LVU- is the Care of Young Persons (Special Provisions) Act, which gives the Swedish state framework to intervene in the care of a young person when circumstances show deficiencies in the care, or circumstance at home, which create risk and the young person’s health or development might be harmed, honour-related violence or oppression at home (2 § LVU).
Additionally, compulsory care may also be seen as necessary where a young person exposes her or himself to significant risks through socially-destructive behaviour (3 § LVU)- addictions such as gaming, substance abuse, skipping school etc. Whether a young person’s own behaviour (3 § LVU) may constitute grounds for care in cases where the person wishes to return to an environment where he or she is at risk of being exposed to honour-related violence and oppression is still unclear.
In short, LVU is a legal framework where the state places the child in protective custody and is able to place the child outside the home. Interestingly, the parent retains the guardianship of the child, which allows them to get official information about the child from school and medical players.
How does the LVU process start?
The path to LVU starts with a registration of a worry, Orosanmälan. This can come from a member of the public- whatever age- a teacher, doctor, counsellor. It can be a named person or anonymous.
The “worry” is assessed and a dialogue begins somewhere in social services.
In some cases, the parents are called in to discuss the concern.
The path of action: what level of investigation takes place, when are the police involved is a black box of confidential paperwork not disclosed to parents.
If the social services decide there is an “imminent and grave danger” to the child/children then they have the power to take immediate action, call in the police and remove the children from their home. These are the videos that circulate on social media.
The children are interviewed in the process, often in very questionable ways: In the case of the van Nort family– their 12-year-old son was told before the interview why they were at Barnahus and could not go home. When the police interrogator asked, the child answered with what he had been told just before the interview. That allowed the interrogator to pursue that line of questioning, as they are not allowed to ask leading questions otherwise.
Their 8-year-old son was subjected to extremely questionable psychological intimidation tactics of 2.5-minute silent stare followed by another 2-minute silent stare after asking him a question. Neither the little boy’s state-appointed lawyer nor the social secretary present (Lena Aho of Uppsala social services) intervened.
The reason we have direct knowledge of this is that the parents were allowed to review the video.
It is important to note that even if the police conduct a thorough investigation- interviewing a much wider range of people linked to the family- and find the parent(s) not chargeable with any offense, the social services will very often still pursue LVU.
And this is the greatest flaw in the LVU system:
- Children can be removed because a social secretary is concerned for the child based on actual or perceived harm;
- The “investigation” documents produced very often lack legal security and are crafted to support a predefined decision instead of assessing the real situation;
- …this leaves a parent having to prove innocence, when the basis should always be “innocent till found guilty” noyt based solely only a single source;
- The checks and balances that should work in a democratic country do not work in Sweden: The social secretary’s decision is rubber-stamped in the social review board, the administrative court and then the upper court. (This why the terms fascist, dictatorial and communist are often used, and why the term legal kidnapping represents the problem correctly)
In the meantime, the children are used as a commodity: transferred between homes – jourhems, familjhems and HBV- between people who lack psychological training to support a displaced child.
Often the wider family faces a full-contact restriction, siblings frequently are placed away from eachother.
The Objective of LVU law
The LVU law states that social services should work towards family reunification. It is excellent that this is enshrined in law!
However, reality rarely follows. Mostly, because there is no legal accountability on the part of social services. Social Services quickly move on to the next case instead of working on reunification.
The objective of care, mål, is vague in most investigation documents we have seen. It is often a copy and paste of “the child should be free from violence- physical and psychological-, have access to school, medical care”, etc. …and many parents where children have been removed can evidence providing these in a better way than their children receive in LVU care placed outside the family.
The van Nort family requested a meeting with the senior manager of the department responsible for their case to explain the investigation document, discuss deficiencies in it and address the objective of care and how that will be implemented. The managers, after trying to avoid the meeting finally accepted it. The family then faced contempt from management, where the manager spent almost an hour explaining what 2 sentences mean on a theoretical level. However, when Maria asked for the concrete link between the investigation and the objective of care then she was told “it is hard to explain that, we professionals have many years of training to understand.” Maria has both a business degree and a bachelor of sciences, so probably would’ve been able to comprehend most complex concepts.
The genomförande plan, the implementation plan, is what should follow the objectives of care. There is often a lack of a concrete action plan for the family, and if there is it is created in vague terms with no SMART goals (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-constrained).
The flaws in the system are well-documented, with IVO, the oversight body having reviewed cases over a 2 year period and found inconsistencies (illegal actions if we look at it for what they actually are) in over 60% of the cases.
So why is there no change? Why can this gross abuse of children’s and family’s rights continue in a seemingly democratic country?
Power and money!
We welcome a healthy debate on this topic! And look forward to a constructive discussion and action to mend the broken system of child protection.
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