The Norwegian government and their CPS (Barnevernet) have not reformed their ways as was hoped after the international embarrassment they suffered in the wake of snatching the five Bodnariu children.
Barnevernet is back on the international scene because they secretly removed Aryan, an Indian boy (mother Indian citizen) while he was in school for alledged slapping by the parents. Same tactic was used in the Bodnariu case. No warning, no court order, no social intervention or “help,” only the nuclear option. This is how Barnevernet operates.
Well, the parents are now crying out for international support and they have been featured on English-language CNN in India. Delight in Truth friend, attorney Suranya Aiyar was featured on the program with strong and passionate arguments against Barnevernet.
Looks like we are on the verge of another international scandal, and Norway and Barnevernet victims need it! Maybe the shame will reach an unbearable level for Norway and it will stop violating family rights and due process.
Watch the CNN program at the link below
http://www.news18.com/videos/india/watch-india9-with-arunoday-mukharji-19-1326984.html
Delight in Truth 
24 December 2016, Christmas Eve:
I have found a couple of publishings in India and one in Norway about the case. Another writer on the Forum Redd Våre Barn (Rescue Our Children) found a very useful video from CNN on youtube.
“New case about Indian child, Aryan, taken”
http://forum.r-b-v.net/viewtopic.php?f=56&t=8595
*
In Norway, (the afternoon and evening of) Christmas Eve is the centre of Christmas, especially for children. The thoughts and prayers of those of us who know what Barnevernet camouflages as “children’s best interest”, pray for the affected families, who have been tragically separated and long for each other.
Thank you for posting this, Delight. The world needs to know that this evil takes no holidays.
Reposted comment from Facebook:
Thank you, Suranya. You represented those who are fed up with this evil very well. I was not only impressed with you, but that and Indian media source was willing to spend this much time on this important story. I have seen no American media report that even comes close to the effort put forward here. It also seems that your embassy is much more concerned than the one in my country. As soon as our next president takes office, you can be assured that I will do what I can to make him aware of cases like those of Amy Jakobsen of Norway, return Tyler to Amy.
The psychologist on this panel seemed typical. He claimed to criticize the Barnevernet and then defended them at every opportunity. Thank you for not letting him get by with his behavior. I pray that you get many more opportunities like this one until the evil behavior stops.
Lastly, the moderator seemed sympathetic to parents who are having their children taken for no reason. I applaud this media source and the obvious research the moderator has done.
An interesting Polish news article: Poles are reinforcing their laws so that their authorities — including at least a prosecutor if not a court — will be quickly involved in cases when Polish children are “abducted” by foreign authorities:
http://niezalezna.pl/91357-koniec-z-uprowadzeniami-rodzicielskimi-polscy-rodzice-otrzymaja-wsparcie
Sounds excellent, Jasper, thank you indeed! Google translate is sufficiently clear on this one to bring joy to my heart. This will be an article for me to post on “my” websites and to circulate.
I think it is important that the Poles mention German child protection (the Jugendamt) and British child protection along with the Norwegian Barnevernet. Not because I do not think Norway deserved maximal condemnation for the way Barnevernet carries on, but because it truly IS a general, international problem in Western nations. The Poles seem to have recognised it. That is the best possible start of going to the FOUNDATION of these faulty “protection” policies.
Some more details are mentioned here: http://www.rp.pl/Rodzina/312299936-Prawa-dzieci-w-postepowaniach-transgranicznych.html#ap-7
Reblogged this on Wings of the Wind and commented:
A prayer for the New Year, that Baby Aryan and others like him are returned to their loving families in 2017.
Happy new year wishes to all of you.
Thank you everyone for all the heated discussions and opinions,i`ve developed a lot from this. I still do not agree with all the theories which is put forward,but respect your views.
I wish in my Utopialand; someone hacked into the Norwegian CPS and their computer program, Familia, and let out all the information on how people behave toward the defenseless, younger members of our globe. This had not been good for our innocent little ones, but it is an Utopian thinking. The world would have seen how many evil people that are out there and which many of you are defending
Norway has evolved tremendously in terms of human rights over the past 40 years. When countries such as Romania and Poland and Russia etc engages towards child protection in Norway, the reason is that they do not possess this legal way of life and the laws that apply in Norway. Norway is a pioneer in human respect, in perspective in relation to the rest of the globe, and countries that are in opposition,are those who is in lack of this. I am proud of Norway, -we have built up a welfare society for the last 70 years that is formidable and I call on the Norwegians who reads this blog to thank our ancestors and to be grateful for all we have today . We do not go to bed with bombs brackets, but with New Year rockets from people who have enough money to celebrate well into the night.
I wish you all well.
With regards Topsy
Topsy,
I hope your wish about hacking does not come true. Among some secrets lots of sensitive information could go public.
However I do hope Norwegian legislation will be improved, so that
– emergency care is to be reviewed by a court within few days, especially if emergency care was necessary.
– lawyer for the child herself/himself or at least for the family should be present from first questioning by child welfare. A child is not expected to be able to ask for a lawyer!
– there is equality of arms before the court between the legal guardians of the child, barnevernet and parents, and also the experts asked by them. In case of any doubt or controversy, there should be a confrontation before a court — for most cases in an open hearing, with the most sensitive cases confrontation with the child should be non-public but at least lawyers for all parties must be allowed to be there. In case of unresolved controversies a new expert should be assigned by the court.
These were just the most trivial proposals for strengthening the rule of law and protecting children from unnecessary emergency care.
To what you say here, Jasper:
“I hope your wish about hacking does not come true. Among some secrets lots of sensitive information could go public.”:
Mostly, it is just Barnevernet that claims that everything is so sensitive (and the naïve press follows them). If you get the cases properly publicised, not only Barnevernet’s documents but also evidence from the family (including the children), you will see plenty of lies on Barnevernets part, plenty of children who just want their parents, who escape from foster homes and institutions, are located by the police and taken by force back to their foster prisons, etc etc.
