How to contact the CSA Inquiry

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA) has today published guidance on how to share your experience.

They wish to hear from:

Anyone who was sexually abused as a child in an institutional setting like a care home, a school, a hospital or a religious, voluntary or state organisation, or who first came into contact with their abuser in an institutional setting.

Anyone who was sexually abused as a child and reported their sexual abuse to a person in authority like a police officer, a social worker or a teacher where the report was either ignored or not properly acted on.

They state:

We are obliged to pass on all allegations of child abuse to the police. However, we will not provide your name or contact details to the police without your consent, except where it is necessary to protect a child at risk of continuing abuse.

The first step is to complete and submit a form online which asks for basic information.  You do not have to answer every question.  The form can be found here:

Submit information online

You do not have to provide the Inquiry with any contact details unless you choose to do so.

If you do choose to share your contact details, you will be invited to either:

• Meet and speak with an Inquiry member in private.  You don’t have to go alone and a trained professional will be available to provide support if you wish.  Your meeting will be recorded (audio) and a written summary will be produced which you can check and edit.  The information will be held securely.

or

• If you do not wish to meet an Inquiry member, you may submit a detailed written account of your experiences.

The evidence you give, in writing or in person, will contribute to the final reports that the Inquiry will publish.  Your name will not be published unless you have given your permission.

IICSA Truth Project.  Sharing your experience: what to expect

IICSA: How we work

IICSA homepage

Kings

The Friday Night Song

 

Ben Fellows Found Not Guilty

Ben Fellows has been found ‘Not Guilty’ of Perverting the Course of Justice

What a mess ! 

I don’t think this will be the end of this saga and it has now opened a very nasty can of worms. The allegations against Ken Clarke are entirely false but some foolish people will now mistakenly believe that this verdict validates these erroneous and ludicrous allegations. This verdict can only be based on the jury’s opinion that Ben Fellows did not deliberately and knowingly make false allegations against Ken Clarke and it can not possibly be seen as giving any credence to the allegations themselves.

Since Ben Fellows was charged I’ve made no comment regarding his character or this case. He like everyone is entitled to a fair trial and it is important not to publish anything that might prejudice that but now that the jury have delivered their verdict I’m free to say what I want and that is that Ben Fellows is a fantasist as anyone who has bothered to research his catalogue self-promotion activities online over many years will have seen.

Even if I were to believe that the allegation that Mr Fellows had been groped by someone, not Ken Clarke but someone (which incidentally I do not believe) I find it disturbing that a 19 year old actor who was playing a part of a younger boy to try and entrap gay men into such a pass should be taken up by those campaigning on behalf of survivors of child sexual abuse.

I’ll state this now; victims of CSA are not 19 year old actors playing a part and they do not get paid a wage to provoke a sexual assault. This was just another bandwagon that Mr Fellows has jumped on in an effort to promote himself.

I wrote at the top that I do not think that his will be the end of affair, I’ll explain, I expect that lawyers acting on behalf of Ken Clarke will be looking very closely at what people in the Alternative Media  and Social Media now publish and I’d expect that if anyone suggests that Ken Clarke is guilty of these false allegations then those lawyers will be instructed to begin civil proceedings. I had heard that Ken Clarke had been reluctant to do this prior to Ben Fellows being charged as it would have just given more oxygen to the stories floating around online but the circumstances have changed and I can’t see that Ken Clarke would have any other choice if he wanted to clear his name after this debacle.

Those that think that this verdict is in any way a victory for genuine victims of child sexual abuse are mistaken. False allegations like this, especially involving VIPs, are always found out in the end and do nothing but undermine the cases of those that were genuinely sexually abused as children by establishment figures. Furthermore, during the  6 weeks or so that the Metropolitan Police Paedophile Unit, who have limited resources, were actively investigating Ben Fellows’ false allegations they may not have been able to adequately respond and protect children that were in danger at that time.

