Islington Survivors Network

ISLINGTON COUNCIL PLANS TO STOP ALL FUNDING TO ISLINGTON SURVIVOR’S SUPPORT AND TRAUMA SERVICES

Islington Survivors Network has been informed that the council leader, Una O’Halloran, has decided to cease all funding to Islington Survivors Network and Services from 31st March 2026. This is sudden and devastating news. We only knew of the plans from survivors who sent us the council emails they had been individually sent. Since then we have had meetings with council officers who wish to discuss the feasibility of ‘replacement’ services possibly financed by local charities. After years of campaigning to establish specialist services and working since 2018 in the development and provision of these services, it is obvious to ISN that there can be no appropriate replacement service set up within the 3 month time period before closure is planned to take place.

These cuts will mean that the Islington Survivors Trauma Service at St Pancras Hospital will cease after many years of coproduction with ISN. This is an excellent service which since 2019 has received consistently good feedback from over 200 survivors. Referral is made directly by survivors without the need to go via a GP or other professional and there is rarely a waiting list. The psychologists have a deep understanding of the Islington child abuse scandal and have developed specialist knowledge and skills applicable to the experience of child abuse in Islington children’s homes and foster placements between the 1960’s and 90s. The service accepts re-referrals and survivors can return when they need to. From the beginning, when we planned the service it was clear it could not be time-limited.

The Non recent Abuse Team at 222 Upper Street will also close. This consists of 2 support workers and a social work manager. This team has also been coproduced with ISN since 2018 after we had received a full apology from the council leader Richard Watts. In 2017 Watts publicly acknowledged survivor’s accounts of the abuse experienced until the 90s. He apologised for what he called ‘the darkest chapter in the council’s history’ and said,‘ We are desperately sorry. The council clearly did not do it best. There was systematic failure all the way through all of those years’. ‘Its incredibly important that we as councillors hear this because it’s important that we understand the full horror of what went on’. The Non recent Abuse Team has provided a highly valued service responding to more than 200 survivor’s practical needs related to housing, benefits, disability needs and much else. They also assisted ISN in accessing childhood care records in a sensitive way enabling us to collect the files from 222 Upper Street instead of, as before, at the site of a former children’s home in Elwood Street. The commitment, sensitivity and dedication of the staff on both these teams is highly valued by survivors.

Richard Watts, before he left the council, put in place the Support Payment Scheme which from 2022-4 provided over 450 survivors with a payment of £10,000. Implementation of the scheme was a rocky road with many difficulties, but the scheme was innovative and provided a one-off flat rate payment for survivors who would have found it difficult to claim compensation through civil litigation. In 2018, the Sarah Morgan QC Review, commissioned by the council stated that services for survivors must be ‘lifelong’ . We think it is important for Islington Councillors and Officers to revisit these report recommendations.

‘It is in my view, impressive and right, that the Islington Council of today is different from the Islington Council of the 80s and 90s and is committed to the provision of support for victims and survivors and is working with victims and survivors to make sure that the support which is offered is that which is needed‘

‘The direct contact I had with victims and survivors helped me to understand , in a way I had not previously, the need to be able to trust that what is being offered will be enough and will not be taken away. Many will need access to specialist counselling or therapy; some will be ready to take that up as soon as it is offered; some may not be ready to take it up yet and may find that they are in a few years. It must still be available to them when they are ready. Those who do not take it up need to be secure in the knowledge that they will not face a situation in which they will reach the end of their allocation of sessions and feel that they are cast adrift’

As the Review continued and my knowledge of the past failures of the Council and the experiences of the victims and survivors increased, I was forcibly struck by the extent to which characterisation of abuse as ‘non recent and of failings by the council as ‘past’ is entirely inapposite when it comes to understanding the life long and continuing effects on those who were abused. I saw and heard from adults who were able to explain to me how their experience affects their lives, their children’s lives and, as the next generation is born, their grandchildren’s lives on a daily basis. In some ways the message was conveyed to me even more clearly by those who could not find the words to explain but in whose presence I could see for myself the enduring harm and the continuing need for help’ (Morgan Review 2018.p125-6).