A basic question, which should be voiced every time Barnevernet’s supporters claim that there are so many abusive parents and so on, is this:
If there are really so many such cases, why then is it that Barnevernet spends endless time and resources on quite different cases, cases in which there is nothing so wrong with the family that breaking it up is justified at all, even families where there is nothing wrong whatever?
I meant making the system more transparent and responsible before courts is the right way to go, not hacking…
Aha, then I agree!
An easy answer: there IS SOMETHING WRONG! And YOU do not know What is behind every familyhistory! (For decades in Norways history?)
The Cps spends endless of time on anyone who askes for help and it is not up to you to judge on theories! Do you claim that everything behind a removal of a child/children is just a longing and personal agenda
from some strange person working in the Cpc to grab some child from anywhere/anyone?
Do you know how many other authorities than the Cps the “case”has to go through before they get a note of concern?
When was the last time you experienced this?
Do you know why the county Council so calleds “win” in aprox.93 prosent of the time?
It is very often because the local Cps has reached the end of measures they can provide,of course political and economical,;hands thight-
and the partent/s can`t keep their heads above the water anymore.
Not because of the Cps, but more often their own personal problems and economi.
Do not look down on families who are striving and make them victims, that is what you are all doing. Spiting on someone lying down.
On behalf of those who accept help.
Whit regards Topsy
Life is not black and white, it gets grayer with age
It seems to be far more specific than there is something wrong.
Lack of quality assurance, lack of supervision, of no recognition of even obvioius bias, wrong management culture to name a few things that are now pretty obvious from several cases.
I don’t think it is the primary resposibility of the local child welfare services — of course they have a contribution of their own as well — but as far as I see these topics show the blatant failure of Bufdir/Bufetat/Helsetilsyn/Ministry.
“Do not look down on families who are striving and make them victims, that is what you are all doing. Spiting on someone lying down.”
I have no idea what you mean by the quote above, Topsy. Could you please elaborate.
“Life is not black and white, it gets grayer with age”
Personally, there are things that get grayer with age but the really important things are getting either blacker or whiter as I grow older.
I’m curious why you even included this sentence. Where is the gray area when a child is taken from his/her parents without notification, without due process, without trial; separated for his/her parents (who are many times given flimsy reasons) up to months or even years? Where is the gray area when abducted children are moved miles away from frightened parents to foster homes that many times split up multiple children that have been taken? Is it gray area when the parents end up able to see their own renamed child a few times a year for a few hours each and given little hope for reunification?
All of the human rights offenses of the Norwegian Barnevernet like the ones I’ve mentioned in the above paragraph are blacker than black. I know of parents who feel that the “black hole” called Barnevernet (like the ones in space) is so intense that nothing can escape it.
A ray of light:
Jan Simonsen:
“Poland with new legislation to protect Polish children
against Norwegian Barnevern”
http://www.mhskanland.net/page45/page394/page394.html
In the nick of time! It sounds almost too good to be true. Poland actually seems well on their way to doing something very similar to what Suranya Aiyar suggested a few years ago (cf especially p 7 here):
“Humanitarian Crisis for Indian children and their families in confiscatory child care proceedings abroad”
Click to access nhrc-petition-121012.pdf
Congratulations to Poland. What we must hope and pray for now, is that the light spreads to other countries. There should be a good chance of it: Norway has been strongly criticised by several countries in The Council of Europe, in the EU Parliament, and 7 (or 9) Barnevern cases against Norway are going up before the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg before long.
I hope the Indian NHRC petition gets to the hand of PACE members as well. Authors see clearly and name the issues as they are.
A Norwegian newspaper compared barnevernet to Stasi.
The reasons are well collected I think:
http://www.op.no/debatt/familie/politikk/styrk-familien-og-dens-vern/o/5-36-303532
The article is good. But it is not the editorial staff writing. The writer Lars Arne Høgetveit is clearly external; this is a “letter to the editor” in the “debate” section. Høgetveit criticises an earlier (also external) article by a parliamentary representative for the Labour Party, who wants Barnevernet to “be strenghtened”. – I suppose it will take some time yet for Norwegian media people to describe Barnevernet in the way e.g the Czech president did.
I left Norway for fear of this happening to me.
My marriage to a Norwegian national is not perfect and we have problems.
I looked for help and realized that anyone we talked to for marriage counseling would be obligated to report us to cps for any problems we discussed.
You shouldn’t be penalized because you ask for help.
It’s a scary situation in Norway.
It’s so sad because it’s a beautiful country but I couldn’t live like that.
No one is perfect but you must be perfect if you want to keep your kids.
I know other immigrant mothers who live in a domestic abuse situation who are too afraid to ask for help.
How can they claim to be the best country in the work to raise children if any request for help can trigger removal of the children?
Something needs to change.
“..No one is perfect but you must be perfect if you want to keep your kids..” well said, Anonymous!
The standards to be perfect/ ideal is not really human, are they?
A perfect family is an political and economical ideological Utopia,
crushing families on it’s way up on the podium, to receive the imaginary gold-medal ceremony in the political power elite:
the best child protection in the world!
Really like you name, System. I hope it is truth.
It is ironic that the elites of a country that prides itself as the best has one of the worst records on human rights in the world today. There is a reason the world is protesting!
Yes, Chris..the system must crack eventually IF people rise up, run out in the streets, angry and loud protesting!
Please pray that we get a good leader and activists who organizes these crushed families, to demonstrate in the cities and towns; create an uproar weekly because they won’t be still until they are seen and heard; being taken seriously – with human rights for their family, and who do not go home from the wild protests in the streets until the CPS is willing to dialogue – and to reopens the cases, forced to document their accusations/ diagnoses used against the parents, or else their children will be set free and can go home.