I’d also like to point out that because of Mr Fellows’ behaviour since his contact with the police including him secretly recording discussions and publishing them online, I can not see any other outcome than that the treatment of future CSA victims coming forward will as a consequence become far less informal and less generous.

In no way can that be described as a victory for child sexual abuse victims

A man who claimed he was sexually assaulted by former Chancellor Kenneth Clarke has been cleared of perverting the course of justice.

Ben Fellows, 40, of Solihull, in the West Midlands, had said the Conservative MP abused him in 1994.

In the trial at the Old Bailey Mr Clarke – the MP for Rushcliffe – described the claims as “preposterous”.

The jury took eight hours to find Mr Fellows, of Redstone Farm Road, Olton, not guilty of the charge.

BBC News

In Light of the MI5 Revelation, David Cameron Must Apologise to Abuse Victims

Will Black is a writer and journalist with a background in anthropology and mental health care.

His latest book, Psychopathic Cultures and Toxic Empires, examines the corrupting influence powerful psychopaths have on societies. Examples of psychopathic and toxic cultures addressed include those within paedophile rings, politics, finance, gangs, security services, religious organisations and the media. As well as identifying distinctive characteristics of psychopathic cultures, Black highlights inherent weaknesses of organisations built on deceit and corruption.

Will also writes for the Huffington Post

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During a period last year when Gaza was being bombed relentlessly by Israel and children were routinely being killed, maimed and left homeless, I had an incredibly moving message from a contact in Gaza. They expressed concern for children in the UK who, they heard, had been abused by powerful people.

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Tragically, it would seem that, in addition to roast beef, cricket, colonialism and binge drinking, Britain is known now as a place of child abuse. Whether groomed on the streets of Oxford, Rotherham or Peterborough, or taken from children’s homes and abused by rings in London, we know that there has been organised and large scale abuse of children for decades, often at the hands of powerful people.

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Given that there has been an increase of allegations of ‘historical abuse’ in the internet age, when victims have a stronger voice, it seems likely that abuse rings have operated for much longer than since the early days of Savile and friends. Survivors from the more distant past seem less likely to have disclosed abuse, and were perhaps more likely to be disregarded and intimidated if they did. We also know from victim testimonies that some were fearful that reporting abuse would bring shame on their families.

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There is ample evidence that the intelligence services and their police arm, Special Branch, were previously involved with settings and cases where powerful people were accused of abusing children. When a story was given to the media about Cyril Smith abusing young boys, a newspaper editor had Special Branch turn up and prevent the story from coming out. MI5 links to Kincora children’s home in Northern Ireland have been alleged for decades, yet the current UK child abuse inquiry won’t cover it. The allegation, which Ken Livingstone voiced decades ago in Parliament, is that MI5 officers took politicians to the home and then filmed them abusing children, in order to gain leverage over them.

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An MI5 officer appears on a list of regular visitors to Elm Guest House in Richmond upon Thames, London, where it is alleged ‘VIPs’ abused children trafficked from care homes. We do not know at this stage what information was passed to the police by the MI5 man, but we do know that when the property was finally busted there were no charges relating to child abuse but only to running a disorderly house. Investigations into abuse at the guest house continue.

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It would seem sick to most people that spies employed to help keep the country safe would knowingly allow rings of powerful sex abusers to attack children. Although I find the following reprehensible, it could be that security services have justified covering up ‘VIP’ abuse rings in the name of political stability or national security. If it was thought that the public knowing about, for example, groups of MPs abusing children, could bring down a government and lead to loss of trust in the system, then security services could find justification to cover up abuse.

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However, recent revelations that MI5 urged a cover-up to halt an investigation into a member of Margaret Thatcher’s government abusing children throw this into question. A 1986 letter, found in a search of Whitehall documents following claims that abuse allegations involving MPs were covered up, emphasises a threat of political embarrassment rather than to national security. The letter was written by the then head of MI5 Anthony Duff.

