Phil Frampton, a member of the CLA and former Chair, has written the following article calling on OFSTED to rescind John Goldup's appointment as Social Care Director. The reason behind this is that Mr Goldup held a senior position at Islington Council's Children's Services department during the 1980s and 1990s. The department was later criticised in a series of official reports, after whistleblowers revealed that a child sex ring had operated throughout Islington’s care homes for several years.
Phil's full article is below. The Care Leavers' Association's official response to this issue can be viewed here. Tell us what you think about this appointment and the reactions to it.
Rescind John Goldup’s Appointment to OFSTED
The 1,000,000 people who have passed through Britain’s care system will shudder when they hear that OFSTED has appointed a senior representative with the record of John Goldup.
Goldup is now OFSTED’s Social Care Director, giving him control over the protection of young people in the country’s care homes.
During the 1980s and early 1990s Goldup was the second most senior figure in Islington Council’s children’s department. His department was later savaged in a series of official reports after whistleblowers revealed that a child sex ring had operated throughout Islington’s care homes for several years.
An independent inquiry headed by Oxfordshire’s Director of Social Services found that the council was in a ‘deplorable state’ and ”line managers should have visited children’s homes, should have taken necessary action, should have spoken to children and ... should have responded to allegations as serious as the ones made and now investigated.’
Detective Chief Superintendent Kevin Moore, of Sussex Police, investigating the abuse said Islington actively thwarted attempts to bring the abusers to justice and ‘If we’d had the usual co-operation that you expect and deserve from other agencies, it’s a very strong likelihood we would have got a conviction.”
OFSTED must rescind the appointment of John Goldup immediately. When it came to protecting vulnerable children in his care in Islington, Goldup more than failed on his watch. OFSTED has only just taken over national responsibility for children in care and is showing a level of disdain for those who suffered and suffer abuse whilst in care.
The same OFSTED last year tried to have Paul Blackburn, a representative of GlaxoSmithKline, a company notorious for testing new drugs on children in care, on its board. That was defeated because of public opposition. Hopefully people will not sit back but instead contact their MPs and unions to demand action to cancel Goldup's appointment.
This second inept and horrendous decision by OFSTED should also prompt calls for OFSTED's responsibility as watchdog for children in care to be reviewed and replaced with a body which is representative of service users in the care system and its staff. The calamitous failure to protect Baby P in Haringey highlighted the mismatch of placing education functions alongside the social work functions of child protection.
OFSTED failed so dramatically that The Guardian reports a whistleblower at Ofsted has claimed an official report into Haringey children’s services was secretly downgraded from "good" to "inadequate" when public outage followed the conviction of Baby P’s killers.
Child protection has been undermined by making it subordinate to Education Department officials who lack the training and understanding regarding what is a very different function to promoting learning.
Watchdog’s need to be led by people that have experience of using or working in the sector. Not one member of the OFSTED Board has ever been in care and most are representatives of businesses such as Royal Mail and Cable & Wireless and have no real knowledge or experience in dealing with care issues. Hence it is hardly a surprise that they fail to match up as a watchdog for the care system.
We must not wait for another child tragedy and the knee jerk government response of hand-wringing. Goldup’s removal must be followed by the removal from OFSTED of its responsibility for children in care and the creation of an independent care watchdog led by service users, those with care experience and elected representatives of care staff.
Phil Frampton
Subscribe to this comment's feed
