Barnardo's

The following question has been tabled in the House of Lords. NO DAY NAMED The Baroness BarkerTo ask Her Majestyגs Government what is their policy towards access to personal information relating to individuals who receive, or have received, social care, or who have been adopted; and whether they have any proposals for change. It will be interesting to see what answer Lady Barker receives to this question, and whether or not all the evidence submitted made at the committee stages of the Adoption and Children Bills leading to the new Act have been taken any account of, Certainly the Adoption and Children Act 2002 has failed to do much of what might be hoped of it. Robin Harritt [url]http://harritt.net[/url] .

This morning I received yet another lengthy letter from Barnardo's legal representatives to my lawyer. On the whole, pretty much as expected, yet another glorified backside covering exercise on Barnardos part. It mentions as one of its excuses for continuing to withhold access to various records and correspondence about what was a very dodgy adoption, a 'Public Interest Immunity where matters of the adoption of a child are concerned'. From what I remember of reading the transcripts of the Gunn-Rosso judgement, an agency might claim immunity from laws requiring disclosure in other circumstances because it might undermine the public's confidence in adoption. Barnardo's solicitor says '....Barnardos have an additional duty to ensure in their capacity as holders of adoption information and having involved in an adoption process, the public interest in disclosing the material is such that it should be disclosed. This is an overriding duty placed by law on Barnardos and one which they take very seriously...' I suspected it could be disputed that it is an "overriding duty" particularly as Barnardos has always in the past steadfastly maintained that its "overriding duty" was one of care to those involved. Strange then, that when it become possible to prove that those who Barnardos were previously exercising a duty of care towards, have deceased, then that duty of care becomes no longer the "overriding" duty, giving way to public interest duty which in its view overrides its duty of care to me or presumably any other of its former inmates in my position. Has anyone else here been given 'Public Interest Immunity' as a reason for withholding access to records of an adoption, or of fostering or time in care particularly where care and fostering records have been annexed (probably illegally) to an adoption record in order to deem them un-discloseable? Robin Harritt *

Looks to me as if the Data Protection Act 1998 did away with the public interest immunityђ excuse as of March 2000 except where access was sought through the courts See the article; Access to Social Care Records by Peter Garsden at [url]http://www.abny.demon.co.uk/acal/Newsletter[/url](Oct2000).htm Certainly he seems to think that local authorities can no longer use PII as an excuse. Perhaps voluntary agencies are different but I would not have thought so. But then, Barnardos is a law unto its self and is bound to support anything that allows it to sweep its past under the carpet no matter how much people are hurt as a result, just as long as that 100,000,000 PA figure doesn't suffer. Any further opinions from anyone here would be welcome Robin Harritt [url]http://harritt.net[/url] *

If you have adoption records or care records being held by Barnardos in the UK do beware. In December of last year I asked my lawyer to ask Barnardo's lawyers, why in 1992/3 or thereabouts Barnardos claimed that they held no information about my sister other than that my mother had had another female child who was adopted? Yet in 1996 or thereabouts Barnardos was able pass on to me completely un-requested and as a part of a bundle of other documents, full details not only of my sister's adoption but also of her paternity and details of the circumstances of her conception.Today I received in black and white from Barnardos legal representative a letter via my legal representatives outlining amongst much else, why the above happened.It was because; '"at that stage Barnardo's were aware that Mr Harritt had already had a reunion with his sister so this issue had been dealt with". These people really do beggar belief don't they? So there you have it then in black and white, all you need do is to have a "reunion" with one of your relatives long lost to adoption and Barnardos will automatically and without asking further, let you have all of your relatives most intimate details. Yet when you are actually searching for your brother or sister it is perfectly good practice, apprently, for Barnardos to claim that it holds no records at all for the person you seek. Even when in fact they do have all those intimate details as well as the information needed in order to trace. I wonder if Barnardos President Ms Cherie Booth, our current Prime Minister's wife runs her legal office in such a way. Or if her husband runs his country that way? And Barnardos want me to sign additional waivers before they will show me more of my own records????? Though I suppose by now they may well have shown them to just about everyone but me. They certainley seemed to think that that would be an acceptable way to treat my infant medical records. If it wasn't clear before, it is now, the terms that Barnardos like to throw around willy nilly like "duty of confidentiality" and "duty of care" have little real meaning, what matters at the modern Barnardos is individual and corporate back-side covering and they can't even manage to do that very well. And that is just a very very small part of the story. My search [url]http://robin.robin.org/search[/url] Robin Harritt [url]http://harritt.net[/url] *

Just bringing this back to the top, again. Some of the links in the posts above might no longer work, you can see my story on the following links. [url]http://barnardos.harritt.net/[/url] [url]http://search.harritt.net[/url] Of interest to anyone who was involved with Barnardos (Barnardo's) in the past. [url]http://groups.msn.com/thebarnardofamilygroup/general.msnw?all_topics=1[/url] Robin call +44 20 7871 1835 Fax +44 20 7691 9668 *

. Just wanted to bring this back to the top as I still feel that it raises issues of importance to anyone cared for by or adopted through Barnardos (Dr Barnardo's) in the past. Even perhaps now. Robin Harritt [url]http://harritt.net[/url] *

. I've added another page to the website on this [url]http://robin.robin.org/records[/url] Robin Harritt [url]http://harritt.net[/url] *