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When the initial Wanless Review of Whitehall documents pertaining to child abuse took place, David Cameron shocked campaigners and survivors by characterising those concerned with high-level cover-ups as ‘conspiracy theorists’. This seemed to me to be an outrageous thing to have said at the time and, the more we learn about the scale of abuse and impact on victims, the more outrageous it seems.

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Members of Mr Cameron’s own party have acknowledged abuse taking place and cover-ups, including former whip Tim Fortescue who, in 1995, said: “Anyone with any sense, who was in trouble, would come to the whips and tell them the truth and say ‘now listen, I’m in a jam, can you help?’ It might be debt, it might be a scandal involving small boys, or any kind of scandal in which a member seemed likely to be mixed up in. They’d come and ask if we could help and if we could, we did. And we would do everything we can because we would store up brownie points… it does sound a pretty, pretty nasty reason, but it’s one of the reasons because if we could get a chap out of trouble then, he will do as we ask forever more.”

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Those covering up abuse by powerful people in the 60s, 70s or 80s may have been confident that allegations could just disappear. Choosing already marginalised kids in care homes to abuse meant victims could be disregarded. ‘Who’s going to believe this kid from a home over a politician / celebrity or bishop?’ might have been a reassuring thought for abusers. That assumption has proved misguided – the public has believed them and so have courts.

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Rather than remain marginalised and discredited figures, survivors of abuse have found a stronger voice, aided by the internet and supported by many diligent campaigners. It is time that David Cameron publicly recognises the bravery that victims of abuse have shown in coming forwards and attempting to find justice for themselves and others. He could begin this by apologising for calling those seeking justice ‘conspiracy theorists’.

The Curious Case of the Mandarin’s Memory

By Tim Tate.

When the Duff letter emerged on Thursday last week, I e-mailed Lord Armstrong to ask five fairly straightforward questions.   They were:-

1. Whether you recall receiving this letter ?
2. What you did with the information ?
3. Whether you passed on the allegations concerning this MP in question to the Prime Minister and/or the Chief Whip ?
4. Whether you made any attempt to speak with MP yourself about the allegations ?
5. Whether, in more recent times, you informed the Home Office and/or its recent internal enquiries about the existence of this letter ?

 

He did not reply immediately, but was apparently willing to give some kind of statement to the Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail. He told the Telegraph:

 

My official business was the protection of national security. I have to stress that there was nothing like evidence in this case. There was just a shadow of a rumour. It’s impossible to take investigative action on shadows of rumours. . . If there is some reason to think a crime has been committed, then people like the cabinet secretary are not to start poking their noses into it. It’s for the police to do that.

 

And he told the Mail:

 

I thought MI5’s actions were correct at the time. I think they were right to report the rumour, they were right to make what inquiries they could and they were right to come to the conclusion they did. I think if there was evidence it would have been properly examined at the time. I don’t think this is a matter of important people being protected. You can’t pursue inquiries unless you have evidence on which you can base the enquiry. A shadow of a rumour is not enough.

 

This afternoon, Lord Armstrong finally sent a response (from his House of Lords email account) to my five questions. It appeared that in the three days since he had spoken to the Telegraph and Mail, his memory had suffered a catastrophic failure. He wrote:-

 

 I am afraid that I do not remember receiving Sir Antony Duff’s letter, or what I did when I received it.   It is now a long time ago, and there were a lot of other things going on at the time.

Yours sincerely,

Armstrong of Ilminster

 

Sir Robert famously brought into public usage the concept of being (as he put it during the 1986 Spycatcher trial) “economical with the truth”.    But the question of what actions the second most powerful civil servant in the country took about allegations that one of the most senior Tory politicians was a paedophile is too important to be left to this sort of evasive nonsense.

Lord Armstrong thus joins the lengthening list of the great and good who must be summonsed to testify at Lord Justice Goddard’s Public Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse.    A little robust cross-examination might do wonders to help the noble Lord recover his powers of recollection.