One of the the aims of the movement could be to get barnevern workers to STOP labeling parents with undocumented diagnoses – in order to take children from good enough loving parents.
And the government/ parliament should be pushed to define “what is good enough parents” and get it in writing in the barnevern law, so that parents have a blueprint they can be measured up against, and thus avoid misjudgment!?
I think they need to be reminded that it is important that inhabitants are allowed to be human; and humans can get sick, and this is not good enough reason to remove children from parents eighter. Because sickness/ illness can get better, and be healed, with the right help, understanding and treatment.
It seems like barnevernet needs help from the world to develop from a terror organisation into a family-helper organization, as it is supposed to be – or is it?
I will continue to pray, System.
Great suggestions and comments!
Some fresh and interesting scientific news:
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-38653906
My conclusion: It is not in the best interest of foreign children at all not allowed to speak their original mother language…
It is perfectly understandable that when people hear about such CPS cases for the first time, they want to discuss how child protection should be and how the laws regulating it should function, in Norway and in other countries.
Still, a lot of wasted time and confusion comes of concentrating just on these fundamental issues and refusing to take in what is likely to happen to a family in a particular case.
Here is something I wrote about the advisability of facing the existing system realistically as regards physical punishment of children. That is the only way to understand what happens in individual cases and what the authorities’ next moves are likely to be.
“Prison and foster home – this is what the system is like”
http://www.mhskanland.net/page45/page399/page399.html
I indeed think that pressure from Council of Europe could contribute into some changes into legislation and legal processes, better safeguards, I would say better brakes and counterweights with respect to child welfare cases…
However it is impossible to change culture by simply changing legislation and legal processes. I wonder what child welfare has to do to become a major topic for general elections and when some political parties could get momentum by programs on child welfar.
It is up to Norwegians at the end…
Some interesting news.
http://www.dagbladet.no/kultur/nedslaende-skoleresultater-for-barn-i-barnevernet/66903468
The factual part is pretty disappointing in itself, but it is not the worst part I would say.
What is even more disappointing is that there is a very directed thinking about what could cause the disappointing statistics and what to do with it…
No one mentions that it could be in a large part a symptom of traumatizing a child by forcibly removing from family — which is a pretty trivial suspicion I think.
Mari Trommald is the leader of that section of the Ministry and hence the head of Norwegian Barnevern.
It is completely ridiculous that she paints a picture of surprise – there is all sorts of research, from just about every country and for umpty years, showing the same thing: Children deprived of their parents by the CPS do extraordinarily badly in shool.
So it is almost equally ridiculous that they spend money on doing “new” research showing the same thing.
But of course Trommald has an agenda: They want to use these bad school results as an argument for MORE Barnevern, more money, more dictatorship, more messing with the children they take, more “therapy”, more “follow-up”, more explaining away that THEY are the cause.
A piece of news on Norwegian text-tv tonight (my translation):
“The news service AFP reports that a French constitutional court has voted down a law forbidding parents to beat/spank/hit their children. The decision is causing strong discontent among people opposed to child violence in the country. The practice of physical punishment har many supporters in France.»
– The way such laws against punishment are implemented in Norway and Sweden, France is probably well served by not adopting it.
I had a quick look and as far as I understand the t the problem was with formal issues with the procedure in French Parliament — and not with the content of the law.
I think it is OK to ban spanking as long as the sanctions are well differentiated — according to necessity to be investigated case by case, especially with respect to Article 8 of ECHR.
Interesting comments about proposed change to Norwegian Child Weilfare Act — in Norwegian, but Google translation is understandable:
http://www.aftenbladet.no/meninger/debatt/Forslaget-til-ny-barnevernlov-legger-opp-til-fortsatt-sprikende-og-omfattende-bruk-av-hastevedtak-537883b.html
An article on potential issues with using police force in child protection cases (in Norwegian), Norwegian Bureau for the Investigation of Police Affairs asking Norwegian Police to have a better protocol on barnevernet’s request — as far as I understand due to complaints by children.
http://www.aftenbladet.no/nyheter/innenriks/Spesialenheten-kritisk-til-bruk-av-politimakt-i-barnevernet-3863699.html
Yes. It is the first time I can remember that anybody in police circles has manned up and said they should perhaps not act like puppets for the CPS without asking a few useful questions, somewhere in the hierarchy.
barnefjern.org has collected interesting new articles in the past days/weeks.
An opinion published in Oppland Arbeiderblad, criticizing child welfare:
https://www.oa.no/debatt/barnevern/politikk/barnevern/o/5-35-388862
Forbes (!) article on Barnevernet:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2017/02/27/norways-government-abducted-children-and-ramifications-for-europe/
Thanks Jasper. This article is making the rounds in social media right now.
Dagbladet has not offered commenting options for their child welfare related articles for the last 8-9 months and they tend to show only the side of the child welfare.
I cannot withstand to comment their last article (in Norwegian): http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/vi-er-beleiret-jeg-vet-ikke-hvor-lenge-mine-ansatte-kommer-til-a-orke-dette/67016465
After creating crazy processes and eliminating almost any supervision, in practice changing courts a stamping machines in child welfare related cases, and trying to not let media to report either, do not be surprised either for the legal cases going to Strasbourg or for the mob law mood among Norwegians!
Maybe it is not too late to start a thorough investigation for all the coercion cases (urgent and not urgent) for the past years and let children to meet parents more and to go back if they want to.
