Karen Smith

Today is the day. David vs Goliath. Today we go to the High Court for our landmark judicial review against the Government. We have been shocked at the arguments being advanced by the Home Secretary in defence of its failure to implement key recommendations made by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA). These arguments include, that The Maggie Oliver Foundation does not have standing to bring this challenge on behalf of children, that the Government is under no obligation to implement child protection measures, and that the public at large cannot rely upon promises made by the Prime Minister and Ministers that are made in Parliament. The Government's legal defence raises fundamental questions about public trust, accountability and whether promises made to survivors following public inquiries mean anything at all. At the centre of the judicial review are 20 key recommendations issued by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) proposed to better protect children across the UK from sexual abuse. These include properly collecting data relating to child abusers and victims of abuse and exploitation, ending the use of pain-inducing restraint techniques on children in custody and regulation of staff in children’s homes. We are concerned that more effort and public money appears to be going into defending a challenge designed to ensure these critical improvements in child protection are made than into implementing them. The simplest example of this is this – if the Government had implemented the first recommendation of the IICSA, there would have been no need for a further three-year, £65 million public Inquiry (The Statutory Independent Inquiry into Grooming Gangs). WHO IS ALLOWED TO ASK THE QUESTION? The Secretary of State is a challenging whether The Maggie Oliver Foundation and our founder and Chair, @MaggieOliverUK , have standing to bring the case at all. This raises a deeply troubling question. If organisations representing survivors and working every day with the consequences of child sexual abuse are not entitled to ask why promised child protection measures have not been implemented, who is? The Government is trying to exclude from the debate the very people closest to the consequences of these failures. For years survivors have been told to come forward. Speak up. Tell the truth. Many have done so at enormous personal cost, but now the Government says they, and those who represent them, cannot object to failures to protect children. Their voices must be silenced. This challenge was never about politics. Governments of all stripes have let down children. It is astonishing that the Government's first argument in this judicial review is that victims can have no voice. If organisations representing survivors, and survivors themselves, cannot ask why promised child protection measures have not been implemented, who can? IF GOVERNMENT DOESN'T HAVE TO ACT, WHAT IS THE POINT? A central plank to the Government's defence is that ministers are under no legal obligation to implement recommendations made by public inquiries. If that is right, why spend hundreds of millions of pounds on public inquiries if Government is just going to ignore what they find? We genuinely struggle to understand how anyone can think that is acceptable. Millions are spent, years of hearings are had, victims pour out their hearts, findings and recommendations are made, promises are made by Government and then broke – but when someone has the temerity to ask why those promises haven't been kept, the Government's response is we never had to keep our promises. If that is right, the Government must be open about it, and explain to the public why they hold expensive public inquiries at all. IICSA took seven years, heard from more than 7,000 survivors, cost more than £200 million and made twenty recommendations intended to protect children. But the Government now says, we have no obligation to fulfil its promises to implement recommendations to protect children. CAN POLITICIANS DENY THEIR PROMISES MATTER? We are also challenging the Government's position regarding promises made by the Prime Minister and ministers following publication of IICSA's recommendations. Repeated assurances that action would be taken have been made by senior politicians across successive governments. The Government's defence includes arguments relating to parliamentary privilege. In effect the Government say that The Foundation cannot rely upon ministerial promises made in Parliament, and that such promises cannot give rise to expectations about future action. If the public cannot rely on promises made in Parliament, what can they rely on? Survivors and the public hear ministers make promises. They hear repeated assurances that lessons have been learned and change will follow. They build their expectations around those promises. Many survivors have spent years believing ministers when they said action was coming. To now be told that those promises cannot be relied upon is not just a legal argument, it is a fundamental betrayal of the trust survivors (and children across the UK) were asked to place in the process. Trust works both ways. Survivors are asked to trust public inquiries with the most painful experiences of their lives. Governments should not then be able to argue that survivors cannot rely on the promises they receive in return. WHILE GOVERNMENT ARGUES, CHILDREN ARE STILL BEING ABUSED Government figures show that approximately 2 million children have been sexually abused since IICSA published its recommendations in October 2022. That astonishing number must not be lost amidst legal arguments and the Government’s technical defences. This case is about the protection of all British children. What shocks us most is how much ingenuity and effort has gone into finding reasons not to act. Imagine if half of the same energy had been invested in implementing child protection measures. Imagine if the resources currently being spent defending this case had instead been spent protecting children. How many children might already be safer? While well paid Government lawyers argue, children are still being sexually abused. That is the reality we cannot lose sight of. This case was never about clever legal arguments. It is about whether promises made to children and survivors mean anything at all. The Maggie Oliver Foundation will not be silent on that question.