Tynwald has rejected a call to introduce a new law making false allegations of child abuse a criminal offence.
Policy and Reform Minister John Shimmin told the court: ‘It is felt that to introduce bespoke legislation that specifically criminalises false reporting of child abuse may be counter productive as it may prevent a person coming forward to report abuse for fear of prosecution.’
The call to introduce a false reporting offence was made by the Social Affairs Policy Review Committee following its inquiry into the over-referral of cases to children’s social services.
Committee member Speaker Steve Rodan said in 2012 the number of children in need of protection was about the same as the English average – but the number of referrals, assessments and inquiries were proportionally higher. He said things had got worse since 2012.
He said: ‘This is significant – it suggests we have a problem with over-referrals.’
Mr Rodan said this has a direct, adverse impact on families needlessly subject to the attention of social services. It also had a ‘needle in a haystack’ effect by swamping social services with low level concerns, increasing the risk they will miss the really needy cases, and the extra workload came at an extra cost to the taxpayer.
He told Tynwald: ‘At the moment it is too easy for people working in education, health or the police to rely on the words “if in doubt refer” and to pass all sorts of cases on to social services. Making an unnecessary referral is not protecting the child – it is passing the buck.’
The committee suggested a series of recommendations to address the over-referral problem.
Mr Rodan said it was only asking for consideration be given to a false reporting offence and said he was disappointed the Council of Ministers appeared to be dismissing the idea out of hand.
He accepted CoMin had a perfectly valid point that someone might report child abuse in good faith without sufficient evidence. ‘Obviously prosecuting someone who is simply mistaken might deter other referrals which may well need looking at. However, that is quite different from someone deliberately and maliciously making a false allegation.’
Mr Shimmin said CoMin had taken the advice of the Attorney General chambers and a decision taken that a new offence would not be appropriate. He said there was already adequate legislation in place to deal with a complaint of false reporting with malicious attempt.
Health and Social Care Minister Howard Quayle said the committee was comparing ‘apples with pears’ - as the UK recorded figures for referrals for help separately whereas ‘our figures are as one’.
The same report also covered the under-preparedness of civil servants when giving evidence to parliamentary hearings.
This followed an incident in January 2013 when the then chief executive of the health department, David Killip, told the committee that a report on bowel surgery gave no cause for concern. Six months later, however, he wrote saying there had been concerns over surgical techniques that required action by Noble’s management. Mr Kilip retired a year ago.
Mr Rodan insisted this was not a witch hunt but lessons need to be learned.
Tynwald rejected the recommendation to introduce a false reporting offence by 15 votes to 12. All the other recommendations were carried.