Otherwise, if child welfare and new child welfare laws continue to head into the direction they went for the last decade, mob law really could come to reality. No one wants that, that could be the lose-lose outcome, in case foster care industry and child welfare strecth the strings too far…
An interesting blog entry in Norwegian:
http://faktasynsing.blogg.no/1488403437_hetsen_mot_barnevernet.html
I really do not understand Norwegian officials and politicians.
https://www.nrk.no/norge/slar-alarm-om-svikt-i-barnevernet-1.13411569
https://www.oa.no/nyheter/barnevern/nordre-land/ordforeren-sjokkerende-opplysninger/s/5-35-393235
Most of them seem to assume or pretend (and then play the fool) that in child welfare cases only unidirectional error is possible: children lacking help.
It is of course clear that bidirectional errors are possible especially in case of coercive measures: also children can be forcibly taken out of families and kept away from family (even forcibly adopted) unnecessarily.
and also https://www.oa.no/nyheter/barnevern/nordre-land/ble-bedt-om-a-pynte-pa-barnevernsmapper/s/5-35-392988
Yds, you DO understand Norwegian officials and politicians quite well, except perhaps that you do not fully see how programmed they are into the ideology geared to shut up critics and criticism and make the critics appear to be liars and idiots.
“Most of them seem to assume or pretend (and then play the fool) that in child welfare cases only unidirectional error is possible: children lacking help.”
Exactly, Jasper! You got it, never fear!
“.. also children can be forcibly taken out of families and kept away from family (even forcibly adopted) unnecessarily.”
The official view on this: No mistakes are made by the Norwegian social system; parents are the uneducated ones who are unreliable, and who do not understand the best interest of their children. And IF in some rare case the separation and forced adoption wasn’t necessary after all, that does not matter, because the social workers and their psychobabblers know from “attachment theory” that children form new, more satisfactory attachments to their new, hand-picked “care figures” if one can just keep the children from being disturbed by their nasty parents and get the children to understand that their parents were no good.
M, bøyer meg i støvet for denne uttalelsen; vil fra nå av ha deg til statsminister !
Interesting post in Dagbladet!
http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/oddvar-driver-antibarnevernsgruppe-pa-facebook—jeg-synes-synd-pa-ansatte-i-barnevernet-radmenn-og-ordforere-som-snart-ma-sta-til-rette-for-sine-handlinger/67238953
The newspaper interviewed administrators of Facebook-groups that are critical on child welfare.
Their answers are pretty convincing to me that they are concerned about the processes, methods, management and supervision of child welfare and not about harassing anyone, just making people accountable for their deeds.
I know especially one of the interviewed people, Oddvar Espegard, quite well. He is very active and hard-working. All 4 of the interviewed group administrators who are themselves victims or in close contact with victims (the fifth is a lawyer who seems to ride both horses) answer quite well. Dagbladet’s journalists try to malign them and have done so for a couple of weeks now. Rumour has it that the journalists at Dagbladet have been falling over each other in their eagerness to “expose” CPS protesters as worthless, antisocial, moronic criminals, who “are after” the upright social workers who faithfully carry out their work of saving children on behalf of society.
Dagbladet seems to push one side of the story while ignoring counter-arguments and debate around completely… I wonder how long more could it be feasible for them without completely losing credibility.
Dagbladet has perhaps varied a bit in their attitude to concrete issues over the years, but they have always been radical in the sense of promoting the ideal of the socially run state. They have also tended to have people with some kind of social work or social university subjects in their education. They can continue eternally, together with our authorities, if either the opposition to the Barnevern tyranny is not exposed abroad to such an extent that it gives Norway a real set-back in international contexts, or the ill-treatment of families becomes so widespread inland that it triggers some kind of uprising. The Norwegian population has unshakable confidence in and admiration for our welfare state and the way it is run.
One of the journalists behind the present bunch of articles in Dagbladet is one John Færseth. I remember a couple of articles by him 2-4 years ago, cf
“Tanker om ‘anti-barnevernsaktivister’ som tikkende bomber”
(Thoughts about ‘anti Barnevern activists’ as ticking bombs)
http://forum.r-b-v.net/viewtopic.php?f=132&t=7683&p=34874&hilit=Færseth#p34874
Færseth seems a bit odd to me. He expressed ideas about Barnevern-protesters of being right-wing extremists, mentally disturbed believers in conspiracies, extreme enemies of vaccines, religious sect extremists, and so on. He has apparently been energetic doing research to prove that protesters against Barnevernet’s practice are off their rocker as well as having hidden agendas. One of his articles appeared in ‘Fri Tanke’ (Free Thought), which is published by Human-Etisk Forbund, whose program is anti-religious (but more so against Christianity than against e.g. Islam, which they do not seem to have bothered about much as yet).
Færseth’s thoughts in 2012-15 are echoed in the recent Dagblad articles and do not seem to have changed to any extent, except that they were perhaps even more strongly expressed in his own previous articles.
It is laudable to be socially sensitive in general. However social sensitivity would also mean eagerness in detecting abuse… and responsibly participate in the debate. That I cannot see in Dagbladet since last May and there have been no articles on child welfare with commenting allowed.
That’s why I think Dagbladet seems to have an obvious bias with respect to child welfare.
I have found the “Tilsynsmelding” — supervisory report by Health Supervision for year 2016 at https://www.helsetilsynet.no/no/Publikasjoner/Tilsynsmelding/
I have just had a quick look at it vi Google Translate.
A few observations:
1. they try to sell the story of Glass Girl “Ida” as a success story. Not really looking at responsibilities.
2. In article “Tvang og makt overfor mennesker med utviklingshemming” they tell they have no knowledge on coercive measures. In my understanding they make a full confession about being unsuitable for their job.
My favoutire part:
“Statens helsetilsyn mener det er viktig å skaffe mer og bedre kunnskap om hvorfor det brukes mer tvang overfor mennesker med tviklingshemming.
For å vite om tvangsbruken er i tråd med formålet, er det også behov for å framskaffe bedre kunnskap om innholdet i vedtak, om hvor ofte vangstiltak blir benyttet og om hvordan brukerne opplever tvangstiltakene.
