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22 December 2014
Marianne Haslev Skånland:
The Norwegian children's ombudsman:
The child protection people are magnificent
A helper?
For more than 20 years I have seen families persecuted by the Norwegian child protective services (CPS) spend untold hours and tap their energy searching for someone to help them against these destructive 'protectors'.
One of the many they think of writing to or calling on is the Norwegian children's ombudsman. For trustful Norwegians, admirers of their welfare state under the rule of law, it would seem obvious: The children's ombudsman is officially independent and has as his or her duty to put children's life and interests first and be their spokesman. The ombudsman's office has probably received several thousand letters from families about the misguided CPS.
Real Norway
The reality is that no children's ombudsman would ever be appointed in Norway who did not share the official ideology and policy regarding children, parents and the CPS. They have all been staunch supporters of the CPS against parents, through thick and thin.
The reality is also that the children's ombudsman's office has several dozen employees, who naturally have to share and express the official policy of their employer, the state. These people are the ones who answer letters crying for help against the CPS.
An example
Here is today's children's ombudsman, medical doctor Anne Lindboe, being interviewed, together with the government minister concerned, about the efficient implementation of children's rights through ever more strengthening of the CPS:
"– Det har skjedd mye i barnevernet, og jeg har lyst til å understreke at de som jobber i tjenesten gjør en strålende jobb. Men vi ser at det svikter igjen og igjen på kommunalt nivå, sa Lindboe i Politisk kvarter."
(– A lot has taken place in the CPS and I want to emphasise that the people working there are doing a magnificent job. But we see failures again and again on the municipal level, Lindboe said to [the program] Political quarter-of-an-hour.)
The failure on the municipal level is said to be in that so many local CPS offices have far too few social workers and that the municipal administration of the CPS is not good enough to find all children who suffer in their parents' home.
– Ingen faglig grunn til ikke å rettighetsfeste barnevernloven (No professional reason not to handle the law of child protection as a law of children's rights)
nrk [the national, public tv and radio company], 22 December 2014
All in all
One might read more about the ombudsman on the ombudsman's webpage:
Barneombudet - English
but I rather doubt what real use this information is. Whatever it says on paper, reality is harsh.
So victims of the CPS had better not waste time, hope and energy by appealing to our children's ombudsman. The Russian children's ombudsman Mr Pavel Astakhov, in making public internationally what Norway's child protection amounts to, comes considerably closer to giving adequate help to children in Norway – native as well as foreign, actually – than Mrs Lindboe and her predecessors have, or her successors forseeably will.
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Pavel Astakhov
Wikipedia, updated 18 November 2014
Marianne Haslev Skånland:
Russia is alarmed at Norwegian child protection (CPS)
15 November 2014
Marianne Haslev Skånland:
Norwegian CPS action against Russian families – what is the truth?
26 November 2014
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