Christian foster girl’s family has background in the Islamic faith
THE mother of the five-year-old “Christian” girl who complained her daughter had been placed with Muslim foster carers was herself born into the Islamic faith.
Court documents released yesterday show the girl’s maternal grandparents “are of a Muslim background but are non-practising”.
Her mother had protested that her daughter is Christian and should never have been placed with devout Muslim foster parents.
The dispute has caused a furore amid allegations the child’s foster carers had taken a necklace from her that contained a cross and refused to allow her to eat her favourite meal – spaghetti carbonara – because it contained pork.
Tower Hamlets council, which had taken the child into care after concerns for her safety were raised by police, said it did not recognise the claims.
The court papers show the girl was placed with foster carers who were “not culturally matched” because of the urgent need to find a safe home for her.
Last night, Sir Martin Narey, the Government’s official adviser on fostering, intervened to insist it would be wrong to ban carers from looking after children just because they were a different religion or ethnicity.
Sir Martin told The Daily Telegraph he will publish a fostering report at the end of the year which will make ethnicity and religion of carers a “secondary” issue. Sir Martin said: “Skin colour and religion do not matter in 2017.”
The eight-page written order published yesterday shows the child was taken into the care of social services on March 10 after police intervention. It is understood the mother suffers from alcoholism and a possible cocaine addiction and had been arrested for prostitution. Judge Khatun Sapnara ruled the court order made on Tuesday be published to clear up confusion over the complex case.
She will now consider whether to allow the grandmother to take the child abroad to live. The grandmother wants to return to her country of origin, according to the court documents. There had been complaints that the child had been placed with a foster family that
‘Documents including the assessment of the maternal grandparents state that they are non-practising’
did not speak English – a claim vehemently denied by the council. The court order released yesterday suggested the girl’s foreign-born grandmother needed a court translator.
The order shows that Tower Hamlets applied for the child to be placed with her grandparents – after six months with foster parents – and that the judge agreed. The order states: “Documents including the assessment of the maternal grandparents state that they are of a Muslim background but are non-practising. The child’s mother says they are of Christian heritage.”
Tower Hamlets council said yesterday it welcomed the decision by the family court to publish the order and added that “it supports our position that we always had the child’s best interests at heart”.