BAIRNS, NOT BOMBS, BOMBAST OR BAMPOTTERY

‘Life is what happens when you’re busy making plans.’ As an Edinburgh law student in the early 80s, I did company, contract and tax law thinking that was the career I’d pursue. Of course instead I came home to Clackmannanshire, acted for women seeking safety and support with Clackmannanshire Women’s Aid and for men looking to get custody of their children following difficult separations. A few years of a mixed practice meant I learned a bit about criminal law but eventually concentrated on family and child law. Today I was so glad of this. Scotland has been groundbreaking in legal terms – the Kilbrandon Report and Children’s Hearings were world leading pioneering but needed overhauled. The result is tremendously important and requires wide publicity.

If you’ve an interest in Scotland’s children, if you care about how we look after our children when families struggle, if you want to understand how we can make our systems and processes better, if you can see how poverty has lifelong consequences, and if your view is that we must do all we can to maximise the potential of every Scot, you’ll not only share this report – you will require our leaders, of every political party, to ensure full funding and complete implementation of every recommendation here.

If processes don’t change dramatically soon, unnecessary unwelcome misery will continue. This is an example of such and I hope with all my heart that headlines of this nature can now be consigned to the dustbin. Let’s do better Scotland. Our bairns, their futures and our country demand it.

https://www.alloaadvertiser.com/news/13529470.vulnerable-children-are-being-put-at-risk/

Children are our future. Treat them well. Bairns, not bombs.