Tim Tate Blog 26/07/15

Lord Armstrong talking to Tom Bateman (Radio 4), 31st January 2015 about Sir Peter Hayman:
The Needle

Aylesbury Child Sex Ring

Six men involved in a child sex ring in Buckinghamshire have been found guilty of abusing two schoolgirls on a “massive scale”.
The Old Bailey heard the abuse in Aylesbury went on for years and involved rape and child prostitution.
Eleven defendants faced trial, accused of 47 sexual offences between 2006 and 2012.
Four were cleared of any wrongdoing, while the jury could not reach a verdict on one of the men.
The six who have been convicted will be sentenced in September.

BBC 24.7.15

The Aylesbury child sex ring was not discovered as most would expect – with a victim complaining to the police, a parent voicing concerns or online surveillance. It began with the main victim – known throughout the case as child A – trying to prevent her own children being taken into care.

Between the ages of 12 and 16, she had sex with about 60 men, nearly all of them Asian. Sometimes, this sex was “consensual”, sometimes it was rape.

The efforts of Buckinghamshire social services to have Child A’s two young sons taken into care were halted when she spoke out about sexual abuse she had suffered. The case – heard in the Family Court – had centred on her own fitness to be a mother. The police investigation into Child A’s claims started soon after.

Social services were well aware of the victim – she had been on its children-at-risk register from the age of seven. And over the years the records held by various public organisations about her life swelled. But paperwork did not prevent the ongoing abuse of Child A, or a second girl – Child B – who was also abused by some of the men and who, again, was known to social services.

It is understood Child A may have raised issues of sexual abuse previously with social services but nothing was done.

David Johnston, managing director for children’s services at Buckinghamshire County Council, declined to comment on any “previous contact (Child A had) with social care”.

More…

BBC 24.7.15

 

 

The Great Pretender

The Friday Night Song

Jehovah’s Witnesses and Child Sexual Abuse

In June, the High Court ruled that the Jehovah’s Witnesses organisation was liable for sexual abuse committed by one of its members.

The Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Britain – to give the group its official name – had failed to take adequate safeguarding steps when senior members of the organisation were aware that a fellow Witness was a known paedophile.

It was the first civil case in the UK of historical sexual abuse brought against the Christian-based religious movement.

The BBC’s Religious Affairs Correspondent, Caroline Wyatt, explores the implications of the Court’s decision and investigates the Jehovah’s Witnesses explicit policy of attempting to deal with all allegations of sexual abuse in-house.

The Report has gained access to confidential internal documents, sent out only to those who are senior in the Jehovah’s Witnesses. These reveal the organisation’s reluctance to involve the secular authorities in cases where a crime has been committed by one Witness against another.

Caroline Wyatt hears from former Witnesses who have suffered abuse and who claim that the organisation’s doctrine and procedures have allowed offenders within the congregation to avoid prosecution.

Presenter: Caroline Wyatt
Producer: Hannah Barnes.
BBC

Supplement to the Wanless / Whittam Review

This report was quietly released today;

‘Following the discovery of a file that should have been submitted to Peter Wanless and Richard Whittam QC in their review, the Cabinet Office undertook further searches of the Cabinet Secretary’s private papers collection and identified 4 additional relevant files. Peter Wanless and Richard Whittam QC have reviewed this additional material and produced a supplementary report.’                    gov.uk

Of particular interest is this observation by Peter Wanless and Richard Whittam, 3rd June 2015;

‘More broadly, there were a number of references across the papers we saw that reinforced the observation we made in our Review [Review 2.5] that issues of crimes against children, particularly the rights of the complainant, were given considerably less serious consideration than would be expected today. To give one striking example, in response to claims from two sources that a named Member of Parliament ”has a penchant for small boys”, matters conclude with acceptance of his word that he does not and the observation that “At the present stage … the risks of political embarrassment to the Government is rather greater than the security danger.” [Sir Antony Duff to Sir Robert Armstrong 4/11/86]
The risk to children is not considered at all.’

Full Document:

Key Westminster Figures in Child Abuse Papers

 The Cabinet Office apologised for the ‘flaw’ in the way they responded to a request for information during the Wanless-Whittam Review.  A supplementary report to the review was released on the government website today and can be found here.

