THE term 'shocking' doesn't even come close to describing the admission by Edinburgh City Council that children’s records were destroyed at a care home where teenage girls were sexually abused - though it is right that the local authority is now investigating the extent of the problem following the Sunday Herald investigation published today.
The practice of shredding files has serious implications for survivors of sexual abuse who are trying to piece together their past in order to obtain both justice and closure.
As it stands the local authority is unable to say whether this is an isolated case - therefore many victims will be rightly fearful that potential evidence from their traumatic childhood is gone for good.
A Scottish Government-commissioned report published in 2007 found that senior council staff in Scotland routinely ordered the destruction of children’s records as recently as 2004, despite strict regulations stipulating that they must be retained for 100 years.
The Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry is well underway and more and more survivors are coming forward for the first time with horrific testimonies of abuse in care by people who were placed in a position of trust.
There is something chilling that amid the inquiry and its litany of horror we learn of documents being destroyed at care homes where children were sexually assaulted. Even though it is claimed the destruction was in error, one cannot escape the sense of something terrible having gone wrong.
If it emerges that councils are still systematically destroying children’s files ten years on from the damning Scottish Government report it raises serious questions about those who disregard regulations meant to protect the young and vulnerable.
If survivors are to see justice done they must be given access to vital evidence of their time in care. The message has to go out that remaining children’s records must be protected and preserved – and those who destroyed them must be held to account if they acted wilfully.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here