On Monday 23rd August 2010 the BBC broadcast a Panorama programme entitled “Please don’t take our child”. This programme portrayed the story of the Ward family, who had been investigated by police and social services when they were unable to explain serious injuries to their three month old son. After two years the family were cleared of causing non accidental injuries to their son and the programme focussed on the family’s fight to be able to speak openly about their case, including identifying the names of the expert medical witnesses who they believe made significant errors in their provision of evidence. A bill was passed in the final week of the last Parliament which rubber stamped the Ward ruling that paid expert witnesses could be identified.
As one of Psychology Associates’ expert witnesses in child and family cases I was interested to read the comments on the BBC blog following the programme. I wondered how the programme would influence the public’s perception of expert witnesses. However, very few respondents appeared to pick up on the key theme in the programme about changing the rules regarding identifying expert witnesses. Instead the majority of the comments were criticisms of the Local Authority, or narratives about the bloggers’ own experiences of being investigated by the Local Authority. There were in addition some comments which supported Social Workers and the necessity of investigating cases of unexplained injuries in children.
The Panorama programme, in reporting one family’s story, was explicitly one sided. I reflected (as did some of the BBC blog respondents) on the response of the media and the general public to cases where a family has been cleared, in comparison to cases where a family has been found guilty, or where a child has been harmed or killed. I wondered if there is a psychological task in relation to providing psychoeducation around managing the media and emotional response to issues which are hugely publicly important and emotive?