By Tom Parmenter, Sky News Correspondent

The Government reveals that unreleased files relating to child abuse allegations do exist which name key Westminster figures.

19:29, UK,Wednesday 22 July 2015

Clockwise from top left: Morrison, Brittan, Van Straubenzee, Hayman

Key Westminster figures from the 1970s and 1980s have been named in a series of Government child abuse documents.

After months of requests from Sky News the Government has revealed that papers exist that relate to Margaret Thatcher’s former parliamentary secretary Sir Peter Morrison, former Home Secretary Leon Brittan, former diplomat Sir Peter Hayman and former minister Sir William van Straubenzee.

All four have passed away and the contents of the papers have not been revealed.

Sky News 22/07/15

Extract from the letter from Richard Heaton, Cabinet Office, 5th May 2015 to Peter Wanless and Richard Whittam:

As you know, there was a flaw in the way in which the Cabinet Office initially responded to your call for a search of departmental papers. I am writing with an explanation for that error, and an apology.

The additional papers that Roger Smethurst showed you when you visited the Cabinet Office on 16 February and 24 March, and which had not been earlier identified, fall into three categories.

The first is the PREM file about Sir Peter Hayman. This file was held by the Cabinet Office and it should have been identified as relevant to your review. It was overlooked, and that may have been because it appeared in The National Archives catalogue. In any event, on behalf of the Cabinet Office, I am very sorry for the oversight and for our failure to identify this file earlier.

Second, a PREM file about Sir William van Straubenzee was identified in late January 2015. This file did not meet your search criteria and was part of a batch of files that had been selected for destruction in 2013, before your Inquiry began, as part of our routine records management process: To guard against the destruction of historically important records, The National Archives team checks files selected for destruction. As a consequence, on 22 January The National Archives referred the file to the Cabinet Office to be reviewed. On review my team noted that the file contained references to the Kincora Boys’ Home; Roger Smethurst promptly drew this to your attention.

The final group of papers about Peter Morrison, Leon Brittan, Peter Hayman, William van Straubenzee and Colin Wallace’s allegations about Kincora were found in a separate Cabinet Office store of assorted and unstructured papers. This collection, colloquially known as the Cabinet Secretary’s miscellaneous papers, has accumulated over several decades and was closed in 2007. It was largely uncatalogued and unregistered. We have been aware for some time that this is an unsatisfactory position.

Gov.uk

Theresa May facing Tim Loughton at the HASC 21 July 2015

The Home Affairs Select Committee allows opportunity for full interrogation of witnesses, usually in the full gaze of the public eye. Tim Loughton, MP (former Children’s Minister), doesn’t miss this opportunity to ask the questions that many others have also wanted to ask the Home Secretary;

” Why did you leave it so late to send out guidance about protecting material that might be relevant to the inquiry? “

And;

” The latest guidance only went out on the 23rd June giving various people months and months and months where they might conveniently destroy material.
It could have been done a lot earlier couldn’t it? “

Like a terrier, and in the face of political answers that might help explain why Theresa May has now been Home Secretary for 1,893 days, Tim Loughton keeps going. He also raises the question of the ability of the Goddard Inquiry to fully access information held by the Intelligence Agencies.

Acting Chair, David Winnick, seeks further clarification of access to information, getting the response from the Home Secretary that;

” No Exemptions have been set on the material that will be made available to the Justice Goddard Inquiry. “

The Home Secretary also confirmed that Justice Goddard’s salary is £360k per year, plus other allowances, plus four return flights to New Zealand each year for her and her husband.

Cyber War Pt 2: Unintended Consequences

This follow up to ‘Cyber War – Real Time View‘ delves slightly deeper, and examines the possibility of ‘unintended consequences’

Another view of attacks, again from security company Norse.

