A CYFS Poem
This ditty was posted on CYFS Watch, which reports it has now had more than 400 submissions. Someone should make a You Tube of it being sung!
I am a social worker,
I’m really very nice.
I help you loving mothers,
And give you good advice!Your partner has departed
Your income is too low.
I’m really very sorry,
All your kids will have to go !Your partner is abusive?
He beats you black and blue?
We’ll soon be there to help you,
And take your children too !You have a learning problem,
You’re really not too clever
We’ll get your kids adopted
When can you see them?? NEVER!!Your son is hyperactive?
You need a brief respite;
We’ll soon take ALL your children
Give up the hopeless fight!Your child was taken into care,
So many years ago
If now you have a baby
That too will have to go!Foster parents love your kids
To get some more they seek,
For each one brings a tidy sum
$400 per week !!Children’s homes are run by us ,
Where paedophiles abound
Each time we cover up abuse
“The gutter press” come round“They” said adoptions worked the best
We soon proved that they would
Fathers shout and mothers cry
Their kids are gone for good!What happens in our special courts?
Our experts they will say
“You’re a danger to your children,
So we’ll take them all away!”Your children may be healthy,
Happy and well fed
But one day you might hurt them
That’s what our experts saidThe judges know that we are right,
With us they will agree
They dare not risk another course
You have no chance you see !Our special courts are secret,
So don’t you breathe a word
Of what goes on inside those walls
No matter how absurd !We’ll get your kids adopted,
And don’t you dare complain!
Or you’ll end up in prison
And I won’t say that again!We have adoption targets,
They must be met you see,
Failure means a reprimand,
So spare a thought for me!
Hat Tip: Hitting Metal
February 1st, 2007 at 9:26 am
Vaguely amusing, but so wrong in so many ways. Not sure what the fascination with adoptions is, but last time I was at CYF they had very very few adoptions in a year (in fact, the running joke was how little work the adoptions staff did in comparison to the rest of the people in CYF).
The crying shame that I saw every day was how overworked the CYF staff were. Most of them were young social workers, straight from uni, and very underpaid. After a few years in the job they would generally burn out, and move to one of the private sector service providers, who generally got paid more, and had to deal with the less complex cases (all the really screwed up kids and families end up at CYF, most of the slightly screwed up ones end up with one of the community groups that CYF fund).
The job these folks do is quite simply heart breaking. The nature of the work is such that they make judgment calls every day – I am sure some of those judgments are wrong. But for every wrong judgment, there are 10 kids they are seeing who are abused in their home environment – it is absolutely disgraceful what some people think it is OK to do to their kids.
Until I spent some time looking at some of the cases that were going through the systems I had no idea that such evil could exist in our society – it had never even crossed my mind that people would do things like some of what goes on. And the volume of it is simply mind boggling.
February 1st, 2007 at 10:43 am
Paul L, agree with you but as far as I know “judgement calls” are made at a senior practice level and are required to follow the statutes.
Chris M.
February 1st, 2007 at 11:37 am
i have had two major encounters with the family court system…(custody hearings..)
i prevailed in each one….and have no real complaints about how i was treated by that system…
but..i consider myself reasonably articulate/able to present arguments etc..
plus i have a track record of caring for the boy since his birth…
so..i was in a strong position..
but given all that..i can see how men can be marginalised/used by ex-partners/lied about..
and how social workers could aid them in that…and exceed their powers in others..
and come away from the system feeling totally bitter/screwed over….
and a family in shards…
i totally support the idea (should it come to this) of children having their own legal counsel..this should be the norm..
and the only nasty/weird experience was my encounter with the person from cyfs…
at one stage it was deemed they should make a report on the life the boy and i have together…
(a report subsequently deemed ‘un-necessary’..and never presented..)
so..’the visit..’
this person came to our house clad like zena having a ‘leather-moment’..
skirt..knee-length boots..the whole nine-yards
(i hadn’t seen so much animal skin on one person since i’d done a couple of days as an extra in a swords ‘n sandals flick..)
and she came dressed like this despite a cursory reading of her ‘file’ on us telling her we are vegans..and so she was coming in to the home of vegans..
