‘We may never know scale of council foster care abuse’

THE true scale of alleged child abuse in local authority foster care may never be revealed due to historic issues with record keeping, the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry heard yesterday.

Opening submissions were heard from 14 local authorities, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS), children’s charity Barnardo’s and Police Scotland.

Councils admitted that records relating to children in their care were not always kept fully up to date prior to local government reorganisation in 1996.

City of Edinburgh Council said it was difficult to say how many children had been looked after in their region because of the way information had previously been recorded.

Local authorities apologised to survivors and pledged to learn from their mistakes.

But the councils represented also acknowledged that some survivors may feel so traumatised that they do not wish to share their experiences. The COPFS told inquiry chairman Lady Smith that there were very few recorded cases of abuse in foster care because there was no ‘specific code’ within the case management system used to record such crimes.

But the inquiry also heard that the Crown has taken steps to ensure this does not happen again by introducing a code specifically for reports from survivors.

Family law expert Professor Kenneth Norrie, from the University of Strathclyde, gave an overview of the law on foster care placements from the early 1930s to the present day. He said that while there have been regulations concerning children who were ‘boarded out’ since the days of the Victorian Poor Laws, these were not always followed.

Professor Norrie said: ‘You would think Scotland was at the forefront of doing really well.

‘But if you asked “are those regulations being followed”, you would find that very difficult to answer.’

Professor Norrie said he also found big gaps in updating legislation relating to children in foster care during the second half of the 20th century.

Witness testimonies from survivors of abuse will be heard later this month. It is expected that the foster care case study part of the inquiry will last until the autumn.