There are two important aspects regarding these images:

1. The people behind the attacks are not necessarily residing or even acting from the country the attacks appear to come from. As was noted last time, ‘this is a war without frontiers, uniforms, or even a clearly defined enemy’. Its important not to view this as one country versus another country type of war. It’s far more subtle than that.

2. The map mainly serves so show the scale and type of the attacks as monitored by Norse. It is not a complete picture of all worldwide threats. It under-reports because it doesn’t include attacks on sites that aren’t monitored by Norse. Other security companies will have similar maps that aren’t publicly available. Without access to that data, the real scale of intrusion attempts cannot be accurately assessed.

Many of these attacks are simply about theft. Data is money, and attackers are looking to steal private data to sell on to willing buyers.

The theft from ‘Target Stores’ in 2013 involved 40 million credit cards, and 70 million customer details. It was estimated that between 1 to 3 million card details were sold on by the thieves, netting around $54 million

Target aren’t alone, these have been subject to a large scale loss of data in 2014;
Staples – 1.16 million cards, Michaels (retail chain) – 2.6 million cards, Home Depot – 56 million cards and 53 million email addresses, Sony – Theft of 5 unreleased films, and 47k Social security numbers (including 15k staff) many will full personal details, JP Morgan Chase – 76 million households and 7 million small businesses data, and New York’s Attorney General advised that over 8 years, 22.8 million private records were exposed.

However, its not always about theft.

Industrial espionage or malicious intent can be the motives, such as disrupting a company or organization’s operations, sometimes re-routing or delaying the logistics chain. There is also the example from 2013 where drug dealers hacked the Belgium Antwerp port computers, with the intent to smuggle drugs into the country.

Probably the most public malicious attack was the Stuxnet worm, (2008-2010). An infected USB stick delivered a payload intended to achieve a very specific result, and targeted only the Siemens devices that controlled the Iranian centrifuges used for uranium enrichment. It’s believed that 20% of the Iranian centrifuges were destroyed by Stuxnet.

The worm was later confirmed to be a joint USA / Israeli operation, and although achieving its objective, it wasn’t without problems. The worm was designed not to travel outside the the nuclear facility. However an error in the code allowed the worm to replicate and spread all over the internet. It was claimed that no ‘unintended consequences’ occurred as a result, but some reports suggest otherwise. The Russians claimed that their nuclear facility was infected with the worm and, in the UK, a French owned nuclear reactor unexpectedly shut down. EDF confirmed that the reactor also used Siemens controllers, but denied that the Stuxnet virus was involved. In a secret war, how would we ever know?

However, whatever the truth, it does appear that no catastrophic events occurred. Will we be so lucky the next time, when the people who design malicious code fail to grasp the significance of the unintended consequences of their work?

This attack highlighted how unprepared countries and organisations are to defend or respond to such action. It also showed how catastrophic unintended consequences might occur.

Most of all, it showed the potential of Cyber-warfare – the ability to collapse complex infrastructures.

Similar malware could cause havoc if allowed to infiltrate the computers in large corporations or infrastructure such as Power, Water or Communications.

This isn’t a war in which people are merely spectators. In many cases they are the players. Often the doors are left open by the users themselves.

A major retail chain suffered a crippling attack last December, during a peak trading period. Despite having invested in an extensive central security team, it transpired that a senior director had download porn onto his work computer and unwittingly introduced the malware into his business.

Many intrusions occur because an individual had a lapse with their own security. One intrusion technique is APT (Advanced Persistent Threats) where a specific individual is identified, and then repeatedly targeted with the expectation that eventually one intrusion will be successful.

‘Security should be viewed as a shared responsibility that reaches well beyond the traditional view of it residing in a single department.’ …Senior Director NTT Com Security

This should be the standard thinking, but it’s far from it.

Security is not ‘configure and forget’. It requires constant monitoring and user interventions. Often the simple solutions are most effective.

Around 60% of attacks on web applications in the UK are ‘SQL injection‘, typically exploiting known vulnerabilities in software. It’s not reported how many are successful, but since NTT Com Security research shows that 76% of known vulnerabilities identified in Businesses were over 2 years old, its not hard to see why they are so popular with attackers. The simple act of regularly updating operating systems and applications would block them.