(call me over-sensitive..i thought it displayed an arrogance/power..an arrogance which her body-language/manner only accentuated…)
she even had leather ‘gloves’ with fingers exposed..that enclosed her wrists..and went up her forearm…(whoar..!..)
so..after starting this way..she then just exuded ‘attitude’..
and i watched in a faintly bemused (polite) manner..as she tried to find ‘something’ she could use ‘against’ me..
y’know..the boy is fine..school reports are really good..he gives every sign of being happy and healthy..(fingers/toes crossed..)
so..basically..there was nothing..!
yet..towards the end..she made a point of saying to me..”you moved around a bit..didn’t you..?..”
i said..um..a couple of years ago..yes..the perils/uncertainties of life on a dpb..
she said to me..”you had better not move again..!..if you do..i will get the court to review your custody arrangments..”
my politeness facade dropped at this point..
and i said to her..”is that it..?”..(with an appropriately curled-upper-lip/fixed glare..and standing-up at the same time…)
i then escorted her to the door..
and said absolutely nothing as she leather-squeaked her way down the stairs..
as i said..no report ensued….but i had a clear glimpse of the possibilities of the abuses of (some) of those officials..
and can understand the anger/hurt of many who have been done-over by that system…
if not for the strengths of the rest of my ‘case’..etc etc..
that cyfs worker was really ‘gagging’ to take my boy away from me..eh..?
and for no feckin’ reason…
and i must confess.
i thought she was a right ‘evil bitch’…
and i’ll stand by that carefully-thought-out/evaluated opinion..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
February 1st, 2007 at 12:01 pm
> this person came to our house clad like zena having a ‘leather-moment’..
So you told her that she had the wrong address and the local S&M club was next door?
February 1st, 2007 at 12:26 pm
Phil, any family court proceedings require the appointment of counsel for child.
Regarding your zena meeting,I doubt the women wanted all the work that removal of a child and the subsequent shit fight over placement generates.
And to be honest, do you really think that every sole custody parent home that zena visits is all joy joy happy happy.
Chris M.
February 1st, 2007 at 12:33 pm
DPF – I’m interested by the ethical issues raised by your republishing material from a site you don’t approve of and won’t link to.
February 1st, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Lyndon – basically I think good content stands on its own regardless of its source.
It does depend on level of disapproval of source though. There was some gorgeous photos of ausie girls in flag bikinis that I wanted to post here. But they came from an Aussie neo-nazi blog. In the end I decided not to use them, as it is impolite not to credit the source, and I didn’t wnat them getting any credit.
My level of diapproval regarding cysfwatch has been decreasing as more and more stories come out. In fact it was Phil U’s story on this blog which has really convinced me we need a commission of inquiry into the culture of CYFS (as we had with Police culture). I don’t like how CYFSWatch asked for personal details, and hope they will still change that. But I am forming the opinion that despite diapproval of the means, the end may prove to have considerable merit.
Also I should point out that I don’t regard my non linking as having had any practical effect in stopping people finding the blog if they wan to. It was just may way of saying I disapprove of the nasty personal comments and the soliciting of private details. The poem doesn’t involve either of those.
February 1st, 2007 at 2:13 pm
ta
February 1st, 2007 at 7:14 pm
I make no apology for supporting the cyfswatch site.I like the poem . Anybody can see my comments on the website without going into detail on this blog.I don’t try and hide my name.
I urge you all to just put the shoe on the other foot for a second. Just imagine you are a victim of false allegation’s of sexual abuse orchestrated by cyfs, that later leads onto false domestic abuse allegations, which cement in place permanent protection orders. Life does mean life buddy …at the mercy of the system ! You must be fully prepared for your badly damaged name to appear on the front and court pages of various newspapers. Just an assumption of guilt is enough to make you want to seek the suicide is painless option. Not to mention the beatings you’re dealt with good old rough justice ……………eh mate ..yeah right …..thank you!!!!