Det nedsatte tvangsutvalget skal undersøke disse problemstillingene.
Statens helsetilsyn er bekymret for om økningen av tvangsbruk er et resultat av for dårlig kompetanse og knapp tid i tjenestene, og for at tjenestetilbudet til den enkelte ikke blir tilstrekkelig individuelt tilrettelagt for å unngå tvang. Manglende arbeid i tjenestene for å finne alternative løsninger til tvang, kan være medvirkende.”
According to Google translate:
“Norwegian Board of Health believes it is important to obtain more and better knowledge of why it is used more force towards people with developmental disabilities.
To know about the use of coercion is in line with the purpose, there is also a need to increase our knowledge about the content of decisions, about how often coercive measures are used and how users experience coercive measures.
The discounted enforcement committee will examine these issues.
Norwegian Board of Health is concerned about the increase of use of force is a result of inadequate skills and little time in the services, and that the services of the individual are not sufficient individually designed to prevent coercion. Missing work in services to find alternative solutions to coercion, may be contributing.”
Note that these are the last words for the topic in the supervisory report!
The report should be translated into English and circulated on the web, so people could now all around the world how supervision of child welfare cases are not done in Norway. They are only concerned about lack of documentation for dismissing cases.
Quite right, Jasper. This is the typical response, we have seen it for years: If anybody complains about what Barnevernet does, all authorities – bureaucrats and politicians alike, as well as the lawyers, who cry for a new child protection law (it is due this coming autumn), and all the “help” professions, nearly all media, nearly the whole population, say that of course they need more resources and more qualifications, because there are SO many children who do not get help. They plan for the social workers to have a 5 year master’s degree education instead of the present one taking 3 years. The content of the study will be more of the same, and their prestige and power and the trust they are given will be even greater.
The reason why this propaganda is stronger now, is that they are trying to stifle all the criticism in social media and abroad. At the same time they are stepping up their tough actions on people who in any way can be prosecuted for anything they do and say in the way of criticism or desperate cries from the heart.
“Helsetilsynet” (the health inspectorate / Board of Health) is the regular supervisory and sanctioning body over Barnevernet. They should of course keep Barnevernet under control all the time. Nevertheless, they too are prevented by legislation from looking into “individual cases” on their own initiative. (Nobody is allowed to, this is the way the state pulverises responsibility.) Now the cabinet minister, Solveig Horne, as a reaction to the message of concern about Barnevernet from about 150 professionals in 2015, after months and months appointed Helsetilsynet to go in and examine a selection of individual cases. So the public authority responsible for Barnevernet all the time – is going to inspect the result of their own control of Barnevernet. And in order to get this tragi-comedy established, Horne said they would first have to pass special legislation in order to let Helsetilsynet look into the confidential case documents of the cases.
– Who is going to select cases? I guess it will be Bufdir, the section of the Ministry responsible for running Barnevernet?
– How long is Helsetilsynet’s reading and assessment of a hundred cases going to take? Horne said, “About 2 years.”
A supervisory authority not authorized to go into the details of individual cases means simply lack of democracy and lack of rule of law.
And a perfect place to start to build a totalitarian regime.
Yes.
About “not knowing” about the use of force, and “needing” to do research to find out:
Of course they never listen to a word the families say. Even if the families’ information can be proved in court, it is irrelevant to the authorities. The authorities are always so surprised – they said that the “Glass girl” case hit them like a bomb exploding, it was that surprising.
They want research – new “investigations”. Guess where the grants and resources to do research go? To the people already involved in the industry, of course.
What about research existing abroad? (There is a lot of excellent, international research showing the general misery of CPS systems in almost all Western countries and even facts very comparable to those in Norway)? Oh, but Norway is “the best country in the whole world for children”, and research from elsewhere can not be relied on to show anything relevant to conditions here.
The present “debate” I have seen in over 20 years, it is the same idiocy again every time. The only difference being that the official side’s attempts to drown us are more comprehensive now.
Interesting comments indeed; Marianne
Child welfare is on the table for mainstream politics, in terms for future coalition!
http://www.aftenposten.no/norge/politikk/Dette-er-SVs-fire-ufravikelige-krav-for-a-stotte-en-Store-regjering-617117b.html
These demands come from SV, Sosialistisk Venstreparti (the “socialistic left”). They were coalition member of our last government, together with the Labour Party and Senterpartiet (historically a farmers’ party, very concerned with de-centralisation etc). SV now presents some central demands if they are to participate in government again (the socialist side has the upper hand in polls now).
Regarding Barnevern and other child welfare questions, SV does not want less Barnevern, they want more, and of the present type. (SV is the party which all surveys say that most social workers vote for / belong to.) What SV wants is that private companies should be thrown out of Barnevern business. Actually, I think they are mostly right on this particular point. These companies get away with demanding sky-high pay, they offer psycho-expertise for evaluation of families, these conclude that the children should be taken away from their parents. The same companies then offer places at institutions, and foster homes. – The institutions and other foster set-ups run by Christian organisations are no better when it comes to their inimical attitude to biological families.
I agree about the actual conditions, that they are in the good directions especially about private actors — remembering the findings of the Vista report from 2014 — but clearly not sufficient.
Anyway, I think it is important that Norwegian Child Welfare is now brought to the highest political levels by a parliementary party, as a party.
So far I have seen only isolated politicians and small non-parliamentary parties raising concerns on system level.
In reality I don’t think SV (the sosialistic far left) will have much influence on politics or barnevernets future and change. They want the system to be under extreme control by the state and muncipality, we have been there, done that. It didn’t work.
The pressure on the barnevern system these days to change and become even more effective in “saving children from evil Norwegian parents” need all the help and cooperation it can get, so they hire private barnevern personell and “help measures” (hjelpetiltak) that are so called professionals, who are supposed to have special competence and higher education in child psychology, therapy and sociology.