But cast adrift survivors will indeed be in April 2026. It seems the council’s memories are very short and that all the services put into place by Richard Watts and recommended in the Islington Council’s very own commissioned Morgan Review, are to be closed. ISN have consulted with survivors and the response has been unanimous in opposing these cuts and in fearing the impact on themselves and other survivors when and if these services are closed down.

The ISN office will continue to be at London Metropolitan University. A steady number of new survivors continue to come forward and our work with civil litigation and criminal cases continues. We also need to begin to archive our documents – such as the the press archive and inquiry reports.

Islington child abuse scandal campaigner Liz Davies made OBE

https://www.islingtongazette.co.uk/news/25731552.islington-child-abuse-scandal-campaigner-liz-davies-made-obe/

Islington Gazette: 31st December 2025

Gong for whistleblower who exposed Islington’s care homes scandal

https://www.islingtontribune.co.uk/article/gong-for-whistleblower-who-exposed-islingtons-care-homes-abuse-scandal

Islington Tribune: 5th January 2026

Jason Swift among past tragic cases linked to Conewood site

Islington Gazette, 4th September 2024

Exclusive by Charles Thomson, Investigations Reporter

A children’s home at the centre of a new sex abuse claim was already linked to a succession of controversies and tragedies, including one kidnapping the killings of two teenage boys.

At least four people who worked at Islington Council’s former home in Conewood Street, later named Park Place, have previously been accused of abusing children, according to privileged council documents.

When another was convicted of kidnapping a child he met at the facility, a paedophile magazine sprang to his defence.

Schoolboy Jason Swift, killed by a child sex trafficking ring dubbed the Dirty Dozen, was linked to the building, as was another boy who was violently killed.

The home is now the subject of a lawsuit claiming a teenage girl was repeatedly sexually abused by strange men who entered her bedroom under the cover of darkness.

As lawyers representing the complainant urged other victims to come forward, the Islington Gazette explored the Conewood home’s murky past.

'Sally', now in her 40s, is suing Islington Council, claiming she was repeatedly sexually abused in her bed at Park Place in Conewood Street. She is seen her discussing the case with her lawyer Andrew Lord

Kidnap

In 1983, social worker John Picton (now deceased) snatched a 13-year-old boy he had met at the Conewood facility.

The boy had moved to an adjoining children’s home in Elwood Street by the time Picton took him.

The homes were joined by their back gardens, so staff and children could move between them.

Picton and the boy he abducted were tracked down almost two months later in Toulouse, France.

He was brought back to the UK and prosecuted, prompting a paedophile magazine called Minor Problems to lament his plight.

In an article titled ‘Affection is not a crime’, the paedophile rights newsletter claimed to have met Picton and been convinced “of his genuine concern for his chosen ‘son’”.

He was sent to prison for six months, which the paedophile pamphlet called an “inhuman wrong”.

Abuse Allegations

A 1999 council document revealed numerous historic abuse allegations at the Conewood home.

The document, by the council’s Child Protection and Reviews Service, was published under Freedom of Information laws at the request of Dr Liz Davies at the Islington Survivors Network (ISN).

It said two specific staff members were “alleged to be involved in abuse and pornography”.

A third was alleged to have watched a pornographic film with a child, at added.

Two girls separately reported being abused by unidentified persons at Conewood Street.

None of those allegations was dated in the file.

But a fourth identified staff member was “alleged to abuse boys through prostitution and described boys as his boyfriends” between 1986 and 1995, the report said.

After an “unsuccessful disciplinary hearing”, he went to work for another council.

As of 1999, none of these allegations had ever been investigated by police.

A 1999 Islington Council document, released under the Freedom of Information Act, detailed numerous historic abuse allegations linked to the Conewood Street home *(Image: ISN)*

Jason Swift

By 1999, police were aware of reports that Jason Swift had been linked to the Conewood facility not long before he died, the document continued.

Numerous staff and children have reported knowing him while he was there, said Dr Davies.

The Hackney teen was not a resident, she added, but attended an education facility there.

Jason, 14, was found in a shallow grave in Essex in November 1985.