Cyfs, cops and family court staff whinge when we name and shame them on the net, or when we put a brochure in their letterbox. Yes we put their address details on the Net…. So what…. Fair’s fair…. They don’t mind telling the public, politicians and judges you are a kiddy f..ker or violent deadbeat dad. Does anybody know what it is like to have a police prosecutor publicly stating in a court of law that you are a danger to all children of New Zealand?
It’s so embarrassing when you are refused entry to Australia because you don’t pass the character test!!! Dam corrupt cyfs, cops and judiciary… My four children don’t understand .It’s about time for the truth.
“All the truth passes through three stages:
First, it is ridiculed.
Second, it is violently opposed.
Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.”
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)
February 1st, 2007 at 7:51 pm
Isn’t it just wonderful when certifiable whackos try to justify their position with grave sounding, antique quotations?
February 1st, 2007 at 8:53 pm
Not trying in any way to diminish the experiences some people have had (and certainly my recollection of CYF was a rather feminist dominated sort of place – which isn’t a big surprise when a huge percentage of their workforce is female…).
The thing that concerns me is that most people have no idea what CYF staff actually spend their days doing. There is this general concept that they wander around poking their noses into family business, and generally making trouble.
From what I saw, CYF really didn’t get involved anywhere unless there was a complaint – simply speaking they don’t have enough time and staff to do proactive type work, and they also don’t get around to most of the low priority work because of the volume of high priority work.
I’ve been through all the ambulance at the bottom of cliff v’s fence at the top arguments, but it is a really hard call to make to not go visit the kid with the allegation today of serious abuse that is life threatening, in order to visit the kid with minor issues, but for whom an intervention today might mean they never get seriously abused.
Anyway, we have this organisation that receives allegations. I think we would all rightly be disgusted if they received these serious allegations (here I am talking about serious physical abuse or sexual abuse of a child) and then didn’t go and at least check if they are true.
They then send out a junior social worker to find out what is going on, and work out whether more intervention is needed. Yes, they get supervision from a senior social worker, but there aren’t that many of those. And the junior social workers do have to make judgment calls – everything they include or don’t include in a report is a judgment call. If they miss something and a kid gets hurt, that is CYF’s fault for not intervening. If they intervene and somebody thought they shouldn’t have, that is their fault for being over-zealous. It is pretty much lose-lose, because whatever choice you make something can go wrong.
If you move the kid to a foster home, your choices are limited. Who would want a potentially abusive kid in their home if they have kids of their own? If you take in a kid who has behavioural problems (say, they like lighting fires) your insurance is void – you could lose your house. In this limited pool, CYF have to choose whether that person is fit to be a foster carer, again with limited time to complete an assessment. Also don’t forget the clear legislation requiring CYF to first consider a placement with extended family, notwithstanding that in many cases they aren’t much better than the nuclear family – but of course that is hard to prove.
The problems these folk deal with every day would cause me to crack. I recall a case I saw go through where a call had come in about a boy at school, suspected being sexually abused by his father – to the point that he couldn’t sit down because it hurt so much. This was a Friday, the case record was clear that the teacher was worried the boy would be dead come Monday. Somebody has to go out and deal with that – maybe the kid just fell and hurt himself and the teacher is over-zealous, maybe this poor kid is getting sodomised by his father every night. Who wants to be making that decision every day?
Whilst we are looking at the cultural issues, and the institutional bias that may exist, don’t lose sight of the many staff in the organisation who are doing a crappy job every day, and getting no thanks for it.
February 1st, 2007 at 9:14 pm
“but..i consider myself reasonably articulate/able to present arguments etc..”
Quote of the year (already)!
