Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi,
I am an autistic adult who is a parent. Since having my daughter I went through a terrible time with social services who set me up to fail and removed my daughter from me because I have a diagnosis of autism. It took me two years to fight for my daughter back and through this time social services and Cafcass used the so called deficits of my autism to justify the removal and to stop the return of my daughter. Thankfully the judge saw through this and returned my daughter concluding in her judgment that I parent my daughter to a high standard.
I want to know how many my adults will autism who are parents have been through a similar situation. How many parents with ASD and other disabilities and or impairments are being targeted by social services and having their children removed? If you have experienced this please tell your story because the current system is outrageously discriminative against parents who have a disability and or impairment and I would like to raise awareness of the current failures within the current child protection system which is targeting parents with disabilities and or impairments so that change can happen.
The blood of parents who took their own lives as a result of losing contact with their children is in the hands of social services UK.
This evil system need to be reformed.
Social Services are local services - there are national laws and policies, put each local authority decides on how its services are structured and managed. There is a major review of Children's Services in progress at the moment (December 2021). The DoH and BASW has published "Capabilities Statement for Social Work with Autistic Adults". BASW has also set up a group for neurodivergent social workers (i.e. social workers who are themselves neurodivergent) which is aiming to educate our neurotypical peers. There is, hopefully, light at the end of the tunnel.