John Hemming's Web Log

The above video is a good one for pointing out ballot box stuffing. We should not pretend that this sort of thing doesn't happen in the UK. One interesting thing about elections in Birmingham is that some polling stations have presiding officers working for the Labour Party. This may sound surprising given that the council is now run by a non-Labour partnership. However, it developed during Labour's control of the authority and is taking some sorting out. Remember that 4,000 people's votes were defrauded by Labour in the Bordesley Green Ward in 2004. Totally unacceptable. Labour must not be allowed anywhere close to power in Birmingham until they give up fiddling elections.

Its that time of year and I think there is some merit in doing a message for the new year. Normally I don't comment about constituency issues on this weblog. That is because the audience is a wider one than those people living in Yardley. People living in Yardley should get leaflets and reports. However, this time I will look at local issues as well. Yardley One aspect of local activity that is always busy is dealing with local people's problems. I started a new casework system in 2004. The last case created in 2006 was 5597 and in 2007 7763. This gives rise to just over 2,000 new cases in each year. Some are simple and are resolved quickly. Others take a long time and are difficult to resolve. Some issues affect more than one person. Issues like the redevelopment of The Swan have dragged on for almost 10 years now. We are, however, seeing the start of the practical work. Some of the buildings are being demolished and work should be starting on Bakeman House soon. ...

The link is to the top ten nonsensical legal arguments of the Bush Government and a detailed analysis of them. This is a summary (in increasing level of stupidity): 10. The NSA's eavesdropping was limited in scope. 9. Scooter Libby's sentence was commuted because it was excessive. 8. The vice president's office is not a part of the executive branch. 7. Guantanamo Bay detainees enjoy more legal rights than any POW's in history. 6. Water-boarding may not be torture. 5. Everyone who has ever spoken to the president about anything is barred from congressional testimony by executive privilege. 4. Nine U.S. attorneys were fired by nobody, but for good reason. 3. Alberto Gonzales. 2. State secrets. 1. The United States does not torture. We face some similar difficulties in the UK. Getting proper answers from the government remains very difficult. I am continuing to try to stop some of the cover ups that go on in the UK. However, I think the USA government have the edge on us...

According to the Daily Mirror: A top police scientist in charge of checking the qualifications of forensic experts has been suspended for allegedly faking his own CV.

At the age of 89 Andy is still performing around Birmingham with his band "the Blue Notes". It is nice to have his contribution recognised. He must be one of the older recipients of honours today.

Time Lapse video allows an unusual thought to be worth watching for just over 1 min.

There has been much debate recently about Export Witnesses, Paediatricians, the GMC and Child Protection. A lot of the difficulties arise from the mismatch between medical decision-making and legal decision-making. However, there are other factors that need looking at. Given a bit of spare time today I will make a start at consolidating information about this. It is worth looking at a few facts first. People who act as Expert Witnesses in the Family Court get paid substantial sums for their reports. The government is proposing to change the system. However, it is important to recognise that there is a financial interest in the system for expert witnesses. Secondly, often Family Court judges will refuse second opinions. Even the Court of Appeal will refuse a second opinion. What this means is that if an expert states that a parent is guilty of child abuse frequently there is little that the parent can do. A number of the theories which are used for expert opinion in the courts a...

Liberal England have kindly awarded me the accolade of "campaign of the year" for my campaigning for justice for families. My test of a campaign is to what extent things change as a result. I am aware of some changes we have achieved, but we have a long way to go.

PC Pro have kindly stated that my quotation about the Government and IT was one of the top ten IT quotes of 2007: (see link) 9. John Hemming MP The loss of 25 million child benefit records on a couple of CDs was an open-goal for opposition politicians. But hand the match ball to Liberal MP, John Hemming, who said the government couldn't even be trusted with CD burners and warned of worse to come. "Normally what happens is that we close the door after the horse has bolted, but in this case we're leaving the door open for more horses to bolt." He wasn't wrong, was he?

The following story has just been published by the Essex Enquirer. They publish on the net using PDF so I have extracted the text: IT’S USED up more than £90m per year for the last four years and has the power to save children’s lives or ruin families for ever. It has overseen the adoption of about 450 youngsters since 2002 and investigated the home lives of 8,000 more. And it employs more than 150 people with the power to investigate anyone’s home life answering only to itself. But there are calls to make Essex County Council social services more accountable to the public over controversial cases hitting the headlines. Just 18 people have launched formal complaints against the department since 2004 but the authority will not say how many of these have resulted in disciplinary action taking place. A spokesman told The Enquirer: “The complaints procedure and disciplinary process are quite separate from one another and, therefore, do not become linked at any stage.” Following its contro...