He had died during a vicious gang rape by a paedophile gang known as the Dirty Dozen.

The tabloid press described him as a “rent boy”, despite him being a child incapable of consent.

Paedophile Sidney Cooke was convicted of manslaughter over Jason’s death in 1989, but how he first came to the attention of Cooke’s gang has never been properly established.

A 1999 document, released to Islington Survivors Network (ISN) under the Freedom of Information Act, said Jason Swift – later killed by a paedophile gang – had been linked to Conewood Street *(Image: ISN)*

Tony McGrane

Another Conewood boy wrongly described by tabloids as a “rent boy” also met a violent death.

Tony McGrane, 13, was found stabbed to death in a garage in Clerkenwell in October 1986.

His family denied lurid newspaper reports that he – a child incapable of consent – had been “selling sex in Soho”.

Tony’s death was one of 16 child killings investigated under Operation Stranger – the same operation that investigated Jason Swift’s death – as being potentially linked to one another.

But a 19-year-old family friend from Finsbury, called Gary Whelan, was ultimately convicted of manslaughter over Tony’s death in 1989.

A 1999 document, released years later under the Freedom of Information Act, detailed a catalogue of abuse allegations linked to the Conewood Street home, known to Islington Council but, until that point, never investigated by police

New Allegation

In July, the Islington Gazette published a harrowing interview with a woman who says she was repeatedly sexually abused at Conewood in the 1990s.

Her lawyer Andrew Lord, at Leigh Day, has appealed for anyone with knowledge of the home at that time to make contact.

The council said it could not comment on active lawsuits.

However, it has previously admitted and apologised for decades of widespread abuse in its children’s homes, calling it “the worst chapter in this council’s history”.

Islington Council child abuse victims told therapy may end

Islington Gazette, 21st July 2024

Exclusive by Charles Thomson, Investigations Reporter

Dr Liz Davies, from the Islington Survivors Network (ISN), said multiple child abuse victims had been told by their therapists that the council’s trauma therapy service would be closing down in March *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

Islington Council has stressed that it will continue its trauma therapy service for child abuse victims after confusion over its future emerged.

Some patients have been told by therapists that the service will close in March 2025. Others say they have already had their treatment cut off.

There has been anger and upset among abuse victims, with Jane Frawley, of the Islington Survivors Network (ISN), calling it “absolutely soul-crushing”.

Her colleague Dr Liz Davies confirmed that those who had received the news were left “very, very upset”.

The news comes less than two months after applications closed for the council’s Support Payment Scheme, offering £10,000 to survivors of historic abuse in its children’s homes.

The survivors network said dozens of new victims came forward in the final months of that scheme after the council advertised it on a radio station.

“So we are looking at months and months for them to get through all these people, with the potential of them then not being able to get any therapeutic help,” said Jane.

She said the apparent end of therapy made a mockery of the council’s promise that the payment scheme would not retraumatise survivors.

“This particular thing shows very clearly that they really do not give a rat’s arse about survivors and not retraumatising them,” she said. “It makes absolutely no sense.”

While insisting the service was not under threat, Islington Council was not able to explain why service users had been told it was closing down.

It appears the contract for the current service is coming to an end, but the council says it has never suggested the service itself will stop.

The Gazette was contacted by a patient last month who said she had been told by her therapist that the service was being shut down. However, she had not received any confirmation in writing.

Then others started telling ISN they had been told the same. One, said Jane, was left “shocked” after being told the therapy session she was sitting in was “one of her last three”.

Shortly thereafter, said Dr Davies: “Some survivors had their therapy ended. Therapy that was supposed to be ongoing. They are obviously closing people down in readiness.”

Dr Liz Davies is a former Islington social worker who turned whistleblower, helping to expose widespread abuse in the council’s children’s homes. She is now an emeritus professor of social work at the London Metropolitan University *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

Those told their therapy was being halted included Jane, who said the council had since refused to answer any of ISN’s queries about the service.

“The communication between them and us is usually so much better,” she said. “They explain that they are going to be looking for further funding.”

