Potential conflicts of Interest in child safeguarding (FOI)

Request

Families with children need stability and a stable home life where possible.

In my opinion Non Qualified families in Jersey have been prevented for decades from having a basic need of a stable family home. In my opinion families are being forced into homelessness or constant moving mode as a direct result of the discrimination against families in Jersey. They have in my opinion been poorly let down by politicians and key agencies responsible for safeguarding children and MASH.

I have just read the UK document "Equality Matters for children" on www.crae.org.uk website.

"Part 6 Public sector equality duty and children's services" of the "Matters for children" report states that the public sector equality duty (PSED) applies to local authorities and children's services and that they must "in exercising public functions have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination."

Jersey is still part of the British Isles, a British Crown dependency and not meant to be a 3rd world country. I would expect it should be following UK / English statutory laws and immediately following suit in implementing them in Jersey. The Equality Act 2010 in the UK is the Act which legally protects people from the very discrimination I believe is in Jersey and making people homeless. The US Federal fair Housing Act 1968 specifically prevents discrimination against families.

Please can someone explain why eight years later in 2018, Jersey is still not implementing this Act and protecting the children living in Jersey and preventing this discrimination? The landlords who are doing this should not be being rewarded for this disgraceful behaviour but being penalised in my opinion. Jersey appears to be now 50 years behind the US.

I can think of only one reason why this law has not been implemented for all these years.

Please answer the following for each of the last eight years and the present time where this Act has not been brought in:

A

How many people and percentage of staff involved in the key agencies responsible for safeguarding children are landlords?

B

How many people and percentage of staff involved in the key agencies responsible for safeguarding children are landlords or have immediate family or close family who are landlords?

C

How many people and percentage of staff involved in the Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH) are landlords?

Response

A  to C

The Health and Social Services Department do not hold any information in relation to whether staff of either key agencies or MASH are landlords, or have close or immediate members of their family, who are landlords. Therefore, Article 3 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 has been applied.

Article applied

Article 3 Meaning of “information held by a public authority”

For the purposes of this Law, information is held by a public authority if –

(a) it is held by the authority, otherwise than on behalf of another person; or

(b) it is held by another person on behalf of the authority.