February 1st, 2007 at 9:39 pm
PauL. Your insights are both enlighting and illuminating. Can you provide some views and insight on the other side of the coin? ie. the extraordinary number of children who are sexually abused in foster homes? This abuse can go on for years and only come to light when the fostered child reaches teenage or adult years, and when they can finally summon the inner-strength to speak out. By then, their lives are ruined. The predominance of sexually abused children seems be particularly high in foster families residing in the Northland region. Would you care to comment?
February 1st, 2007 at 10:06 pm
Don’t worry Paul there are many cases down her in the South Island . It is gut wrenching when you hear of young girl raped by cyfs approved care givers .
Who is accountable ??
February 1st, 2007 at 10:14 pm
Lyndon – basically I think good content stands on its own regardless of its source.
It does depend on level of disapproval of source though. There was some gorgeous photos of ausie girls in flag bikinis that I wanted to post here. But they came from an Aussie neo-nazi blog. In the end I decided not to use them, as it is impolite not to credit the source, and I didn’t wnat them getting any credit.
My level of diapproval regarding cysfwatch has been decreasing as more and more stories come out. In fact it was Phil U’s story on this blog which has really convinced me we need a commission of inquiry into the culture of CYFS (as we had with Police culture). I don’t like how CYFSWatch asked for personal details, and hope they will still change that. But I am forming the opinion that despite diapproval of the means, the end may prove to have considerable merit.
Also I should point out that I don’t regard my non linking as having had any practical effect in stopping people finding the blog if they wan to. It was just may way of saying I disapprove of the nasty personal comments and the soliciting of private details. The poem doesn’t involve either of those.
Posted by David Farrar | February 1, 2007 1:10 PM
Posted on February 1, 2007 13:10
lyndon:
ta
David. Im dissapointed in you. You sound just like a crappy politician who has lost the ability to have a mind of his/or, her own. Where have your ‘gut instincts’ gone? Your faith in people??? Id wager any bet you like, that every commentator on the CYF’s Watch site has a legitimate gripe. Where there’s smoke there’s fire. I’d wager another bet that every poster ‘agin’ this site, has never been in a position against the State where perjury can often runamuck and go unchallenged.
February 1st, 2007 at 10:33 pm
Abuse in care is a real problem. It is hard to deal with. I see the problem broadly like this:
1. The financial remuneration is poor – $400 a week sounds a lot (and I am not sure that number that I saw somewhere is even true – it may be lower), but these kids walk in the door with nothing, they need feeding and clothing, and many have behavioural issues that mean they are expensive
2. Having a kid in foster care with you is incredibly hard. They have issues almost by definition, they are going to hate you, they are going to make your life very complex, but you are responsible for them, issues and all
3. Abused kids often abuse smaller kids – you are asking for trouble having foster kids in if your kids are younger or even close to the same age
4. They impact your life – like the aforementioned fire starters impacting your insurance
So, why would you want to be a carer? Basically my theory is you do it because you get something out of it. To me that means people who see it as a calling (some just genuinely good people, some who feel a religious calling, which can be a disaster with some of these kids – spare the rod etc doesn’t always go down too well), or those who get something else out of it – like maybe they are kiddy fiddlers and that is how they get access.
I am by no means condemning all foster carers, hell most of them do a great job also in trying circumstances. But I reckon it is an area that someone with bad intentions towards children might be attracted to.
I think there are potentially also issues with children/teens who are sexually aware beyond their years, and perhaps who have behaviours that are misconstrued (or even correctly construed, but still inappropriate given age and relative power balance etc). So perhaps there are situations that turn up that make it easier for someone to justify doing things of that nature.
And finally, that old chestnut, that people are less likely to abuse their biological children, any transient and non-genetic relationship seems to have a higher incidence of abuse – I seem to remember some stats about abuse by stepfathers v’s that by biological fathers, and I would presume that would have some applicability in this situation.
It isn’t good, but sometimes the alternatives aren’t real good either. In an ideal world more and better people would want to be carers – it would reduce the demands on those who are really good at it and take on the difficult children (reducing their burnout rate), and give the agency more options on where to place the kids when their family genuinely are unsuitable.