But as the current contract nears its end, she claimed, “Communication has completely shut down from them towards us.”

They had to resort to the Freedom of Information Act just to confirm that the current contract ends in March.

Dr Davies said that although the service looks set to formally end in March, that means it is likely to start winding down much earlier as staff jump ship.

One therapist has already told patients they are leaving.

Once it is gone, ISN said, victims will be left with a choice between long waiting lists for NHS therapy or the prohibitive cost of going private.

“So there won’t be any viable alternative for all these people that have been afflicted by the 42 children’s homes Islington ran and that really hurt them,” said Jane.

Islington Council has previously admitted and apologised for decades of widespread abuse in its children’s homes.

A spokesperson said: “We’re committed to doing everything we can to support survivors of non-recent child abuse in Islington children’s homes.

“We know how vital trauma support is to many survivors and people who experienced abuse, and we will definitely continue to provide high-quality trauma support.

“All councils must follow the law and strict guidelines around procurement for contracts we have with service providers. The current contract with our trauma therapists ends in March next year, and we are starting work on the next contract.

“To be absolutely clear, the council will continue to provide high-quality trauma support.”

ISN can be reached at 0300 302 0930 or islingtonsn@gmail.com.

Islington Council child abuse appeals end in success

Islingto Gazette, 16th July 2024

Exclusive by Charles Thomson, Investigations Reporter

Tony Darke and Zara were each initially denied £10,000 pay-outs under Islington Council’s Support Payment Scheme for survivors of abuse in its children’s homes. But they have triumphed on appeal *(Image: Tony Darke / Charles Thomson)*

Three alleged abuse victims have won payouts from Islington Council after the Gazette championed their cases.

We raised questions after the trio were each initially turned down by the council’s Support Payment Scheme.

The scheme offered £10,000 to survivors of historic abuse in the borough’s children’s homes.

All three were told there was insufficient evidence they were in the homes, or insufficient evidence they were abused.

But appeal panels have now awarded them their money.

The Gazette’s reports were submitted as evidence at two of the hearings.

“The panels found them very useful,” said Dr Liz Davies, of the Islington Survivors Network (ISN).

But, she added, the evidence at appeal was not substantially different to that before the lawyers who made the initial decisions.

“Every single person we’ve been to appeal with and who’s had a response has been successful,” she said.

“It brings the original decision-making into question. We never understood the reasons for turning these survivors down.”

Zara

Zara – not her real name – said kids at the Highbury children’s homes she stayed in smoked, drank and used drugs with the knowledge and consent of staff.

She said some workers even took children to the pub.

Neglected, she fell pregnant as a teenager. She said staff then tried to force her to have an abortion.

Dr Davies helped Zara, now in her 50s, obtain her care records, but they were largely missing.

She had to appeal after decision-makers claimed there was insufficient evidence she was ever in the homes.

We reported that she had photos of herself at one of the homes. We also interviewed her roommate at the home, who had already been paid out under the scheme and had mentioned Zara in her own application.

Lawyers who originally considered Zara’s case said there was insufficient evidence she was ever in the children’s homes. But she had photographs of herself inside and outside *(Image: ISN)*

Tony

Tony Darke lived in three children’s homes in the 1980s, where he said he was violently abused and neglected.

He described staff attacking children, giving them cigarettes, withholding food and even preventing children from seeing their families as a punishment.

He also described staff at Gisburn House driving children into the woods at night and dumping them there to find their own way home in the dark.

Decision-makers said there was insufficient evidence he was abused.

But his care records described him as very thin and stealing to eat. They recorded him self-harming and being “beset by anxiety”.

Dr Davies said others in the homes at the same times, including some named by Tony in his own account, had described the same abuse – including the so called “night runs” at Gisburn – and received pay-outs.

A photo of Tony inside one of the children’s homes, with one of the friendlier members of staff *(Image: Tony Darke)*

Jo – also not her real name – was told there was insufficient evidence she had been abused in the council’s home on Conewood Street.

But her care file recorded her telling a social worker she was being under-fed. She was even described in official records as “under-nourished”.

Jo also complained in her application of being violently “pinned down” by a male staff member.