Everyone has responsibility for computer security.

When the lights go out, or communications fail, or water fails to run out of the tap, it’s quite possible that someone, somewhere enabled the malware intrusion by downloading some forbidden file onto their PC without first considering the possible ‘unintended consequences’.

That might be all it takes.

 

 

Exclusive: Rupert Murdoch Gives Nazi Salute

From The Needle’s royal correspondent

A shocking photograph of media mogul Rupert Murdoch apparently giving a Nazi salute has emerged.

There is no way of verifying the context in which Rupert Murdoch makes this public gesture in support of Adolf Hitler but it is bound to be an image that he now regrets.

This public backing of the Anti-Semitic policies of the Nazis and the apparent support of the holocaust by Rupert Murdoch is sure to be controversial.

A spokesperson for Rupert Murdoch in response to our inquiries said, “What ? Who are you?”

The spokesperson at no point denied that the photograph of Rupert Murdoch making this fascist salute in support of the architects of the Blitz was genuine.

Exclusive: Shocking Photo: Young Queen Heils Taxi

Are you going south of the river ?

A shocking photo of an impressionable young girl trying to heil a taxi has been published by a tabloid newspaper owned by an Australian republican.

…

[I really can’t be bothered. Goodnight!]

Another Brick…

The Friday Night Song

The Green Inker

The Green Inker by Chester Stern: Journalist, writer & broadcaster. Former Head of Press Bureau, Scotland Yard; former Crime Correspondent with The Mail on Sunday.

The tale of an Home Office minister who sexually abused and murdered young boys…

Some of it sounds familiar…

As I understand Leon Brittan’s former agent has never confirmed a very similar story.

But then nor has he denied it to my knowledge…

Ann Clwyd MP, Insurance Companies, And An Example From Wandsworth Council.

Above is the video of Ann Clywd MP raising the issue of insurance companies and their part in covering up child sexual abuse in yesterday evening’s Adjournment Debate. The involvement of insurance companies in this issue takes many forms and Ann Clwyd refers to a few examples in her speech. With permission from Teresa Cooper, who very unusually for a survivor has a wealth of documented evidence of her own abuse, I want to give the reader an example of how the influence of insurance companies has been used to prevent survivors of abuse from getting justice.

This example dates from when Teresa was 16 years old when she had been placed in foster care but Teresa also has documented evidence of sexual abuse she suffered when she was below that age while at Kendall House.

For legal reasons I’ve redacted the surname of the foster carers but it should be noted that the record shows that previous to Teresa’s allegation other children who had been placed with this couple had made similar allegations of abuse against the male foster carer, Brian T, and that subsequent to his conviction much later following a complaint made by another girl, Wandsworth Council ceased placing children with him. The assault took place in 1984 and was reported to Wandsworth Social Services and Kent police at the time and Teresa has documented medical evidence of the assault from the time due of the physical injuries she sustained as a result of this incident. However, much of the documentation that I’m using here is from the early 1990s when Teresa again sought justice.

What you’ll note on reading these extracts is that Wandsworth Social Services attempted to discredit Teresa Cooper.

There seems to be a ‘plan’. Wandsworth Social Services will let Kent police investigate and when they find there a “lack of evidence” Teresa will be discredited and shown to be a fantasist.

Unfortunately for Wandsworth Social Services, the big problem with this ‘plan’ is that there isn’t a “lack of evidence”. So how do Wandsworth Social Services overcome this problem ?

They deny Kent police access to the evidence.

And why do Wandsworth Social Services want to do this ?

I’d just like to thank Teresa for allowing me to share this with you. I hope it will help readers to understand why the influence of insurance companies is such an issue in the debate regarding CSA.

I’ve no doubt whatsoever that this clear and documented example is far from isolated.

