Racism at Essex Social Care?
This is specifically about who Essex County Council decide to report to the regulator, Social Work England, or it’s predecessor, The HCPC.
I’ll preface this by saying i’m white, and I have all the privilege that goes with that.
I am listed by the police as having been a victim of a racially motivated hate crime, solely because my car is an inanimate object and thus cannot be named as a victim. Some racist slurs were written in the dirt on my car, mistaken identity.
I wasn’t going to report it, a friend on facebook yelled at me to check my privilege and said it absolutely has to be reported, so I did, it was actually more than one friend, I got properly told.
I’ve mentioned before about the Essex County Council Social Worker who they reported to the HCPC who was removed from the register a few months ago for falsifying a nomination for himself for the Social Work Awards, he got through to the final and it was the manager from the Essex Social Care Academy who found out as all nominations are tightly controlled by her.
He was dishonest and the hearing was held by Social Work England and his fitness to practise was found to be currently impaired and he was removed from the register.
What he looked like didn’t factor into anything at the time I wrote that, despite having seen his name, and also a photo of him when I googled him. He is not British born, and he is brown.
You just need to read through all of the names at Social Work England who are facing hearings to realise there is a disproportionate number of ethnic minorities who are facing fitness to practise issues.
I am not going to post the name of the social worker who I will be talking about. He was dishonest, he admitted to his dishonesty, and he received the harshest of sanctions for his dishonesty.
I am going to compare him to another Essex County Council Social Worker who is dishonest and highlight the differences between what Essex County Council did with regards to the above social worker, and what they did to the other social worker.
Anyone who has read my blog will know it’s Gabriel Lowrie i’m talking about, a white, blue eyed, British born, social worker, so let’s compare.
Firstly, these are the proven allegations against the first social worker who I will refer to as Mr A
In 2019 Mr A falsified a nomination for himself for the Social Work Awards, he was picked as a finalist, which kind of shows how lax their fact checking is.
The manager at Essex Social Care Academy, who tightly controls all nominations, noticed he was a finalist and that she hadn’t nominated him. Mr A had left Essex County Council at this point and was working for another LA as a social worker. His ex boss at ECC received an email that was sent to his work email address, which then forwarded to her when he left, saying he was a finalist. Mr A replied back that he didn’t wish to be a part of it anymore and that he withdrew, citing family issues. His boss at ECC was then directed by her seniors to refer the matter to the HCPC.
The HCPC were the regulators for social workers up until the end of 2019 when it switched to Social Work England, his case got sent to Social Work England when they became the regulator..
Nobody likes a dishonest social worker, it’s the main thing that a social worker has to be, they have to be honest, it is essential to the work they carry out
Mr A fabricated a nomination for The Social Work Awards, that I must admit I find mildly amusing, his dishonesty however is not funny. He lied on the application form and stated that some bits, or maybe all of it, was written by someone else who was nominating him, the same again for the person who endorsed the nomination, it was all him.
If he can be dishonest regarding that, he can’t be trusted, the form also included feedback from a service user, and the service user hadn’t been asked if that was okay to use their words on something which may become public, obvious confidentiality issue.
Dishonesty in social work is very hard to remediate, if not impossible. It’s a given you shouldn’t lie so it’s not as if it’s an oops, proving you’ve learnt from your mistake and won’t do it again, would also be extremely difficult.
The only thing I lie about is my eating, i’ve lied about it so much in the past that people don’t trust me when i’m talking about eating. That said, I am now at the stage where I will tell a lie about my eating and straight afterwards state it’s a lie and then tell the truth. So many people don’t trust what I say about my eating, even when i’m telling the truth. Only those close to me know when i’m telling the truth, as they can tell when i’m lying. Why should I be believed with regards to my eating? I’ve lied so much and so often in the past, including to myself.
In my opinion Essex County Council were right to refer Mr A to the regulator for dishonesty, although I am going to take a guess that part of their reasoning for doing so was because they were worried that having a social worker from ECC in the final through clearly dishonest means, may make them look bad if someone else had found out. They were all over him the year before when he made it to the final, him getting to the final in 2018 was listed initially on the allegations against him, it was a self nomination, but there was confusion over whether or not whoever was down as endorsing it actually did or not.
I’ve written extensively regarding Gabriel Lowrie’s dishonesty, that is easily proven to the point it’s my most shared post on her as it’s used as proof that Children’s Social Workers lie.
Plenty of people at Essex County Council know about this and did nothing. In fact, if the information I was told is correct, he got a promotion to team manager, white boy did good.
I’ll link the proof at the end of this post, but basically what happened was one of my children found his facebook and it was rather disgusting, he is a misogynist, and there were homophobic and transphobic slurs, this caused great harm to one of my children, not the one who found it, but as soon as it was found everyone had a look. One of my children significantly self harmed as a result of it. At the hospital the psychiatric people actually took photos of my phone screen they were so shocked.
I made a complaint to ECC, the response was complete rubbish, mostly because there was no apology, had to go to the Ombudsman to get them to give an apology, a forced apology is meaningless though so I don’t know why I bothered.