Under the payment scheme’s terms of reference, “pin down” was abuse.

Dr Davies said other complainants had alleged pin-downs by the same man.

Jo’s file even mentioned her “not accepting restraint”.

Dr Liz Davies from the Islington Survivors Network said every appeal the group had been involved in had been successful, raising questions about the original decisions *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

Mixed Emotions

Zara thanked the Islington Gazette, saying: “I am forever grateful for your help.

“To be honest, it was never about the money for me. It was the principle that I wasn’t being heard with my truth – to be still ignored for my pain and suffering over the years.

“There’s still a long journey with healing but I’m sure I will get there one day. Every day is a step to recovery.”

Tony said: “I want to thank Liz for all the help she’s given and also yourselves for running the stories.

“I’m still a bit peeved that it had to get this far. I just think it was a complete waste of time. They paid in the end but it’s caused people unnecessary grief.”

A fourth case highlighted by the Gazette is due before an appeal panel next month.

Islington Council does not comment on individual claims but has previously admitted and apologised for widespread abuse in its children’s homes.

It has said it is now a very different organisation with an emphasis on child safeguarding.

It says pay-outs under the Support Payment Scheme are not compensation and do not amount to an admission of liability.

ISN can be reached at 0300 302 0930 or islingtonsn@gmail.com.

Leigh Day seeks witnesses in Islington Conewood abuse case

Islington Gazette, 12th July 2024

Exclusive by Charles Thomson, Investigations Reporter

Specialist child abuse lawyer Andrew Lord in a meeting with his client ‘Sally’, who is suing Islington Council over alleged abuse at Park Place children’s home in Conewood Street *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

A lawyer suing Islington Council over alleged child sexual abuse has appealed for potential witnesses to come forward.

The Islington Gazette revealed last week that a woman is suing the council, claiming she was repeatedly sexually assaulted in her bed at Park Place, Conewood Street, in the 1990s.

The complainant, who we codenamed Sally, spoke in a harrowing interview about the horrors she said she experienced and their lasting impact on her life.

Her lawyer Andrew Lord, at Leigh Day, has now urged witnesses to contact him.

“My client alleges that she experienced serious sexual abuse in a children’s home at a time when there was increased scrutiny of the local authority,” he said.

“Sally described how the abuse occurred on several occasions and, alarmingly, she recalls people being given access to the home through fire escapes at a time when the London Borough of Islington ought to have been conducting a thorough overall review of their safeguarding procedures.”

In 1992, the London Evening Standard published a series of award-winning articles revealing widespread abuse and neglect in Islington’s children’s homes.

Allegations included staff sexually abusing children, trafficking them to other paedophiles, and homes having lax security, which enabled predators to get in.

Sally was not placed in the Conewood Street home until after these articles had already been published, meaning the council should have been taking extra care to safeguard children, her lawsuit contends.

She told the Gazette that unidentified men entered her darkened bedroom in the middle of the night and assaulted her.

After they finished and left, she would hear the distinctive sound of the fire escape door opening and closing.

‘Sally’, now in her 40s, says her alleged abuse occurred in the mid-1990s – after the Evening Standard had already exposed widespread abuse in Islington Council’s children’s homes *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

“They took advantage of me sexually, emotionally and physically,” she claimed in Leigh Day’s witness appeal.

“I was placed in their care and they exploited me. I spend the days of my life marinated in grief. I’m unable to trust. I fear people.”

Islington Council has said it cannot comment on live legal cases.

It has previously admitted and apologised for decades of abuse in its children’s homes, saying it is now a very different organisation.

Mr Lord has represented other Islington children’s home victims and also helped design the council’s Support Payment Scheme, which offered £10,000 to survivors.

He urged anybody with knowledge of Park Place in the early to mid-1990s to call 0207 650 1200 or email alord@leighday.co.uk.

Islington Council child sexual abuse lawsuit interview

Islington Gazette, 2nd July 2024

Exclusive by Charles Thomson, Investigations Reporter

Sally doesn’t know who sexually abused her. It always happened in the dark, she said. Mysterious figures would enter her bedroom at the children’s home, backlit by the lights in the corridor behind.

