1. Do you agree that these proposals strike the right balance between the rights of parents to home educate and the rights of children to receive a suitable education?
DISAGREE
The parent, not the State, has both the legal and moral imperative to safeguard the rights and welfare of the child. The only legitimate function the State has is to provide a safety-net when parents do not meet their legal and moral obligations, not to require families to step into that net "just in case". This attempt to proactively ensure the education and well-being of every child is illegitimate. It usurps the function of parents and it also rides roughshod over the rights of children to own their own lives and decide their own outcomes. Imposing State defined outcomes on children is totalitarian. My moral responsibilty to protect my children overrides my civic duty to obey statute. I will not comply with any legislative changes that are incompatible with my child's right to self-ownership and self-determination.
2. Do you agree that a register should be kept?
DISAGREE
Registration is ALWAYS a pre-curser to licensing and needing permission.
Registration always only catches law abiding people. If someone was prepared to go to the considerable lengths needed to hide a child in order to practise some form of abuse why on earth do think a register would catch them?
I will NOT register, I will NOT seek your permission or approval. My child's education is a private matter between me and my child. The State has no function here and I will not recognise or be bound by it's illegitimate attempts to regulate and oversee private family life.
3. Do you agree with the information to be provided for registration?
DISAGREE
Same as 2
4. Do you agree that home educating parents should be required to keep the register up to date?
DISAGREE
Same as 2
5. Do you agree that it should be a criminal offence to fail to register or to provide inadequate or false information?
DISAGREE
Same as 2
6a Do you agree that home educated children should stay on the roll of their former school for 20 days after parents notify that they intend to home educate?
DISAGREE
The duty to educate and reponsibility to educate lies with the parent, not the State and not the school. Once parents cease to delegate this responsibilty the school has no further role or part to play in the child's education. The State, the LA and the school must respect the decision of the parent.
6b Do you agree that the school should provide the local authority with achievement and future attainment data?
DISAGREE
Such data is completely irrelevant in the context of home education.
7. Do you agree that DCSF should take powers to issue statutory guidance in relation to the registration and monitoring of home education?
DISAGREE
The case for registration and monitoring has not been demonstrated.
There is no basis for the State to proactively intervene in the private family lives of citizens. Education is not a civic function it is a private matter that is the sole legal jurisdiction of the parent. I will not comply with any such registration or monitoring. My primary moral and legal responsibilty is to my child. I will at all costs protect him from attempts by the State to own his lfe and determine his outcomes.
8. Do you agree that children about whom there are substantial safeguarding concerns should not be home educated?
DISAGREE
If there are substantial safeguarding concerns which mean the child is unlikely to be safe in the care of the parent(s) then the child should be in local authority care. If it is deemed safe for the child to live with the parents then it is safe for the child to be home educated.
Place of education is completely irrelevant.
9. Do you agree that the local authority should visit the premises where home education is taking place provided 2 weeks notice is given?
DISAGREE
Home education takes place everywhere. Will your officials be visiting the library? the park? the gallery? the museum? the swimming pool? the forest? the supermarket? the post office? the castle? the stone circle?
the lake? the church?
No, of course they won't, because this is not about visiting the place of education at all, it is about getting a foot through the door of private homes. Why? Because the State cannot bear privacy, it cannot bear strong family bonds, it cannot bear the unregulated thinking that might go on behind closed doors. My home is private. It is the place that we can still be in PJs at midday if we wish, have a sink full of messy dishes if we wish, abuse Ed Balls on the telly if we wish. It is nothing to do with the State. It is not a State premises to be "inspected" it is my private home and YOU SHALL NOT PASS.
10 Do you agree that the local authority should have the power to interview the child, alone if this is judged appropriate, or if not in the presence of a trusted person who is not the parent/carer?
DISAGREE
No way, no how, over my dead body.
Firstly my child does not want to be "interviewed" and I will defend his right to make that choice come what may.
Secondly, every paedophile in the land will be after this job. No amount of CRB checks or vetting databases will prove to my satisfaction that any public sector employee is not a scrupulously careful paedophile.
11 Do you agree that the local authority should visit the premises and interview the child within four weeks of home education starting, after
6 months has elapsed, at the anniversary of home education starting, and thereafter at least on an annual basis? This would not preclude more frequent monitoring if the local authority thought that was necessary.
DISAGREE
You are like a stuck record aren't you? No to visits, no to monitoring, no to interviews.
I have always provided information willingly to my LA, on the basis that I was dealing with a human being who respected my choices, understood autonomous education and realised that the education and welfare of my children is my remit not his. I shall cease to do so if coercion is applied on the basis that I will then be dealing with a representative of the State who is mandated to override the choices I have made regarding my child's education, who is mandated to view autonomous education as tantamount to neglect and who believes my child is *his* responsibilty. I will not comply with registration, monitoring or interviews because I am not delivering a civic function, my child's education is a private matter. You have no role here.
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