The offending facebook posts were historic and made before he was a social worker, they were about 8 years old at the time. No excuse though, as it’s easy enough to check all of your facebook posts are private. Mine are mostly public for a while and then every so often I make all past posts private, but most of the things I post are public, at least for a while. I never post anything I wouldn’t want anyone seeing. Except for my Mum, and that is because of some of the adult words I use,
Gabriel Lowrie lied, he stated that he was 18 when the posts were made and was at university and it was his first time away from home, making out he was some nervy first year student finding his feet. He was actually 20/21 and in his third year/finished and back home. He also stated that the friends he shared a house with were responsible for some of them, that is true in as much as it’s obvious which ones, ones saying he is gay and things like that. You can tell which ones he is responsible with including some misogynist ones.
The most important one was using the slur “Tranny”. To cover up that he had said that he said that the house share lasted until November when the post was made, despite the fact that his other posts clearly showed he finished university in the June and was back at the family home in November. He clearly states it was his friends who made the ‘Tranny’ post, and lied to back that up, when he was in the family home by then and his friends would have no access to his laptop.
Tranny is a slur, and rathe a horrible one. It is also one i’ve used plenty of times in the past, I also wouldn’t be that shocked if it appeared historically on my facebook, although it is possible I knew better by then.
That is the thing, you learn, i’d be ashamed if someone showed me something like that i’d written, i’d apologise and then write about how as i’ve learned more about the LGBTQ+ community my knowledge has increased to know which words are harmful.
I’d also consider myself to be an ally for many years, from ‘accidentally’ telling colleagues about all of the men another colleague would get involved with on our nights out to hide the fact she was gay, to watching a loved one have their life destroyed through homophobia at work, ending their career and destroying their mental health.
Yet I still used slurs until I was told otherwise.
If Gabriel Lowrie had said the same i’ve said, that would have been fine and understandable, no problem. He didn’t, he was dishonest to the point that he lied about it not having been him.
He lied to me, he lied to his bosses at Essex County Council, and then he lied to Social Work England.
His bosses knew he’d lied straight away, I told them, they stated there was no proof he made any of those posts, despite there being plenty of proof. So not only did he lie to myself, and then his bosses, they then covered up for him and despite myself picking out he is clearly lying, as evidenced in the link below, they continued to cover up for the Caucasian male Gabriel Lowrie.
I have recently, well not so recently now, raised a concern regarding Gabriel’s dishonesty regarding this with Social Work England. Unsure if it will get through Triage and then investigated but to be fair, once you raise a concern you no longer have any control over it.
That’s a point, if it does get through triage, depending on how it all goes, i’d probably have to take down everything i’ve written about it. You aren”t allowed to discuss your evidence before the hearing, and I guess what i’ve written on here counts as my evidence. That said, I can’t see how i’d be useful as a witness apart from stating under oath that what i’ve written is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. There isn’t anything more to add.
Anyway, first things first, see if it will get through triage first.
So, Mr A was dishonest with regards to a nomination for the Social Work Awards in 2019, he lied about who nominated him, and lied about who endorsed the nomination.
He had left Essex County Council before the finalists were announced, so if it had carried on, then instead of the finalist for adult social worker having Essex County Council under it, it would have had the name of his new employer, who actually fought to keep him employed. He’s actually still employed by that local authority, though obviously not in a social work capacity.
His dishonesty was brought to light by the manager at the Essex Social Care Academy who i’ve spoken about in previous posts. She is the one who is in charge of the nominations, and during his hearing at SWE it was mentioned that all nominations have to go through her. It was those above who instructed who was his previous boss to report his dishonesty to the regulator.
In 2018 while he was still working there that same Essex Social Care Academy Manager was more than happy to announce he was a finalist and wish him good luck, despite that nomination not having gone through her. It was a self nomination but she would have been notified by whoever endorsed his nomination and she would have known about it. Given that ECC have no record of anyone endorsing him it seems strange they would let it go when he was in the final while still working there, but wanted to end his career when he reached the final while he wasn’t working there.
As soon as his dishonesty became apparent they instantly reported him to the regulator because of his dishonesty, yet despite Gabriel Lowrie working with children and attending court often to give evidence, they have not only done nothing, they have covered it up in correspondence with myself.
Mr A only lied to The Social Work Awards. Gabriel Lowrie lied to service users, myself and my children, his bosses who investigated the complaint, and also the regulator. Mr A did not lie to any service users, let alone children.
So brown Mr A gets ECC seeking to ensure he faces sanctions for his dishonesty, white Gabriel Lowrie gets ECC covering up for him, and if my information is correct, a promotion.
The only difference between them is the colour of their skin, they have both been incredibly dishonest yet ECC only reports the brown skinned non British born social worker.
It’s quite wordy and there is another post linked in there for clarity, all my posts are wordy, but as that post is what I sent to Social Work England, I wanted to make sure that I put absolutely everything in there.
Everyone, including some elected members know that Gabriel Lowrie is dishonest, but they have chosen to cover it up.