“It’s more what I heard than that I saw,” she wept, sharing her memories with the Islington Gazette. After the abuse, she would often hear the fire escape door opening and closing as the perpetrator left.

“The noise is distinctive,” she said.

A few weeks ago, Sally’s lawyer notified Islington Council, which ran the home, that she was suing.

Sally – her name has been changed to protect her anonymity – was sent to the Conewood Street home, later renamed Park Place, as a teenager.

Her first night there was Christmas Eve. She had run away from her violent mother. But, she later realised, she’d been better off at home.

Sally spoke to the Gazette for two hours at the Barbican office of her lawyer, Andrew Lord, from Leigh Day. He has handled several abuse cases referred by the Islington Survivors Network (ISN).

Sally’s story is unusual because her alleged abuse took place after the London Evening Standard’s 1992 exposé of widespread abuse in Islington’s children’s homes. This, Sally and Andrew believe, amounts to an extra later of “negligence” in her case. The council should have been hyper-alert, but instead the abuse just continued.

The former Conewood Street Children’s Home has since been turned into a children’s services office *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

Now in her 40s, Sally cried repeatedly as she told the Gazette of her ordeal and its lasting impact on her life.

“I don’t have a partner. I don’t have children. I don’t have nothing. And it is to do with this,” she said.

“It messes you up in ways that you don’t even realise until you try to get close to someone. The trust – forget sexual stuff – just the trust: I don’t have that with anyone. I can’t have that with anyone.”

She has been in and out of mental health care her entire life, she added.

“I’m just sinking and swimming all the time,” she sobbed. “And it didn’t need to be like this. I went there for help.”

Her lawsuit was precipitated by the council’s Support Payment Scheme. Aided by ISN founder Dr Liz Davies, Sally obtained her care records and applied successfully for one of the scheme’s £10,000 payments. She fully expected her file to be missing or sanitised but was shocked to find it contained evidence corroborating her recollections.

Dr Liz Davies, from the Islington Survivors Network, helped Sally obtain her care files. When she got them, they appeared to bolster her abuse allegations *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

Staff recorded the stomach pains she reported after her abuse. They logged when she ran away and reported to a different council that she was being abused at Conewood.

“[Sally] has presented herself at Haringey Social Services Intake Team, saying she does not want to return to Park Place,” the entry said. “She will run away again. Saying we hurt her.”

Staff noted her becoming withdrawn and “depressed” – yet she was never offered counselling or therapy: “There was no support. They didn’t do anything about that.”

All she remembered being offered was creative writing sessions. Inside her file, she was horrified to discover some of the poems she had written, alluding to sexual abuse.

“All the signs were there,” she said. “They knew I was in trouble – emotionally, mentally, physically. They knew it because they wrote it themselves. They did nothing about it.

“They knew it because I complained when my stomach was hurting. They knew it when I ran away and refused to go back… They wrote this stuff in there. They wrote it in my file. That really pisses me off… They knew what was going on.

“This is why I feel like they were all a part of it or knew about it. Because it doesn’t make sense to hear and see all this stuff and not know that I’m being abused. Why would a child of that age be writing that stuff in a poem?”

Sally said strange men would enter her room at night in the former Conewood Street children’s home, Islington, and sexually abuse her *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

She has always suspected some staff facilitated the abuse.

“They was outside the room,” she alleged. “I heard them. I heard their voices.”

“How could anyone even get in the building without being let in?” she asked. “There were staff on at nighttimes… I feel like it was like prostitution for them, if I’m honest. Like we was the prostitutes.”

Around the time Sally’s abuse began, she said, staff held an event encouraging all the children to have a discussion about sex.

“I didn’t go,” she says. “Of course, I absconded. Looking back… it was like they were checking out to see who would say anything. Would any of us speak up or expose them.”

Sally ran away a lot, she said, staying out until four or five in the morning. Not just because of the sexual abuse, but because of the whole culture.

“They weren’t feeding us properly,” she claimed. “We were always hungry.”

