Namedpersons

With regard to the Named Persons Scheme, Gill Turner (Letters, 8 December) appears to be saying that she and those she agrees with are the sole arbiters of whether this piece of legislation is legal, fair or even workable in practice.

Apparently those of us who have serious concerns about this scheme lack knowledge, are fundamental Christians, people who work the media or have absolutely zero knowledge of child protection systems.

As someone who has over the years had coalface involvement in the Scottish Children’s Hearings system and local authority social work complaints committees, I can honestly say I don’t fit into any of these.

Although I can accept that the Named Persons Scheme was designed to further protect children and improve the joint working and information sharing processes of the various agencies involved in child protection, it is my view that this could have and should have been done utilising the already existing legislation and protocols within the Scottish child protection system.

The Named Persons Scheme has turned into an absolute “bouroch”, ending up in court (and could yet again), not being supported by the Scottish Parliament committee responsible to advise the government and with implementation delayed for about a year!

Despite the Deputy First Minister and his supporters continued push for it, I sense that NOP is being kicked into the long grass and may never (I hope) re-emerge; albeit some positive aspects should be assimilated into existing processes.

As for Gill Turner’s list of supporters for the scheme, it is noted that parents are not listed, and it is they who have resorted to whatever medium is legally available to them to fight against this scheme’s implementation.

BOB BERTRAM Pathhead, Midlothian