Privacy and Safeguarding Evaluation Of

PRIVACY AND SAFEGUARDING EVALUATION OF PRACTICE GUIDANCE (2018) CHILDREN JUDGMENTS JULIA BROPHY & MARISOL SMITH WITH JAGBIR JHUTTI-JOHAL PRIVACY AND SAFEGUARDING AN EVALUATION OF PRACTICE GUIDANCE (2018): ANONYMISATION, AND THE TREATMENT OF DESCRIPTIONS OF SEXUAL ABUSE OF CHILDREN IN JUDGMENTS JULIA BROPHY & MARISOL SMITH WITH JAGBIR JHUTTI-JOHAL, OBE MAY 2021 Acknowledgements First and foremost, thanks go to the young people who participated in this evaluation - at a time of unprecedented pressure in their lives resulting from the pandemic and following a long delay in starting the project. Their commitment, and then patience while we developed a new methodology, was astonishing; their hard work, well-informed, reflective thinking in the evaluation exercise was outstanding. Without their continued commitment to this field on behalf of children – and over several years, this work would not have been possible. The Advisory Group and the Nuffield Foundation also extend thanks to young people for their work. Advisory Group: HH John Altman, 1 King’s Bench Walk, (Retired DFJ, Central Family Court) Professor Karen Broadhurst, Director, C&F Justice, IRC, Sociology, Lancaster University Dr Jaime Craig, Consultant Clinical Psychologist; BPS; FJC Jane Crowley QC, 30 Park Place, Cardiff Maud Davis, Co-Chair Interdisciplinary Alliance for Children, FJC, Bindmans George Eddon, Senior Solicitor, City of York Council Eleanor Harrison, Senior Advocate NYAS (to Jan 2020) Professor Sally Holland, Children’s Commissioner, Wales Calum Lucas, NYAS HHJ Sarah Lynch, Leeds Combined Court Centre Hannah Markham QC, Co-Chair FLBA, 36 Group, 4 Field Court Mary Mullin, Lecturer in Law, Liverpool John Moores University Charlie Owen, Senior Research Officer, TCRU, UCL Katy Rensten, Co-Chair Children’s Committee FLBA; Coram Chambers (to February 2021) HHJ Miranda Robertshaw, DFJ, Devon, Nominated Judge of the Court of Protection Rachel Rogers, Head of Policy, Resolution HHJ Khatun Sapnara, CJ and Deputy HC Judge, East London Family Court Mark Senior, Barrister, St John’s Buildings, Liverpool Dr John Simmonds OBE, Director of Policy, Research and Development, CoramBAAF Dr Fiona Straw, Consultant Paediatrician; FJC Dorothy Simon, Legal Services Manager, Children and Education, Essex County Council Asst Dir. (Legal), Southend-on-Sea Borough Council; TLS - Children Law Subcommittee Rachel Thomas, Head of Policy and Public Affairs, OCC - Wales HHJ Karen Venables, CJ, Milton Keynes Family and County Court Christian James-Watkins, NYAS Thanks are also due to our academic peer reviewers, and to: CoramBAAF, and especially to Dr John Simmonds OBE, Director of Policy, Research and Development, Dr Judith Trowell, Chair - Ethics Committee, and Danielle Sawyer. National Youth Advocacy Service - in the early period of the work, Eleanor Harrison and Mary Mullin; over the latter period, Ben Twomey and Bethany Wright. The Nuffield Foundation, and to Ash Patel, Programme Head – Justice, for support during the early part of the pandemic and changes to the methodology, and for helpful feedback. The authors also extend thanks to Jay Jhutti-Johal for her work on the project from February 2020 to August 2020. Thanks are also due to Julia Higgins for tireless endeavours with young people throughout fieldwork, and for administrative support on the project. The project was hosted by CoramBAAF CoramBAAF is the leading professional membership organisation in the UK for local authorities and the voluntary and independent sector involved in family placement such as adoption, fostering or kinship care. It is dedicated to improving the outcomes of children and young people in care and provides a range of services that develop, promote and enable best policy and practice in family placement including: publications, learning events and consultancy, advice and information, networking and campaigning. CoramBAAF is part of the Coram group of charities. For more information, visit corambaaf.org.uk The project was funded by the Nuffield Foundation The Nuffield Foundation is an endowed charitable trust that aims to improve social well-being in the widest sense. It funds research and innovation in education and social policy, and also works to build capacity in education, science and social science research. The Nuffield Foundation has funded this project, but the views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Foundation. For more information, visit www.nuffieldfoundation.org DISCLAIMER The views expressed herein are those of the authors and not necessarily shared by the funder or CoramBAAF. Copyright 2021 Brophy J and Smith M; extracts from this document may be reproduced for non-commercial purposes on condition that the authors and CoramBAAF as publisher are fully acknowledged. Publication date: May 