Month: October 2021

In the late 1960s Child Care Officers had the resources to spend time with their clients, most of whom needed support and understanding to help them manage their lives and nurture their children.

My very first such family came from a referral by the local N.S.P.C.C. Inspector who described it as the worst case he had ever seen. You can imagine the trepidation with which I took this on. The living conditions were indeed pretty filthy with a bunch of very young unkempt children. I will refrain from further details save to say that I found a likeable couple with limited intelligence who were out of their depth. They managed to feed and clothe their offspring more successfully than I would have been able to do on Social Security benefits. The first words of their youngest infant included “Knight” and “Shit”. I rather hoped there was no direct association.

Poverty was a real issue then. One unemployed couple who managed their home and their children well, possessed only one sound cup. When I was given a tea the others had to wait their turn for it. Again the mother in particular spread their dole money better than most. The white goods considered essential today were usually absent.

Mental ill-health could always have been a factor, but staff in the Children’s Departments would not be allocated to the patient. That was the responsibility of the Mental Health Department. Following the Seebohm Report of 1968, these agencies, along with the Welfare Departments and other related services were, from 1971, merged into Social Services, and we became generic Social Workers overnight. The idea was that coordination between staff would be improved. Outcomes were of varying success, and over the years specialisms returned.

Physical illness was another problem for some. One single mother in particular suffered from a potentially terminal condition. All I could do was supportively listen. She was well able to work out her own strategies. She taught me much about house maintenance and decoration.

One common factor was resourceful women keeping afloat with not so able husbands who could not keep a job and were sometimes, although intelligent, dependent on alcohol. If we could demonstrate that without material or financial assistance children would need to be received into care, we were able to supply food vouchers which could not be used for alcohol or cigarettes. I would sometimes battle for small amounts of cash, arguing that the recipient should be permitted to make – usually his – own choices. Sometimes, of course, bad decisions were made.

Otherwise, financial and practical help was the province of various charities to which we could apply on behalf of our clients.

Of course we did find situations which needed active intervention leading to removal of children. These were usually the consequence of limited self control resulting in injury or neglect. Real evil was such a rarity that I always thought “there but for the grace of God go I” when, over the years, yet another inquiry was held into cases where, often inexperienced, Social Workers had been found not to have recognised it. How many of us would have done so?

During my time at Kingston no children from the families mentioned above were removed from their parents, although I did work with some who had been placed in care before my time. My task then included aiming towards a return home. In this I was rarely successful. Years later I was to meet one such mother in another part of London.

In the summer of 1967, soon after taking up my post in Kingston Children’s Department as an Assistant Child Care Officer I found myself, for one reason or another, the only fieldworker in the agency.

My senior told me that with no experience, I had earned my post by selection from more than 100 other applicants. Although there had never been a time in my life when there was not a child, for example a younger sibling, for me to learn from, and I was now a single parent, I was surprised to be thought qualified.

A good and experienced Child Care Officer, Morlais Thomas, had provided me with the only training in adoption assessment that I was to receive. I had asked him to tell me what areas I should be examining. It is no fabrication for me to state that he wrote a series of headings on the back of an envelope. They were in fact very comprehensive and stood me in good stead as I set about my task.

Throughout my professional career I will refrain from providing any identifying detail of clients, but offer enough to indicate the nature of the work, early examples of which include matching, vetting, placement, and removal.

I was inundated by responses to an advertisement I placed in a local newspaper that was taken up and circulated nationally by a newshound of the paper. One elderly woman who must have had some knowledge of wartime evacuation offered to meet children at her local railway station if they bore notices of their names. After lengthy narrowing of the scope someone who already knew the subject took up the placement. One child who had languished in a children’s home for many years was eventually provided with missing history and successfully placed; but not before I had felt obliged to remove him from the first prospective adoptees.

In those days the local authority had the role of guardian ad litem as appointed by the court to look after a child who was the subject of adoption, and was required to present a report on this. On one occasion I was offered a bribe to support an application which I opposed.

Over the years subsequent legislation has provided for advances to backs of envelopes, and qualifications for the task. I was to become a consultant for various agencies and to chair two adoption and one fostering panels – systems which were to take decades to evolve. More will follow on these in due course.