT hashgraph consensus. Hedera Foundation fuels the development of the Hedera ecosystem through grants and expert support for decentralized applications across DeFi, NFTs, and more.
The Independent
20-02-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
‘Self-centred' UK couple criticised over foreign surrogacy that left siblings stateless
Would-be parents seeking out commercial foreign surrogacies are being warned the government may fight their bids for adoption, rendering the infants both permanently stateless and legally parentless. A High Court case revealed a 'self-centred' older UK couple - their identities concealed by the court - whose unlawful arrangement with a clinic in Cyprus saw two siblings born to Ukrainian women. The children were then left in limbo for four years before the judge granted adoption as their only option. An application for a parental order following a conventional surrogacy may only be made if the gametes of the applicant were used to bring about the creation of the embryo. But in this case, the women in their sixties had used donors for the eggs and sperm. Furthermore, the order can't be made if the surrogate has been paid, other than for expenses 'reasonably incurred', but the fee paid for the arrangement was around £120,000. Lawyers acting for the Home Office warned the government may oppose on 'policy grounds' future attempts to adopt children born through overseas, commercial surrogacy arrangements before being brought to the UK. Andrew McFarlane, president of the court's family division, said the decision should put would-be parents 'on notice that the courts in England and Wales may refuse to grant an adoption order ... with the result that the child that they have caused to be born may be permanently stateless and legally parent-less'. 'Put bluntly, anyone seeking to achieve the introduction of a child into their family by following in the footsteps of these applicants should think again,' Mr Justice McFarlane said. It is the latest case of a judge criticising aspiring parents who have become embroiled in clandestine and costly ordeals, particularly involving countries that ban arrangements with same-sex couples. In the most recent case, the court heard the women, who were beyond child-bearing years, had connected with a foreign surrogacy clinic which they had understood was based in southern Cyprus. It was only after the arrangements had been significantly advanced they came to realise the clinic was in fact operating in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, where surrogacy is unlawful and where the placement of children with same-sex couples is also not permitted. The women refused to take part in a false story that one of them was the natural mother of the children, who were neither afforded Ukrainian nor Northern Cypriot nationality, resulting - among other factors - in the children being denied entry with the women into the UK until a court allowed them to under the European Convention on Human Rights. The judge said: 'During the hearing, I expressed, in strong terms, my concern about the whole project that these two adults had embarked upon. I described the wisdom, in terms of the welfare of any children created by such an endeavour, as being highly questionable.' Mr Justice McFarlane also made reference to the age of the two women, who will be in their seventies and eighties when the children are in their teens. 'The motives of the two applicants in wanting to become parents of babies in their late sixties would seem to have been entirely self-centred, with no thought as to the long-term welfare of the resulting children,' he said. 'It was astonishing to learn, and have confirmed by their solicitor, that the applicants had not given any consideration to the impact on the children of having parents who are well over 60 years older than they are.' In summarising the submission of lawyers for the Home Office, the judge said the government will consider in future cases whether to oppose an adoption order on policy grounds.
The Independent
19-02-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Senior judge warns against unlawful surrogacies after women ‘exploited'
A senior judge has warned against unlawful surrogacy arrangements abroad after dealing with a 'highly unusual' case involving two women in their 60s paying around £120,000 to start a family. Sir Andrew McFarlane, president of the family division of the High Court, said in a ruling on Wednesday that the couple, and two Ukrainian women used as surrogates, were 'being exploited for commercial gain'. The couple, known as Ms W and Ms X, lived in the UK and had considered having children for several years, but were both in their 60s when they 'in some way established a connection with a foreign surrogacy clinic', which they believed was in southern Cyprus, the judge said. I described the wisdom, in terms of the welfare of any children created by such an endeavour, as being highly questionable Sir Andrew McFarlane But the clinic was instead located in the self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), which is not recognised by the UK, and where neither surrogacy nor children being placed with same-sex couples is legal. The couple paid around £120,000 for the procedures, which Sir Andrew said was 'in reality, a commercial rate', but following the births were unable to leave the TRNC with the children, with one of the women incorrectly registered as their birth mother and no paperwork provided by the clinic to state the children were born via surrogates. The Home Office refused to allow the children to enter the UK with the couple, but leave to enter was given four years later after a legal battle. After a hearing in July last year, Sir Andrew allowed the couple to adopt the two children, stating this was 'very plainly' in their best interests, but also raised concerns about 'the whole project that these two adults had embarked upon'. He said: 'I described the wisdom, in terms of the welfare of any children created by such an endeavour, as being highly questionable. 'I suspected, although I obviously did not know, that if they had their time again, Ms W and Ms X, knowing what they now knew, would not embark upon this particular course in order to bring children into their family. 'It was, however, absolutely clear that these children were being well cared for, were meeting their milestones, stimulated, happy and thoroughly embedded in every way, socially, emotionally, psychologically with their two parental figures and no doubt the wider family and the wider community within which they now lived.' Sir Andrew said he released his anonymised judgment on Wednesday to 'draw attention' to the case and 'to offer some advice for those who may, in future, unwisely seek to follow the path taken by the two applicants'. The account of the circumstances surrounding the birth of these two children strongly suggests that all four women at the centre of the arrangements were being exploited for commercial gain by those running this unlawful operation Sir Andrew McFarlane Lawyers for the Government had also raised 'significant legal and public policy concerns' about the case, including around exploitation and immigration, which could lead it to oppose adoption orders being made in future. Sir Andrew said that this could leave children in future cases 'permanently stateless and legally parentless', and added: 'The fact that the court felt obliged to make adoption orders in the present case, should not be taken as any precedent that, in any future case on similar facts, an adoption order will be made.' He said: 'The account of the circumstances surrounding the birth of these two children strongly suggests that all four women at the centre of the arrangements were being exploited for commercial gain by those running this unlawful operation. 'The motives of the two applicants in wanting to become parents of babies in their late 60s would seem to have been entirely self-centred, with no thought as to the long-term welfare of the resulting children. 'It was astonishing to learn, and have confirmed by their solicitor, that the applicants had not given any consideration to the impact on the children of having parents who are well over 60 years older than they are. 'It is likely that when they are in their early teens, these two young people will become carers for their 80-year-old adopted parents. 'The only sensible decision that the applicants made, as I observed during the hearing, was to commission the birth of two children so that, at least, these two full siblings will have each other as they grow up.' Concluding his judgment, Sir Andrew said: 'Put bluntly, anyone seeking to achieve the introduction of a child into their family by following in the footsteps of these applicants should think again.'