2021 CONTENTS Acknowledgements Executive Summary i-xi SECTION ONE 1 INTRODUCTION: EVALUATION OF PRACTICE GUIDANCE (2018) 1 Background 1 Aims and Objectives 4 Methods and Sample 4 Format of Report 7 SECTION TWO 9 GEOGRAPHICAL INDICATORS AND JIGSAW IDENTIFICATION 9 Introduction 9 Location – the home of children and families 9 Schools and leisure activities 10 School incidents/problems 11 Age of child(n)/young people 12 Information about extended family members 13 Information about religion/cultural contexts 14 Key findings 16 SECTION THREE 18 FAILURES OF PARENTING, CHILD ILL-TREATMENT AND THE TREATMENT OF DESCRIPTIONS OF SEXUAL ABUSE OF CHILDREN IN JUDGMENTS 18 Introduction 18 Concerns/allegations contributing to failures of parenting 18 Allegations of parenting failures: the views of young people 19 Key findings 24 Allegations of child ill-treatment 25 Descriptions of child ill-treatment: the views of young people 25 Key findings 34 Treatment of descriptions of the sexual abuse of children/young people: In-depth analysis 35 Key findings 40 SECTION FOUR 42 NAMING AGENCIES AND PROFESSIONALS, ADDITIONAL POTENTIALLY DISCLOSIVE INFORMATION, RECOGNITION OF FAMILIES 42 Introduction 42 Naming agencies and professionals 42 Additional, potentially disclosive information 47 Potential for recognition of children and families 49 Key findings 50 SECTION FIVE 52 INFORMATION THAT YOUNG PEOPLE LIKED, THOUGHT SHOULD OR SHOULD NOT BE PUBLISHED, AND THE NEEDS OF LAY READERS 52 Introduction 52 Likes and dislikes, and the needs of lay readers 52 Key findings 61 SECTION SIX 63 MEDIA ACCESS AND REPORTING OF CHILDREN CASES, AND COVERAGE OF JUDGMENTS ON MEDIA AND SOCIAL NETWORKING PLATFORMS 63 Introduction 63 Media access and reporting: the views of young people 63 Media outlets and social networking platforms 66 Judgments and jigsaw identification: five examples 68 Crime reporting: new players exposing paedophiles, platforms used for trading materials 74 Key findings 76 Media and social networking platforms 76 SECTION SEVEN 79 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 79 Guidance: Annex 1 CL1: jigsaw identification 79 Guidance: Annex 2 CL2 - descriptions of sexual abuse 82 Community and wider risks to children subject to sexual abuse 84 Child sexual abuse and jigsaw identification 85 Health costs to children subject to sexual abuse 85 Coverage of BAILII judgments in mainstream and social media 86 Primary and secondary purpose of judgments 88 Policy implications 89 Recommendations 95 APPENDIX 1 98 EXTRACT - PRACTICE GUIDANCE (2018) - CHECKLISTS 1 AND 2 98 APPENDIX II 115 EXTRACT – EXECUTIVE SUMMARY OF 2015 REPORT 115 APPENDIX III 118 DRAFT PRACTICE GUIDANCE (2016) 118 APPENDIX IV 126 METHODOLOGY AND SAMPLES 126 APPENDIX V 138 INFORMATION PACK FOR PARTICIPATING YOUNG PEOPLE 138 APPENDIX VI 144 SCHEDULE 1 - YOUNG PEOPLE (YP) 144 APPENDIX VII 147 SCHEDULE 2 - RESEARCH OFFICER (RO) (2020) 147 APPENDIX VIII 152 SCHEDULE 3 – RESEARCH OFFICER (RO) 152 REFERENCES 154 ACRONYMS 157 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Recommendations This report is an evaluation of the implementation of Practice Guidance (2018) on anonymisation practices and changes to the treatment of graphic descriptions of the sexual abuse of children in children judgments posted on the British and Irish Legal Information Institute (BAILII) – a public website. The report makes the following recommendations based on summary of the evidence below. 1. Posting judgments on BAILII with unabridged graphic descriptions of sexual abuse/rape of minors should be halted: those already posted should be removed. 2. In a digital world with a perpetual footprint, an inter-department review of the crime- family interface is necessary to achieve an updated practice protocol with regard to the treatment of images (photographs), videos, and narrative of child sexual abuse in documents exchanged, and a judgment intended for the public arena. Use of a schedule of abuse (as used in images in criminal proceedings) should be explored regarding sexually explicit narrative. 3. Family justice policy has to catch up - and quickly, with the digital world and its footprint: this is the landscape within which the contemporary privacy, safeguarding and welfare needs of vulnerable children should be placed. Policy must be forwarding looking: the digital world is evolving at an unprecedented rate. Current safeguards are ineffective, and out of date. Family justice needs a vision to address the current dynamic landscape: Checklist 1 and 2 provide the policy framework. This needs to be delivered through training which should be fully ticketed. The public and young people need to know that judges are fully trained and responsive to this challenge and will exercise their discretion to protect the privacy

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