As always, it probably in the numbers too – is there statistical evidence that abuse in foster care is a higher percentage than abuse in home environments? If you take a kid from an environment where you are 70% sure bad things are happening, and move them somewhere where there is an average (say, 1%) chance of bad things happening, is that better? It is clearly bad for the 30% (who were really fine in their home) * the 1% (who then get abused in care), but the 70% * 99% are better off. Harsh to reduce it to statistics, but that is the reality.
February 2nd, 2007 at 7:34 am
At least the English cyfs network are accountable when they get it wrong :
http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/news/display.var.1160798.0.0.php
February 2nd, 2007 at 10:04 am
> The thing that concerns me is that most people have no idea what CYF staff actually spend their days doing.
How long would it take for CYFS to explain what staff do? If CYFS cannot communicate with the public over a simple matter such as this, is it any wonder they have far more serious problems regarding their credibility with the public?
February 2nd, 2007 at 10:46 am
Ross, you are presuming that the average person cares what they do. Nobody is interested until something blows up, then they take their misconceptions and form a judgment.
If CYF were out telling people 6 months ago what they did every day, who would have been interested?
February 2nd, 2007 at 10:10 pm
PaulL – thats cold comfort to the likes of Ron Burrows eh ? That was a bit longer than 6 months ago and nothing has changed within the department .
February 3rd, 2007 at 11:53 am
> Nobody is interested until something blows up, then they take their misconceptions and form a judgment.
Your misconceptions might by my truth, and vice-versa.
There’s something like 100 social workers mentioned on the CYFSwatch blog. I know that if I thought I had been wrongly maligned, I would want to put my side of the story. The social workers are either oblivious to the existence of the blog – hard to believe – or they have not been unfairly maligned.
February 3rd, 2007 at 12:00 pm
CYFS’ practices appal British social workers
February 03, 2007
By Simon Collins
Two British social workers have accused New Zealand’s child protection agency of “gross professional incompetence”, including unnecessarily ripping children from their mother’s arms without any idea where to place them.
The men, recruited by Child, Youth and Family Services last year, have resigned in protest at the “unethical practices”.
One, Manurewa social worker Jonny Ward, 35, sent his criticisms to CYFS minister Ruth Dyson and has been invited to brief her officials. He plans to return to Britain. The other man, 27, is unwilling to be named as he works for another agency and does not want to risk his registration.
They said standards fell far short of what they were used to. Mr Ward said he took part in removing children from a family last week with another social worker, eight police and two dog handlers.
The other social worker tried to stop the mother cuddling her son when she tried to comfort him.
The children were eventually placed with their grandmother.
“We could have spoken to the grandmother beforehand and told the children, ‘It’s okay, you know your grandmother’. Instead we had them in the back of the car, all three of them crying because they didn’t know where I was taking them.”
In Britain, he said, social workers tried to get the parents’ agreement to a removal, or at least pack the children’s belongings and make sure any health needs were known.
The Ministry of Social Development official in charge of CYFS, Ray Smith, said local practice placed more emphasis than Britain on keeping children within the extended family, which could mean searching for family members if children had to be removed in an emergency.
February 28th, 2007 at 12:44 pm
A cyfs child placed with a family member sexually assulted our 5 yr old daughter and his social worker had him enrolled in a sexual offenders course weeks before, we were not told. and had the boy to stay and he took advantage of her the next day on the clothes line. his age the police are limited to wat they can do and cyfs well… wat are they gunna do put her into therepy and the boy into programme for sex offenders he has other victims in his home a younger sister or two! he still remains in his home! thank you cyfs for putting our family threw hell and allowing him to attack again and he is still at Riccarton High here in Christchurch
April 13th, 2007 at 3:47 am
i have 4 kids and 1 on the way in july 30th 07.i am on chil pertesion with socal workers and one of my son is behaveing badley is it true that socal workers can take all the other kids away from a mum if mother as done nothing wrong