HomeSchooler.org.uk

Comment sent by member of Badman Review Action Group
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"To kick off, there's a small factual inaccuracy in this article. You say that 20,000 home educated children are registered voluntarily, that is incorrect. The majority are registered purely because when they were withdrawn from school the school was legally required to inform their Local Authority. Very few families 'register' by choice. Unfortunately not all Local Authorities take a supportive approach some being openly hostile, bullying parents and making demands far in excess for their legal remit.

As for the purpose of the Badman report, I'm afraid it is nothing so innocent as preventing children falling through a net. He has recommended not only compulsory registration but also a right of entry into the home and questioning children on their own, all when there is not the slightest suggestion of wrong-doing. His plans for redefining a "suitable education" will allow the state to proscribe a curriculum, force children to undergo testing and require them to perform for LA staff like trained animals.

Home educators view this as a serious threat to civil liberties and a dangerous realignment of the relationship between citizen and state. Education, like providing food, shelter and clothing is a natural function and duty of parents and the state should only ever become involved when there is evidence to suggest that parents are failing in their duties. The sane and logical default should be to assume that parents love their children and want the best for them. We are none of us the property of the state. The state exists for the benefit of us, the citizens, anything else represents a totalitarianism that I doubt very many of us would be happy to accept.

Rather than protecting children's rights as he claims Badman's recommendations will take away the rights enjoyed by those being educated in a child-lead or autonomous fashion. He wants to take away their right to shape their own education and force them to do whatever Ed Balls and those who follow him decide.

The whole Badman report is fatally flawed, riddled with personal bias and lacking any sort of academic rigour. It should be dismissed out of hand along with its Stalinist recommendations."