Another former Conewood Street resident told the Islington Gazette in March that children there were underfed.

Sally was aggrieved by an entry in her records about breaking into a staff room and stealing crisps.

“One part of me wants to laugh now,” she said. “The other part of me is angry. I didn’t steal your alcohol. I didn’t steal none of your cigarettes. I didn’t go into all your bags or purses that were there. But you’re calling me this bad, naughty girl that I stole crisps because I was hungry.”

Lawyer Andrew Lord, currently representing ‘Sally’, has worked on several Islington Council abuse cases referred by support group ISN *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

Staff not only kept alcohol on the premises, she alleged, but supplied it to children in their care.

“There’s a lot of adults that were around that would introduce you to certain things,” she continued. “They would give us cigarettes… Cannabis was around.”

Sally left Islington’s care without finishing school or gaining any qualifications. No longer in touch with her family, she was moved into a flat on a problem estate. For years, she lived in a fog.

In the beginning, she said, “I didn’t know that what I was experiencing, or why I felt the way I felt, was related to sexual abuse.” She made several attempts on her own life, never telling anybody what had happened to her.

“I didn’t know how to,” she explained. “I remembered that they didn’t believe me anyway. I’m just a liar. It was like something I had to just take to the grave, I guess.”

She was in her 20s when she finally disclosed her abuse to a counsellor.

“There was a point in my life where the floodgates opened. It was sink or swim time and I was fighting for my sanity. Things came back thick and fast,” she recalled.

She had previously been living in a state of “cognitive dissonance” – her whole life falling apart due to a trauma she refused to acknowledge.

“Your inner voice is yelling,” she said. “It’s screaming. You can’t deny it anymore. You don’t know what to do with it. You know you’re sinking. There’s part of you that wants to swim. There’s part of you that gets angry and mad.”

Islington Council has admitted and apologised for decades of abuse in its children’s homes, but said it could not comment on specific civil lawsuits *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

“The more years that go by that you’re still f***ed up by something, the more it feels like you’re making it a big deal,” she said.

But, she added, pointing at her file: “Then I’ll read something in there, some stuff that they wrote, or remember things, and I’m reading it like, ‘You’re not making it a big deal, you’ve been minimising it to exist, so you don’t kill yourself. It’s worse than you even let yourself know.”

Her whole life, she concluded: “I’ve been fighting to do something, be something – to not be killed anymore than I already am inside by this.”

Islington Council wound not make any comment on Sally’s story but said it was “deeply sorry” for its “past failure to protect vulnerable children in in its children’s homes, which was the worst chapter in this council’s history”.

It said it was now a “very different organisation”.

“We cannot comment on any individual civil compensation claims while those legal proceedings are ongoing,” it added.

Islington Council child abuse appeal panellists are no-shows

Islington Gazette, 28th May 2024

Exclusive by Charles Thomson, Investigations Reporter

Dr Liz Davies, from the Islington Support Network (ISN), said it was ‘wrong’ that panellists skipped their virtual meetings with alleged abuse victims *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

Alleged child abuse victims are having their right to payouts decided by people who did not even show up to their hearings, Islington Council has admitted.

Five applicants to the council’s Support Payment Scheme for abuse survivors have showed up to their appeal hearings to find only one of the three panellists has turned up.

The appeals themselves are contentious – with some applications refused despite witnesses and files backing up their claims.

Yet the missing panellists are still then deliberating over applicants’ cases, deciding whether they should receive pay-outs.

Islington Council says that is OK, because the absentees can catch up by reading the minutes.

“It’s extraordinary,” said Dr Liz Davies, founder of the Islington Survivors Network (ISN), which supported each of the five applicants at their hearings.

“We are bothering to show up. One man came all the way from Newmarket in a train strike and got there in person, whereas the panellists – who were only attending virtually anyway – didn’t show up. It’s not right.”

The Support Payment Scheme, which launched in May 2022 and closes this week, was set up after Islington admitted and apologised for decades of abuse in its children’s homes.

Alleged abuse included staff neglecting children, supplying them with booze and drugs, supplying them to paedophiles and forcing them to terminate babies.