Cyber War – Real Time View

The world has no shortage of war, so it’s no surprise to discover another one.
But this one is different in that it doesn’t involve all the traditional tools of war; armies, guns, tanks, missiles, drones, and country invasion. Although it does retain the ability to inflict pain, suffering and misery.

It has been fueled by the growth in technology, and thrives on the inability of individuals to consider the unintended consequences of their actions.
Like all modern wars, it can be viewed on a screen, just like a computer game.

Click the image to follow the action provided by security company Norse .

These are real time attacks from one computer to another, probing security systems, looking for a way in. But don’t be misled by the implication this is ‘China’ vs the ‘USA’, or any other country.

It’s way more subtle than that.

This is a war without frontiers, uniforms, or even a clearly defined enemy.
The attack location can be anywhere on the planet, as can the target.
Attackers can include small-time thieves, drug dealers, arms dealers, organized crime, commercial competition, activists, rogue states, secret states, and governments, to name just a few.

It’s under reported, so makes it difficult to know which activities are the result of cyber attacks and which aren’t. Quite often those that suffer the outages aren’t certain either.

On the 8th July this year, one day after the China stock market crash, several incidents happened on the same day in USA. Computer ‘glitches’ were blamed;

1. The NYC subway system left a few trains stuck in some stations for extended periods of time.
2. United Airlines’ computer system stopped working, forcing all flights from the airline to be grounded.
3. The New York Stock Exchange’s computerized trading system also stopped working, causing trading to be suspended, a big deal in one of, if not the, world’s largest trading market.
4. Following the New York Stock Exchange failure, the Wall Street Journal’s website also malfunctioned.
5. Over 2,500 residents in Washington, DC lost power.

Co-incidence?
Maybe, but the capacity of cyber-war to devastate Power, Water or Communications infrastructure is proven.

A recent internet outage lasting only 5 days provided a sharp and timely reminder to me of just how dependent we have become on technology, and how difficult life could be with sustained outages.

The mesmerisingly pretty graphics mask that reality.

 

(If time permits, I’ll post a more detailed perspective later).

 

 

Tom Watson And Today’s Dr Morris Fraser Story

The article from the Independent on Sunday that Tom Watson is referring to here is this one below;

Dr. Morris Fraser

Now two former British Army officers, who tried to expose the abuse at the care home, have expressed their disquiet at the PSNI decision to refuse to reveal what it knew about Fraser.

When asked what information the police held on Fraser, following convictions in London and the US for child sexual abuse in the early 1970s, the PSNI said that it could “neither confirm nor deny that it holds the information” and cited, alongside privacy and prejudicial disclosure issues, “Section 23(5) – Information supplied by, or concerning, certain security bodies (national security)”.

Until now it was assumed that Fraser’s dealings with the security forces were limited to those required by his research into the effects of political violence on the young.

Captain Colin Wallace, a former British Army psychological operations officer, tried to expose an alleged paedophile ring involving loyalist paramilitaries and politicians in the 1970s, which included him authoring an army memo naming alleged abusers in 1973.

He remembers Fraser attending his offices at British Army headquarters in Thiepval Barracks, Lisburn, around that year. He told the IoS: “I can remember he came on a tour of our offices. He brought a foreign individual with him and discussed inter-community conflict. Afterwards, I recall one of my bosses telling me that if Fraser requested any Army assistance or facilities in future, not to agree to it.

“One of my colleagues, an Army major, added Fraser’s name to a document which I had compiled for the press about [the Ulster loyalist group] Tara and Kincora. This gives a strong indication that Army intelligence were well aware of who he was and what he was really getting up to at that time.”

Independent on Sunday

It looks like the document that Colin Wallace is referencing in this extract is the one below which was reproduced in Paul Foot’s book ‘Who Framed Colin Wallace’. Until now I had assumed the hand written note was Paul Foot’s. That it was an army major who had made this note of Dr Morris Fraser’s name in connection with Kincora in the 1970s and not Paul Foot in the late 1980s is I think significant.

For more information about Dr Morris Fraser please watch this video;

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