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Melanie Onn MP:

Today’s scheduled meeting with Melanie Onn MP has been moved to April 26th due to Parliament being recalled to debate emergency legislation on the future of the Scunthorpe steelworks – a vital issue for our region. While disappointing, the change is understandable, and at least the new date is still within the month.

In the meantime, I’ve arranged a pre-meeting with the caseworker. There’s simply too much at stake to squeeze into a 20-minute MP surgery. The real progress happens in preparation, and in the follow-up.
There’s growing movement: letters, questions, investigations, misinformation being challenged. And for every step forward, I’m deeply grateful to the many supporters who’ve been pushing with me.
But this is not about letters and replies and polite formalities. It is about Lizzie.

Let me put it this way: So far this year, I have written a lot of correspondence, had innumerable phone calls, had many sleepless nights, dark thoughts, sinking mood; but, in that time, I have not had one single text off Lizzie, nor been given any reason to hope that we will see her anytime soon. Or ever.

That is what matters.

North East Lincolnshire Council:

I am deeply grateful to FASD Hub for their bold letter to the leader of North East Lincolnshire Council. Lizzie’s vulnerability to Coral’s malign influence is largely due to her FASD. Yet those unfamiliar with FASD assume Lizzie’s choices are fully informed and autonomous. Believing they’re upholding Lizzie’s right to self-determination, agencies have positioned themselves as an immovable firewall between Lizzie and her parents and family. I understand their stance, but it’s rooted in ignorance and a serious misunderstanding of how FASD affects cognition and communication. Throughout this crisis, we’ve repeatedly been asked by those meant to protect her: “What’s FASD?”

It is that widespread lack of professional awareness – and a corresponding determination by those selfsame agencies to maintain their level of ignorance – that has enabled this crisis to develop to this stage.

Even now, the council bodies are point-blank refusing to concede that anything is in the slightest bit untoward.

Given everything that has happened, the traumatic events described in the podcast, revelations since, the groundswell of heartfelt concern communicated by friends and family who have put pen to paper – even now, the official position of the statutory agencies responsible for delivery of Adult Social Care is:

“Miss Gladwell continues to have regular contact and support from her social worker and all processes relating to safeguarding, mental capacity and assessment have been undertaken and there have been no concerns relating to her safety.“

This was within a brief and sterile email to me from the Director of Adult Social Care in response to FASD Hub lobbying the Leader of North East Lincolnshire Council.

“Miss Gladwell (or Lizzie) continues to have regular contact and support from her social worker.” On the surface, that may sound reassuring. Apparently, Jane, I, Lizzie’s extended family, godparents, church community, and everyone who loved her as a child are all just mistaken. Because although Lizzie is no longer allowed contact with anyone from her early life – including us, her parents – we need not worry because she is regularly supported by her social worker.
So, that’s fine then. No concerns.

We haven’t seen our daughter for almost a year and a half. She hasn’t sent a message in nearly six months. But Lizzie is receiving “support.”
Which raises the obvious question: why does she need it?

Lizzie became our daughter when she was five months old. She grew up surrounded by love, kindness and community. One letter to Melanie Onn from Lizzie’s church family put it beautifully:

“Lizzie is unique, beautiful and loving, whimsical and wild. These five attributes were able to flourish, blossom and grow because of the love, tenderness and nurture that surrounded her in her family and extended church family.”

For seventeen and a half years, Lizzie’s life was rich and full. Her FASD diagnosis was part of her identity, not a limit on it. We laughed, squabbled, wandered, chatted, ate meals round the table, or simply sat in each other’s company. Social services were never involved; they were not needed.

Lizzie was vulnerable, yes. Fragile, trusting, young for her age. And then, one day after she turned eighteen, she was taken.

Now, we’re told she’s in regular contact with a social worker. But that fact alone is cause for concern. If Lizzie truly needs this ongoing support, then how can it be claimed there are “no concerns relating to her safety”?

It can’t be both. Either she’s safe, autonomous, and well – requiring no social work intervention – or her continued contact with social services is a tacit acknowledgment of her vulnerability.

And if she is vulnerable, why was she taken from her home the moment she turned eighteen? Why has she been isolated from the people who love her?

It doesn’t make sense!

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Thank you for reading. If you have any insights, comments or advice, please feel free to add them below.