My experience is that these private barnevern employees hired by barnevernet to add more “professionalism to determine what is best for children and youth” and to add professional help for the children/ youths and their parents are even more extreme in their reports, worries, blaming the parents even more and writing more wrong accusations/ lies about the parents in their reports than the usual child welfare caseworkers.
This way barnevernet wins 80 % of the cases in court (fylkesnemda) by false abstract accusations, blaming parents with low socioeconomic status, (barnevernet and fylkesnemda dare not do this to the higher middle class) for not beeing perfect humanbeings, thus take their children and give them to the rich families to produce perfect tax paying norwegians in the future?
The demands on the working class parents in Norway today, as everybodys eyes are on them, is to be not less than 100% perfect in every aspect; where their offspring have to perform 100% perfect in all areas also, otherwise CPS with their psychosocial ideologies and blames storms in and threatens to take their children.
On text-tv news:
The Norwegian Christian People’s Party wants to amend the legislation to provide more money for foster parents. As of now, foster parents employed by the state receive sickness pay, rights to a service pension, and insurance. The party wants fosterers employed by the municipalities to have the same advantages.
It is really quite ironic that at the same time, everybody in the foster industry has always insisted that foster parents love their foster children devoutly. Even institutional personnel claim to love the children so much, cf re Adele Johansen’s son:
“At home with his mother he has gone to school in a normal way, while during the months he spends at the children’s home, he goes to school 4 days altogether. The personnel try to bribe him with 1500 crowns (today ≈ EUR 200) to go to school. Most of the time he is in the company of criminals and drug addicts in the Nygård park but he also goes up into the mountain above Bergen and tries to sleep out of doors. He is away from the children’s home during the night without the personnel bothering to look for him. At last he manages to flee to his mother in Oslo and they live under cover for a while. In a court case about possibly letting him return to his mother officially, the personnel from the children’s home say that they love him so deeply that he must live with them, and the CPS claims that an important reason why they had to transfer the care to themselves and place him at the children’s home was to make sure that he goes to school.”
(This was the case back in 1996 for which Norway was condemned for violation of human rights at the European Court of HR in Strasbourg:
http://www.mhskanland.net/page10/page125/page125.html
The treatment of the son was “incidental” to the court case, which was about her daughter.)
I hope there will be competition on the right side of Norwegian politics as well about cleaning up child welfare.
SV made the first step among parliamentary parties, on the left.
On the right, I have heard about non-parliamentary parties campaigning for any clean up so far (De Kristne, or Demokratene i Norge).
I am not a Norwegian but I have very serious doubts about the credibility of Krf due to their attitude about child welfare issues… I wonder when their voters start to have serious doubts…
But SV only wants to get private enterprise out. They want to increase correspondingly public institutions etc. Most social workers vote for SV, as far as is known, and SV is an ardent supporter of Barnevern and social welfare state tyranny.
Again, we are talking about orthogonal topics.
Yes, you are right: SV wants only privaze enterprise out… (which seems to be a good idea after the Vista report from 2014).
My focus is: after the past years I would expect child welfare to be a hot topic in the election campaign, and especially conservative and/or Christian related parties to compete about defending families.
So far I have seen only De Kristne and DEM moving into that direction.
And it is very easy to compete with KrF on this topic, actually they have made it very easy by complete lack of actions in the past years.
“So far I have seen only De Kristne and DEM moving into that direction.
And it is very easy to compete with KrF on this topic, actually they have made it very easy by complete lack of actions in the past years.”
You are right.
About KrF: Most of them support Barnevernet regardless, and lots of individual KrF supporters and several Christian organisations close to KrF are heavily engaged in the foster industry themselves. Criticism of “people who do good” is not popular in those circles.
A general problem about making Barnevernet anything like a hot topic in Norway is that it has never been a draw – people in general shy away from “difficult questions” like this and go for politically safe issues when deciding how to vote.
An interesting article about freedom of speech in general about child protection of an expert psychologist also acting as a lay judge
http://www.advokatbladet.no/2017/03/psykolog-kritiserte-barnevernet-og-fikk-trobbel-som-meddommer/
A lay judge talking about injustice, article in Norwegian: http://www.nyttiuka.no/default.aspx?menu=617&id=65604
Does more responsibilty comes with more supervision/influence? or is it about even bigger money pump towards the private actors of child welfare?
http://www.aftenbladet.no/innenriks/Horne-gir-kommunene-storre-ansvar-for-sarbare-barn-541450b.html
I am a bit shocked about an idea in a post I found due to googling:
http://www.forandringsfabrikken.no/barnevernet-ma-fa-snakke-med-barna-helt-fra-starten/
The idea is that child welfare should be able to talk to kids without formal investigations.
There were cases were it has been proven that child welfare was asking leading questions… I do not think it is a good idea at all.
I would say talk to the child before an emergency care decision in the cases in the gray area. Strengthen the legal safety by either obligatory recording for all the talk, uncutted version — at least for all evidence taken from the talk with the child — or the presence of the lawyer for the parents.
There would be much less international scandal if there were lots of formal investigations, also dismissed instead of so many emergency care decisions.
Also, reverting emergency decisions after a few days after they are known to be unnecessary could help significantly with the international scandal.
Moving talks out from formal investigation is just pouring oil onto the fire and should be immeadiately dismissed.
The young people in Forandringsfabrikken (The Factory of Change) are former cps children who want more cps care and more “done2 for them when they are in cps care. A common denominator is that their parents are air for them. No doubt some of them may have been really mistreated at home. If not, the cps tells them, and makes out the cps and the children are allies against parents.
Among them may also be youngsters in teenage opposition to their parents, who complain to the cps that their parents do not this and that, and who therefore thing they will be freer in cps care. The cps of course agrees.
