I am truly grateful for the existence of people in other countries who can see clearly the dangers inherent in the proposed government inspections of innocent families. Say hello to Elisabeth, who has written this excellent post on the dangers of children's rights as eshrined in the UNCRC and used selectively by Badman to further his cause:

In a shocking move that may eventually effect all families in the United Kingdom, citizen rights will be waived in a bow to UN policy, allowing unqualified government agents the ability to compel entrance into private homes, send parents out and interview their children alone. Though this is a human rights violation, and directly violates Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, pro UN backers seeded within the UK's government are pushing it through. How? They're using a flawed report by Graham Badman to justify the intrusion. This rushed report leans heavily on the UN's "Rights of the Child" (CRC) legislation which is a very controversial piece of politics if ever there was one. Many say it should be called "Rights TO the Child" because it basically signs them over to the government in decisions ala Hitler.

Hitler said, “ This Reich stands, and it is building itself up for the future, upon its youth. And this new Reich will give its youth to no one, but will itself take youth and give to youth its own education and its own upbringing.”

Now, can I point you in the direction of Thinking Love, no Twaddle.

The other question that bugs me a lot is the whole “What constitutes a suitable education?” question. It’s one of those how long is a piece of string questions and I can’t see how it could ever be usefully answered to suit all children of all ages and needs and interests.

Isn’t the very fact that Mrs Thatcher thought all children should receive a one size fits all national curriculum which was then shrunk in the Labour wash the reason so many children find school learning so pointless?

The author, Mum6kids, traces a logical extension of the fears I described in this post regarding certain professionals and their so-called expertise in relation to children with special educational needs. In line with my belief that learning and living are inextricably intertwined, I expanded the concept of special needs out to include any individual human characteristic that can only be accommodated through a uniquely tailored and responsive environment. Human beings function best when their needs are met, not diverted or ignored.

If there is any requirement for families to be inspected, then it won't be just the strictly educational needs of children (if there is such a thing) that local authorities will be called upon to identify and assess. It will also be the features of the life environment they inhabit and the people they co-exist with, which, however uniquely tailored and responsive to those children's needs, might also contain some small shred of humanity. Difference. Diversity.

Mum6kids questions exactly how safe she will be to continue home educating, simply because she uses a wheelchair. She makes reference to an acquaintance who is curently on a 12 steps programme to address his or her alcoholism. She talks about people like me who have had (or are deemed by others to have had) mental health problems. Not to mention the people who choose to home educate because of their faith. In fact, between us, we could all throw some behaviour or trait that would trigger the red flag warning of a LA officer - whether it's something we're actually rather proud of or something we'd rather change.

Quite how a government so obsessed with political correctness can bring itself to even imply that any one of these features is a useful indicator for safeguarding or other concerns is perplexing. And yet that is precisely what is happening, if we cut to the chase. So-called "indicators" are a dangerous thing - and relying on them to identify a child in need of help is a step on the way to branding the forehead of every man with a "P" for paedophile. And yet, if it saves one child, then in the eyes of the people who can't or won't think intellectually about child protection issues or indeed any matter of risk, all of those branded foreheads and scarred lives are worth it.

For the government to use human traits or behaviour as "indicators" in order to initiate force against people who have not harmed anyone or done anything illegal - the so-called "early interventions" or "focus on prevention" so beloved of NuLabour - is the first step towards a country that is socially engineered according to the whims and fancies of a psychopath such as Balls. Creating new rafts of legislation to make the very existence of those traits or behaviours illegal is the second step.

So if only approved children and approved adults are permitted by the government to refuse the offer of state intervention, then who will they be? What will they look like? Because this 5'3" erstwhile manic-depressive atheist with a degree, 2 children and a penchant for the internets rather enjoys spending time with her 5'11", serene Catholic friend who has a degree, 6 children and absolutely no whizz bang technology in her home. Which one of us trumps the danger to children stakes? Or should that be the failure to provide a "suitable" education stakes?

In short, no-one's really sure what they're so concerned about anymore - safeguarding, education - it all blurs into the same unchartered territory of "joined up working" for professionals who know better than you how children "should" be raised. This territory is densely populated with the easy psychological shortcuts of prejudice, stereotyping and because-I-say-so - and this despite an obsession with equality and diversity training that should of course highlight the dangers of such very human constructs. No wonder there are so many elephants wandering around the room.

• No professional dares to say that they think disabled parents must keep their children under lock and key as domestic slaves.
• No professional dares to say that they think the children of substance (mis)users must cut themselves on broken bottles or stick themselves with discarded needles hidden in the furniture.
• No professional dares to say that they think people with mental health problems must struggle to keep their children clean, fed, watered, loved and educated.
• No professional dares to say that they think religious parents must indoctrinate their children, and that indoctrination is abuse.

No, they don't dare to say anything of the sort out loud. Well, not often. They'd be disciplined faster than you can say equality and diversity and that could cost them their job, or even their career. So they don't voice their prejudices and stereotypes, and consequently nobody can challenge them, or educate them, or help them to see that trusting people - all people - to run their own affairs is THE starting point for a healthy society unless everyone wants to live under suspicion and fear of judgement against somebody else's arbitrary standards.

Until there is evidence of actual harm (and that bar should be set pretty darn high if we are to move from the realms of subjective personal choice to objective mutual agreement) then there is no place for mandatory intervention - unless you yourself are happy to be judged by criteria with which you vehemently disagree.

Because you might object to a child indoctrinated with creationism, but I also object to children indoctrinated with the terror of global warming. You might see a child with an alcoholic mother, but I see a child whose mother enjoys a couple of glasses of wine a night. You think that disabled people shouldn't be "allowed" to have children, whereas I would be perfectly happy if ignorant and judgemental authoritarians refrained from procreating. 

So perhaps we should confine our personal opinions to constructive debate?