Friday 5 November 2010

It's madness gone politically correct!

I received this alert through my organisation's email system yesterday:

"Nursery workers ... are taking their mobile phones into Xxxxxx nursery .... This is currently illegal due to safeguarding [sic], and a recent case where a nursery worker was sent to jail for taking photos on their phone of the children."

(In the case mentioned a nursery worker was prosecuted for taking and distributing indecent images of some of the children in her care.)

By this logic, and leaving aside whether extreme cases make for good policy, which I touched on in my post of 6th August (On Contact Point and Abuse), no mobile phones containing cameras should be allowed in any public facility where any young people are present. Not only do we have a duty of care to them all and not just the very young ones, but most paedophiles don't suddenly see the error of their ways just because children reach the age of 5.

Nor should we allow chairs in such places, just in case a member of staff decides to bludgeon children about the head with one. Nor cuddly toys, which could easily be used to smother and suffocate any survivors.

Nor, indeed, should staff be allowed on the premises if they are considered potentially this dangerous even after lengthy and rigorous pre-employment checks.

My gentle enquiry as to the precise degree of lunacy being applied to the matter met with the standard response that we are only following the rules. This plea was insufficient at the Nuremburg tribunals but it looks like we have either moved on, or forgotten. Or just don't care.

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