I understand.
Nevertheless, further weakening legal warranties sounds like a crazy idea and being completely blind about an already ongoing international scandal, having Barnevernet on the agenda of Parliamentary Assembly of Council of Europe as well as negotiations between Norway and the EU (European Parliament at least).
Some fresh, excellent news articles:
http://www.dagsavisen.no/nyemeninger/hvorfor-alt-sinne-mot-barnevernet-de-vil-jo-bare-hjelpe-1.950161
http://idag.no/debattinnlegg/maktmisbruk-i-barnevernet/19.26003
This is by Ken Joar Olsen, the father of baby Aria, cf
It is a very good article indeed.
PS: It is a bit confusing about Arian, the Indian child in the article heading this thread, and Aria, who is a Norwegian child – they are two different children.
and also
http://idag.no/debattinnlegg/barnevernet-en-trussel-eller-et-vern/19.25983
This is a very good article. I’ll see if we can get an English translation. The author, Merete Nykrem, is a member of Partiet De Kristne (the conservative The Christian Party), a rather small party, trying to open people’s eyes about Barnevernet. Their own eyes are in other words considerably more open eyes than Kristelig Folkeparti (the Christian People’s Party), which wants more and more power to Barnevernet.
I wonder what has happened to barnefjern side — redirects to website suspended page…
Also Frie Ytringer blog is down since a while…
I can only hope it is not censorship by Norwegian state??
I don’t know who has been running the Barnefjern (child-remove) site and have not heard anything about why it has been taken off the web. But my general experience is that very many web sites dedicated to cps criticism start up very cocky, then go on for a year or two, until the editor gets tired, or disappointed that nothing much happens. Most of cps victims have naïve ideas about accomplishing something quickly, and unfortunately they do not understand that it is valuable to just leave the published material there even if one ceases to update (cf http://www.barnasrett.no, not updated any more, but a lot of valuable info is there).
Jan Simonsen’s blog “Frie Ytringer” (free statements) I do know about, though, at least I know what Jan was told. It could not be maintained on the server he used, and he took steps to have it transferred to another site with some more steady people for back-up etc. But the copy made at the old place before the site was removed from there, turned out to be so deficient that the new ones could not get up any archives based on it. Lots of people in the computer-related publishing field are just youngsters who want something new every day. Oh well – – –
Thanks for the insights!
An interesting article in Dagbladet (what a surprise! I found their articles in the last one year pretty unbalanced and one-sided, with no commenting options)
http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/vi-jobber-ikke-for-barnas-beste-ved-a-knuse-foreldrene-de-blir-en-pariakaste/67540753
Einar Salvesen and Kari Killén (!) and 18 more expert psychologists formed a competence network for quality in child welfare and the group has important proposals.
@Marianne: do you have any comments here?
I am afraid I have.
http://forum.r-b-v.net/viewtopic.php?f=113&t=8659
My misgivings especially here:
http://forum.r-b-v.net/viewtopic.php?p=38849#p38849
The organisation is named KIB = nettverk for kvalitet i barnevern (network for quality in child protection). There are some good suggestions, such as to abolish the child-professional commission. (But they want to replace it with themselves guiding and instructing!) But by and large this rather clearly means that all these “experts” in KIB want to continue in the driver’s seat. They may SAY that they haven’t done too well so far and that they have to do things differently and come up with new ideas and procedures, but NOT ONE of them have said anything in the neighbourhood of regretting what they have been doing for years. They want more psychology and psychiatry in every cps case.
So this is a bunch of people who are a bit worried that perhaps the system will not have quite such an easy time continuing, then they will be out of a job, unless they act together with the authorities to do MORE.
The KIB people The very fact that Salvesen “had met a lady kalled Kari Killén” (well, cps victims have told him about her for some years, but I suppose they are beneath listening to?) and now wants to collaborate with her, speaks for itself. It is, albeit with some grotesque exaggeration (but I have already heard somebody express this “comparison”), as if at the end of the 2nd WW, Himmler said that they had not quite succeeded in their project with the concentration camps, so now the SS wanted to discuss newer methods which they would use, making it more cosy in the camps.
There is some discussion about this KIB organization on Facebook today, Marianne. I have shared this comment in the discussion. I’m pretty sure you don’t mind but if you do please let me know and I will delete it. I am skeptical of this group as well. I guess we’ll have to see if Killan makes any concessions or confessions at this upcoming meeting on June 12th (I think).
Of course I don’t mind. First of all I leave it to your good sense whether to quote anything I write. Secondly, I do not enforce my copyright even when it is exclusive, because I do not write to make money. Also, I think one should always bear in mind that whatever one writes publicly has a tendency to be quoted in a different context. If that draws fury from some readers, one has to bear it! Don’t you worry, I have been called everything under the sun regarding my work for cps victims.
Thank you, Marianne. I think your opinion on this issue is very valuable and should be a part of the discussion and not just because I agree with it. Please know that I will always attempt to do my best to make sure anything I quote from you is in the proper context. I know you already know this but I just wanted others to know that I would attempt the same with anyone.
We both know the reason you have been called everything under the sun. It is because your opinions have been consistently correct.
Last of all, Chris, even if I had minded, here is the info DiT has printed in the right hand column:
“Copyright info:
All material authored by Delight in Truth may be reblogged and re-posted with reference and link to the site of origin.”
Thanks for sharing this with me, Marianne. I hadn’t seen this before. I will put a link to the quote I posted in case anyone wishes to check on my source.
I mean: It would then seem a bit silly if comments were going to be more restricted than DiT’s own articles and posts.
Indeed. Transparency has always been important to you and that’s one of the reasons why your opinion is so highly respected.
Maybe I will find a place to put this same statement on my blog just so that contributors know that I feel the same as Chris (DiT) Prunean.
