Parents banned from playing with children

[Heracles 417]

Parents banned from playing with children

Article from: The Advertiser

LAURA CLARK

October 30, 2009 12:01am

BRITISH parents are being banned from playing with their children in council recreation areas because they have not been vetted by police.

Mothers and fathers are being forced to watch their children from outside perimeter fences because of fears they could be paedophiles.

Watford Council was branded a 'disgrace' yesterday after excluding parents from two fenced-off adventure playgrounds unless they first undergo criminal record checks.

Children as young as five will instead be supervised by council 'play rangers' who have been cleared by the Criminal Records Bureau.

Councillors insist they are merely following Government regulations and cannot allow adults to walk around playgrounds 'unchecked'.

But furious parents attacked the move and threatened to boycott the playgrounds.

Concerns were raised last night that other councils around the country are adopting similar policies amid confusion over Government rules and increasing hysteria over child protection.

It comes amid an escalating row over the British Government's new antipaedophile database, which will contain the names of more than 11million adults cleared to work with children and vulnerable adults.

Mother- of-five Marcella Bergin, 35, from Watford, who has een visiting the play areas for many years, said: 'It's like they are branding all parents potential paedophiles, which is disgraceful.

'Ninety-nine per cent of people are great parents and certainly not child abusers.'

Mother-of-eight Jenny Abbasi, 41, whose children also use the playgrounds, said the new rules were 'a disgrace'. Miss Abbasi, from Garston, Hertfordshire, said: 'I have been using the playgrounds for 18 years and it's a sad day when parents cannot be involved with the enjoyment of their children.'

The rules were imposed at Harwoods and Harebreaks adventure recreation grounds from this week.

Activities on the half-acre sites include a skateboard half-pipe, a zip line and rope swings.

Play rangers patrol both parks 6 which are for children aged five to 15 6 and are fully qualified with CRB checks.

Parents already have to 'register' their child on arrival so staff have their contact details in the event of an accident.

But now only those who have been selected for CRB vetting by the council can enter the sites. Mayor Dorothy Thornhill argued the council was merely enforcing government policy at the play areas.

'Sadly, in today's climate, you can't have adults walking around unchecked in a children's playground-and the adventure playground-is not a meeting place for adults,' she said.

But the Tories claimed the row showed the Government' s ' heavy- handed' approach to safeguarding was 'completely out of control'.

[Rhiannercakes 14]

Yeah, that's a big "#######" alright.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

It's Pedogeddon.

That's what you get, I guess.

[AlHayatZween 2]

humanity is just in the toilet... talk about the decline of civilization.

[meowmeowmeow 1]

this is so stupid it's amusing....

[Mephys 2]

OMG!

I would never accept to have someone banning me from playing with my own kids. They can go ..... themselves!

[PlatyPius 5]

Wow.

See....THIS is "Big Government", not federal healthcare, or any of the other things 'some people' like to sound the alarm about.

[Niels Bohr 72]

OMG! England is becoming more communistic on a daily basis.

[Nagishkaw 510]

Paint it red.

[Brit Abroad 166]

Good old Labour. Let's penalise the innocent rather than take responsibility for dealing with the guilty. They let them out, unregulated, ready to offend again at the earliest opportunity, refusing to maintain a list that concerned parents can check, for fear of vigilante justice.

How many potential paedophiles are on that vetted list of the Council's, I wonder? You only need to have a clean record, which means not having been caught, rather than not having offended.

*sigh*

I could understand fathers being restricted, but how many women paedophiles are there? In percentage terms it's gotta be pretty low. Most children are still cared for by a mother, stepmother, grandmother. Not all, I accept that fathers have an increasing role in being the main caregiver, but it's still predominantly mums that take kids to playgrounds.