Restrictive practice in disabilities and what CCTV cameras revealed in a Disability School Without the cameras footage no one would have known what had happened...the children were nonverbal...
I had to let a support worker go after I asked for a kiddilock on his car to be used when James is in it because he tends to open and shut the car door for fun but so dangerous. We couldn’t find a kiddilock on the workers car, so I asked if he could in future when he gets a car he had talked about to make sure it has a kiddi lock on it, however the situation then escalated to me the mother being accused of restrictive practices by the worker and his business partner, for wanting a kiddi lock when they take my son out… spare me – those restrictive practices he was calling the kiddi car lock are not that, but are incidents that evil workers and teachers do to special needs kids in schools and respite and day programs tying them up, locking them in rooms etc. Not just keeping someone safe from danger in the car, or any child for that matter.
I talked to the NDIS Quality commission and they said that a kiddi lock on a car is no longer considered a restrictive practice in disabilities for transporting those who have disabilities and are at safety risk. They are considered a reasonable safety measure especially if your disability child or person is prone to opening them while a car is moving or even when it stops and they can get out. They also said a seatbelt extra protection part is also permissible and does not need a special permission sought for it. They said they are new rules and educational information.
This year I wrote on the SNAPS case refer to my previous posts – where a worker a young girl of 23 years old and the client she was transporting an 8 year old boy were both killed when he jumped out of the van she was transporting him in and ran along the busy pacific hight when the worker had stopped at lights. The worker, Rachel, also jumped out of the car to chase him and they were both killed by a truck on the highway, even worse the was that Rachel was pregnant. It went to court recently this year and ADHIC and the organization SNAPs were both prosecuted and fined for the tragedy. I told my worker about it and said I don’t want this to happen to James or you, you have to get a kiddi lock on your car if you want to work with him in future. The organization in the SNAPs case never informed the worker that they boy needed a harness as well as seat belt and could escape and that he also needed another worker to sit with him. Probably saving money or lack or communication, or couldn’t be bothered to tell her or all of the above. The worker paid for it with her life, her unborn baby’s life, and the young boy lost his life who she was caring for.
I will talk about that as much has been revealed in Britain due to CCTV cameras picking up and filming children in a school being held in ‘safe’ rooms so frightening as parents never knew until it was revealed.
Noted by NDIS and definition of “Restrictive Practice means any practice or intervention that has the effect of restricting the rights of freedom of movement of a person with disability” Under the NDIS their Restrictive Practices and Behaviour Support Rules 2018 certain restrictive practices are subject to regulation.”
However, the kiddilock now a reasonable safety measure has only just been brought out by NDIS as new news. The restrictive practices which must be regulated are Seclusion, Chemical Restraint, Mechanical Restraint, and physical restraint which does not include the “use of hands-on technique in a reflexive (I would say gentle firm way) way ;to guide aor redirect aperson away from potential harm/injury, consistent with what could reasonably be considered as the exercise of care towards a person…”
Recently an article from Britain (BBC News Investigations, 14 October 2021, Noel Titheradge) found that teachers in a special needs school were using “safe rooms” to put children in , who were non verbal children this was only caught by cctv cameras which came to light as having filmed the children in the seclusion rooms. This is so nasty and a breach of human rights to do this to children, any children, let alone special needs children! They note that an investigation as been launched into ‘organised abuse’ at a special school in London after CCTV was discovered of pupils being physically assaulted and neglected.
Note CCTV CAMERAS were how they discovered the abuse, otherwise it would have been hidden! The videos, found by staff, show pupils being mistreated in padded seclusion rooms between 2014 and 2017. How dare they to that to poor little kids who cannot defend themselves, shocking, the teachers should be in prison. The article also notes one parent said he didn’t know the rooms existed until he collected his ‘distressed’ autistic son from one.
The school, Whitefield School in WAlthamsotw, north-east London, has over 300 pupils aged between three and 19, many of whom have severe or complex needs and are unable to communicate verbally…
BBC news the article said has learned that in May a staff member found a significant number of videos showing children in the school’s seclusion rooms. In some of the footage, pupils are physically assaulted and neglected. “Seclusion rooms are used in schools when it is thought a pupil needs to be isolate from a classroom during the school day” .
It noted that in July, the school wrote to parents about the discover of the evidence of ‘alleged child neglect’
And the Metropolitan police had now review a significant amount of CCTV footage (thank God there was footage to review!) and the local authority has launched an investigation into the ‘organized and complex abuse’ at the school.
This is defined as ‘abuse involving one or more abusers and a number of related or non-related abused children” They also noted that in January 2017 the school was rated inadequate after an inspection found a small number of pupils had been placed in secure rooms ‘for repeated and prolonged periods of time.”
The report on this said that while the school referred to them as ‘calming rooms’ this was not an accurate description of the three secure, padded and bare spaces that are used. Sounds like a prison, or mental hospital holding cell to me. All three rooms a the school were poorly ventilated, with doors that could not be opened from the inside, while two had no natural light and children were unable to see outside or hear clearly…
Restrictive practices indeed, locking kids in a room is no way to treat them. The article unsurprisingly also noted that this did not help the children, and that the pupils are placed in the rooms more frequently or for longer periods of time as their behaviour worsens, which it would have from being stuck in that frightening place.
One parent told the BBC he didn’t know the rooms existed until he was taken to collect his autistic son from one of them and his soon appeared agitated and his shirt was ripped.
“He was very upset, very distressed, he added, “I thought it was diabolical”
The boy’s mother said her son would not have been able to communicate any of the experiences in the rooms because of the nature of his disability. She said that although called frequently the school about the ways to manage his behaviour the use of these rooms was never mentioned.
She said “you send your child to school because you expect that they are going to be treated with dignity and respect, …I think of calming room, in a safe place, beanbags, soft lighting, bubble machines – not padded cells”
In May 2017 a letter written by the head teacher outlined steps it was taking due to the report and inspection and said it was closing he ‘calming rooms’ but made no mention of the footage documenting their use.
The article also says that that month a teacher at the school was sacked after a member of the public saw him kick a 17 year old pupil with autism on a school trip. In UK schools over 5000 special needs children had attending seclusion rooms and seems very medieval to treat children like this. The article notes that laws there are too lax and there need to be stronger controls and rules or legislation on the use of those rooms or as Paul Dix the campaigner to ban isolation rooms says “it is just ludicrously Victorian to think that putting a child in a locked room is going to do anything but exacerbate the problem”
What I find interesting is that it took CCTV footage to reveal this wrong being done to these vulnerable children otherwise parents still wouldn’t know what was going on in their school.
Parents, need to stand up for their children and fight for their rights in schools and in disability programs. There is a need to push for cctv cameras or nothing will change and children will keep being secretly harmed and traumatized at the hands of those who do not care about them or will abuse them while it remains hidden. We need the cctv cameras urgently to be made mandatory in disabilities
sign my petition: change.org/disabilitycameras

Anndrea Wheatley
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