Hi Marianne.
I searched the Redd Vare Barn for the term “Kongsberg” and found a few references but not any opinion of yours about what is happening there. Here are two links that talk about the “success” at Kongsberg where children are supposedly place with relatives before strangers.
If the following reports are accurate, it seems like a completely different CPS than the one found in the rest of Norway. Will you give me your opinion about what is happening there?
Links:
http://www.tv2.no/a/8942802/
http://kommunal-rapport.no/kommuneprofilen-2016/2016/12/inviterte-familien-inn-i-barnevernssakene
About abolishing Fylkesnemnda and having some guidance instead: perhaps due to mistranslation by Google but I welcome this: separating the body for legal remedy and the body for guidance is a good idea.
As far as I understand, the members of KIB are also members in the Norwegian Psychological Association and this group could be interpreted as an ad-hoc group of them? It is pretty normal that such associations try to provide guidance especially on new research results and interpreting them. However the bodies for guidance should have nothing to do with legal remedy, that is a completely different story and conflicting roles could arise by mixing the two!
I also welcome the idea to start child welfare cases in (normal) district courts. I have read some ideas to create some special courts which I think is crazy. It is important that judges who deal with whatever other cases get to deal with child welfare cases at first instance…
witness testimonies.
You might be correct about they want more psychology and not less — not a big surprisal knowing who are there — and I agree with you. Even expert psychologist can bring only some indirect evidence to the court, and the interpretation shall be subject to all other evidences, especially testimonies by witnesses. Witness testimonies must be far more crucial than psychology! This could be out of the scope for investigation for a group like KIB.
I agree about lack of regretting (especially in public) — only Einar Salvesen made such a step.
About Kari Killén I have seen confusing comments even among blogs who are critical of child welfare. Some (including you) see her as kind of a master mind behind the abuses of public authority, however some say she is a theorerical researcher and likely her research is scientifically valid but then brought completely out of context and abused in day by day practice.
Of course the question arises, why have not Kari Killén publicly criticized the abuse of her theories in the past decade (at least I could not find that by Google). At least she speaks of bad education at the moment — very very litle step by her, I agree. I am not sure if she intends to admit as little as necessary or is she at the start of the journey to understand how her theories are used in practice…
Dialogues in private, discussions in public and willingness to face reality altogether is a must in order to step ahead…
Abolishing Fylkesnemnda has nothing to do with abolishing the child-professional commission (Barnefaglig kommisjon). Actually, when/if the state abolishes Fylkesnemnda, they will take the cases back to the district courts instead, BUT they have said that the cases are so special that only a few district courts in the country have the requisite expertise and must take them all – it will be Fylkesnemnda again, with added power and prestige.
There is no doubt about Killén; I have read her textbooks and parts of her doctoral dissertation, and know quite a bit about her influence. The dissertation concludes widely about 19 cases of which 2 are taken as the basis for comparison (in those two ‘there had been no child abuse’).
Thanks, I did not know aboyut Barnefaglig kommisjon, probably I did not recognize the body is different due to poor Google translation.
Why are there special courts required? Anything else than trying to find a partial tribunal (cf. Article 6 of ECHR) ??
I admit summoning the children can make it necessary to have closed hearings — perhaps only the jugde and the lawyers representing the parties to be present, in case of alleged sexual abuse of whatever. And then the recordings to be shown to all parties, in case of sensitive testimony, still behind closed doors. Any court could do that!
A fresh scandal about a “non-profit” foundation taking significant amount of money out of Norwegian budget, spending lots of money not on the foster homes:
http://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks/barnevernsmilliardene/horne-kaller-inn-bufdir-paa-teppet-etter-vg-avsloering/a/23993098/
The most interesting is the way Bufdir is reacting… I have the gut feeling they might have something to hide…
For me it is interesting to see a huge amount of Pentatonix related comments on this blog exactly when there is a juicy child welfare scandal going on in Norway… It is not the first time I have observed this.
It is a good point, Jasper. It is amazing how popular Pentatonix has been with Christians even though certain members choose to continue to live in sin. It is an important issue and Christians are spread thin because of so many different spiritual battle being fought at the present time.
I believe the battle in Norway is of a spiritual nature. Stealing is wrong but the stealing of children takes stealing to a different level. If you read Ephesians chapter 6, it speaks about the battle we face. I will quote the section I am referring to here:
10 “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. 11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. 13 Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. 14 Stand firm therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, 15 and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; 16 in addition to all, taking up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”
This truth is why I think some Christians have a very good sense of the battles we face and their seriousness.
A fresh Norwegian Article with very very important quotes from the Ministry of Children and Equality:
«I de tilfeller der private aktører tilbyr kjeder av tjenester og tiltak, og kanskje også evaluerer tiltaket, kan dette gi rollekonflikter og habilitetsproblemer. Det er uheldig dersom den samme private aktøren vurderer behov for tiltak samtidig som aktøren tilbyr, og tjener penger på, tiltaket.»
«Barnevernloven inneholder ingen lovhjemmel som gir det offentlige adgang til å delegere offentlig myndighetsutøvelse til private. Det å åpne for slik delegasjon har vært ansett som uaktuelt siden dette vil være lite forenlig med grunnleggende rettssikkerhetshensyn på området»
Google-translated:
“In cases where private actors offer chains of services and measures, and may also evaluate the measure, this can cause role-related conflicts and hability issues. It is unfortunate if the same private actor assesses the need for action at the same time as the player offers and earns the measure. ”
“The Child Welfare Act contains no legal authority that allows public access to delegate public authority to private individuals. Opening such a delegation has been considered to be inaccurate since this would be incompatible with basic legal certainty in the area, ”
http://www.juristkontakt.no/i/2017/4/juko-2017-04b-322