The link is to a story about a sad case in Bristol where a young baby was hurt by his birth parents. What mystifies me about this is that it went on over a period of 50 days. That is when there should be at a minimum a health visitor visiting. It explains a good reason why we need to open up the work of the safeguarding boards to scrutiny. Since prior to the Climbie case the decisionmaking process in child protection has been skewed. If we are going to get it right we need to know where it is going wrong.

This is not one produced by me.

Castle Point DC, St Marys Con 509 and 461 (41.0; -27.3), Lab 480 and 456 (38.6; +6.9), BNP 253 and 234 (20.4; +20.4). Majorities 48 and 19. Turnout 24.8%. Con hold and Lab gain from Con. Last fought 2007. Hackney LBC, Springfield Con 1244 (59.0; +16.1), Lab 590 (28.0; +0.4), LD Brian Stone 113 (5.4; -4.8), Green 85 (4.0; -9.5), Christian Party 40 (1.9; +1.9), Communist 37 ( 1.8; -4.0). Majority 654. Turnout 33.0%. Con hold. Last fought 2006. Shepshed TC, East Lab 275 and 259 (32.8), LD Sarah Fall 193, James Nasmyth 155 (23.0), Con 187 (22.3), BNP 183 and 173 (21.8). Majorities 82 and 66. Turnout 14.5%. Lab gain from Con x 2. Further Result from 13th December 2007, from Chris Nelson Barton Seagrave PC, St Boltophs Con 323 (65.1%) Lab 173 (34.9%) Majority 150. Turnout 25.9%. Con hold

Leader NICK CLEGG Deputy Leader Vince Cable Chief Whip Paul Burstow The economy and business VINCE CABLE Shadow Chancellor Jeremy Browne Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury Sarah Teather Shadow Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Home Affairs CHRIS HUHNE Shadow Secretary of State for the Home Department David Heath Shadow Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor The Rt Hon the Lord Thomas Shadow Attorney General David Howarth Shadow Solicitor General International affairs ED DAVEY Shadow Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Chair of Campaigns and Communications Nick Harvey Shadow Secretary of State for Defence Mike Moore Shadow Secretary of State for International Development Public services DAVID LAWS Shadow Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families Norman Lamb Shadow Secretary of State for Health Julia Goldsworthy Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government Lembit Opik Housing Danny Alexander...

There is more media interest in this issue today. What I wonder is how many innocent people are locked up somewhere in the UK. We are supposed to be short of prison places. Why then have an obsession with locking people up on the basis of unproven theories.

The link is to a story about a Juror from Keran Henderson's trial believing that a miscarriage of justice "has occurred." Keran's trial was essentially one about medical expert evidence. We had a useful discussion on Radio 5 yesterday about how the use of expert evidence needs to be improved to avoid miscarriages of justice. The key point is that legal decisionmaking and medical decisionmaking operate at different levels of certainty. If people wish to introduce pet theories into court they need to have justified them in some way. One approach is a form of Daubert hearing. However, there is a need to look in detail at many unproven theories to decide whether there is sufficient certainty for them to be used in court. These include Shaken Baby Syndrome, Classical Metaphyseal Lesions and FII by proxy. This should not be done on a trial by trial basis. These are large sources of many of the miscarriages of justice in the Family and Criminal Divisions (mainly Family...

The link is to a scheme run by CSV much like Homestart. I just hope that we don't see negative competition between CSV and Homestart.

I don't know who produced this video, but it helps in raising awareness of the situation.

At least the medical evidence (opinion) was recognised in retrospect to be wrong. It would be nice if we put some effort in as a society to ensure that the opinion given in court is actually true. This lady was imprisoned and had a child forcibly adopted away from her family, but was innocent.

The link is to today's story in The Mirror about the Newport Case. What those who defend the current system have to recognise is that taking children into care hurts the children. Where it was not necessary substantial damage has been done without good reason. Yes there will always be times when children do need to be taken into care, but there should be good well argued reasons first. The biggest trauma caused to many children is the step of taking them into care. In studying this it seems clear to me that the system is doing masses of damage to people (parents and children).