The scheme offers abuse survivors £10,000 to help them cope with the ongoing impacts on their lives.

But the Gazette has reported how some were turned down for supposedly insufficient evidence, despite witnesses and files corroborating their accounts.

One woman was turned down for insufficient evidence she was in the home, despite having supplied photos of herself there with the staff.

Those initially denied the payment were invited to appeal hearings at the council’s offices in Upper Street.

“The chair was quite responsive. This is not a criticism of her,” said Dr Davies. “She was very professional and caring in her approach.

“But she said the other panellists had other commitments and couldn’t attend, yet would still participate in the decision-making later.

“She also said, very clearly, that they might not agree with her because they weren’t there.”

Islington Council said: “Not all members of an applicant’s appeals panel need to be present at the meeting, since the meeting minutes, along with any extra documentary evidence supplied, are shared with the panel members to enable them to arrive at a decision.”

Islington Council abuse support payment scheme deadline near

Islington Gazette, 6th April 2024

Exclusive by Charles Thomson, Investigations Reporter

Time running out for children’s home abuse victims to claim £10,000 *(Image: Charles Thomson)*

Abuse victims have been urged to apply for £10,000 pay-outs before the cut-off date in less than two months.

Islington Council is offering “support payments” to people abused in its former children’s homes.

But applicants must put their papers in before 5pm on Friday, May 31.

In 2017, Islington Council finally admitted and apologised for decades of abuse of vulnerable children, which it called “the worst chapter in this council’s history”.

The admission followed a decades-long campaign by survivors, led by whistleblowing former Islington Council social worker Dr Liz Davies, who received her own special apology from the council.

The ‘Support Payment Scheme’ launched on May 31, 2022.

The council says the payments are not compensation and do not amount to an admission of liability.

Am I eligible?

The payment scheme is limited to those who were abused in 35 specific children’s homes.

They include certain homes in greater London, Essex and Hertfordshire, where children were placed by Islington Council.

The abuse must have been suffered between 1966 and 1995.

Those abused in foster care, or in the community whilst known to Islington’s social services, aren’t covered.

What counts as abuse?

Payments are for victims of sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional abuse and neglect.

Sexual abuse includes abuse by other children in the homes and “non-contact” abuse like exposure to sexual behaviour.
Physical abuse includes the use of restraint techniques such as ‘pindown’, where children were wrestled to the ground and held there, unable to move.
Emotional abuse includes ridiculing children, exposing them to bullying behaviour, causing them to feel frightened and preventing normal social interaction.
Neglect includes under-feeding children, failing to provide sufficient clothing or access to medical treatment, and inadequate supervision.

The Gazette has reported for decades on the Islington Council abuse scandal. The council finally apologised in 2017 and launched the support payment scheme in 2022. It closes next month *(Image: Ken Mears / Islington Council / Newsquest)*

How do I prove I was abused?

Rules say applicants do not have to prove they were abused even to the civil standard of 51% certainty.

The scheme is supposed to be “straightforward and quick” and avoid making applicants “relive past trauma”.

It “requires only that there be credible information and/or material of an applicant’s eligibility”.

A small number of applicants have been rejected on grounds of insufficient evidence either that they were in a children’s home or that they were abused while there.

But the overwhelming majority of applicants have been paid. Those turned down are automatically referred to an appeal panel.

Am I waiving my rights?

Applying to the ‘Support Payment Scheme’ does not waive a victim’s rights to sue the council.

Several people who have successfully applied have been referred to lawyers by Dr Davies’s Islington Survivors Network (ISN) for potential civil suits.

However, the £10,000 will be subtracted from any damages awarded by a court.

How do I apply?

To apply or find further information, including a list of the 35 children’s homes, visit www.islingtonsupportpayment.co.uk.

“We really do want all survivors to feel reassured that they can reach out and ask the team any questions they have beforehand, to feel that they will be listened to and treated sensitively – and to know that if they choose to apply, the scheme is open for them until May 31, 2024,” the council said.

ISN, which helps applicants access their records and file applications, can be reached at 0300 302 0930, or islingtonsn@gmail.com.