Please disclose any Association between Minister Sir Keith Joseph, his civil servant Celia Hensman and Peter Righton paedophile

The request was partially successful.

Dear Department of Health,

In 1972 Minister Sir Keith Joseph refused two Commons calls for care inquiry into West Suffolk establishments:

The Sue Ryder Home Cavendish

The Beeches Ixworth residential care home for disabled children Hackney Social Services.

Both establishments had a history of insufficiently investigated sudden deaths. Unknown number of child inmates Beeches 1966 to 1972. 3 deaths January to July 1972 Sue Ryder Home.

Did Sir Keith Joseph avoid a direct inquiry by instigating academic debate into the theory of residential child care ?

Did Peter Righton in any way contribute to such "Debate"

Did Sir Keith Joseph or his refusal of care inquiry civil servant, Celia Hensman, have any association or historical association with Peter Righton ?

Yours faithfully,

Richard Card

Department of Health and Social Care

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Department of Health and Social Care

Our ref: DE00000904690 
 
Dear Mr Card,  

Thank you for your correspondence of 4 December to the Department of
Health about Sir Keith Joseph and Peter Righton.  I have been asked to
reply.

As your correspondence asked for general information, rather than
requesting recorded information or documentation, I should advise you that
on this occasion the Department has not considered your correspondence
under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act.

Officials advise that information going back to 1972 is not available.  No
documents are kept that far back, so the Department is unable to
provide the information you have requested.

I am sorry to send a disappointing reply.

Yours sincerely,
 
Neil Achary
Ministerial Correspondence and Public Enquiries
Department of Health
 

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Dear Department of Health,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of Department of Health's handling of my FOI request 'Please disclose any Association between Minister Sir Keith Joseph, his civil servant Celia Hensman and Peter Righton paedophile'.

Could you verify that you are saying that you have no Beeches child deaths records ? No Sue Ryder deaths and care standards records 1972 ? No records which would show how specific requests for care inquiry into Beeches child deaths diverted to academic debate about the theory of residential child care ?
A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/p...

Yours faithfully,

Richard Card

Department of Health and Social Care

Thank you for contacting the Department of Health.
This is an acknowledgement - please do not reply to this email.
Where a reply is appropriate, we aim to send one within 18 working days,
or 20 working days if your query is a Freedom of Information request or
complaint.
If you have contacted the Department of Health about a current health or
social care campaign, please visit the [1]GOV.UK website, the UK
Government’s official information website, where a response may have been
published.

If your enquiry is about a medical matter, please contact NHS 111 or visit
[2]NHS Choices, or contact your GP surgery.

For general health information you may also find it helpful to refer to
[3]GOV.UK, which includes the Department of Health's [4]'What we
do' section.
Please note that the Department of Health does not process complaints
about the NHS or social services. If you wish to make a complaint about a
healthcare professional, an NHS organisation or a social care provider,
please visit the [5]'Complaints procedure' page on the GOV.UK website.
 
You can find out more about the Department’s commitments from our
[6]Personal Information Charter.

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Department of Health and Social Care

1 Attachment

Our ref: DE00000912446 
 
Dear Mr Card,  

Please find the Department of Health's response to your recent FoI request
attached.

Yours sincerely,
 
Jonathan Young
Freedom of Information Officer
Department of Health

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Dear Department of Health,

Thank you for the effort you have made as demonstrated by the diligent links you have provided.

What happened in 1972 was that Sir Keith Joseph ignored correspondence and approaches from a concerned person about the deathof Matron Mary McGILL at the Sue Ryder Home Cavendish. In particular Matron's self imposed 143 duty hours per week (as a volunteer) and concerns about appalling care standards and poor West Suffolk Social Services care home monitoring.

The Shadow Minister Barbara Castle raised a question in the house. As a result Sir Keith ordered a Section 37 National Assistance Act inquiry to be made of West Suffolk Social Services.

So there were two Commons questions of 1972 concerning West Suffolk care standards and monitoring. Sue Ryder and hackney Social Services residential care of disabled children.

And both ended up being denied public care inquiries by Sir Keith Joseph. In fact the Sue Ryder Home was only registered under the lowest category available in Section 37 as in effect a boarding house. You may know that research in more recent years reported Leonard Cheshire Homes as 80% unfit for purpose.

The week of Mrs castle's Commons questions saw another death at the Sue Ryder Home. That of inmate Stefania Bronk. I reported to Sir Keith the facts that Suffolk Police had threatened the Clare funeral director not to tell press about the Bronk death.

So although you delineate the Coroner function the fact remains that Sir Keith knew he was raising his Section 37 inquiry of West Suffolk Social Services at the time of an inmate death awaiting inquest. Your dept also had (possibly through the People newspaper or direct) the expert opinions of Dr Nini Ettlinger a locum GP and psychiatric expert.

Dr Ettlinger cut to the core of it "The homes are not a case of loving patients but of loving Sue Ryder loving patients". "People are extraordinarily blinded by the smokescreen of charity". All the while the registration status underpinned what Dr Ettlinger was saying. Ryder registered to be monitored at boarding house standards but then played nursing homes and hospices without even having registered for a requirement to employ qualified staff. Her only qualified nurse was Matron McGill a New Zealand volunteer. Who became deeply critical of Ryder and Cheshire.

Matron McGill was visited at the home by qualified UK SRn Friends who Sir Keith was also aware verified the care concerns of Dr Ettlinger and Matron McGill.

The HM Coroner for Stefania Bronk sat unaware of the Commons questions and the whitewash Section 37 care inquiry phone call from DHSS to West Suffolk Social Services.

The issues with the Beeches were put by me to Stage 3 Shipman Inquiry (Death registration weaknesses). Bury St Edmunds Coroner had failed to find records for all the child deaths at Ixworth 1966 to 1972. So where had they been declared dead and which Coroners jurisdictions waived inquests ?

The fact it seems to me is that Sir Keith dodged giving inquest evidence in Stefania Bronk (died facedown in her bath. Matron McGill drowned six months earlier allegedly in the home lake but the absence of diatom test and collapse of circumstantial evidence place doubt on that now) He diverted calls for specific inquiry which would necessarily have had to answer the death registration inquest waive question above. He diverted inquiry to academic discussion as you allude to.

My view is that the Child abuse inquiry has to investigate the Beeches. Six years of child deaths no one knows how many. Only two in that six years got local jurisdiction inquests.

Some years ago an anonymous Bishop alumnus of Christs Cambridge used that route to give me information that Sue Ryder Cavendish and Beeches Ixworth had a connection concerning staff and volunteers in a London based child and youth charity (I cannot name it on this site).

I will however point out there is only one such alumnus which was Bishop of Southwark Mervyn Stockwood himself a supporter of the London charity named.

Thanks again for your efforts. My legal advice BTW is that Inquest records have to be maintained as public records locally by HM Coroner for 15 years and that the properly interested person stipulation in Coroners Law would not survive challenge at law. The records should not be closed for 70 years. The 70 years is the duration of rights to inquest. But of course we don't know which Coroners sat or waived inquest ... so a moot point.

Anyway I am very pleased with your efforts and thank you.

Yours faithfully,

Richard Card