BEWARE OF THE CLDF

TO THE PERSON WHO SENT ME AN ANONYMOUS MESSAGE on 24th July, please scroll down and read the red paragraph at the bottom of this page.

THE FACTS:

November 2006.  Samantha responded to a feedback feature in the CLDF on-line forum, and suggested that members be allowed to post pictures of their children. This was emphatically refused due to “child protection issues”.

31st March 2008.  Bethany attended a hospital outpatients’ appointment and chatted to CLDF worker Ellen Cooper.  She gave this worker a card with details of her website (www.bethany.webeden.co.uk). This website has its safety precautions clearly printed on it. These include the fact that a tracker records all visitors to the site and that messages sent to Bethany are delivered to my e-mail address and manually posted by me. Bethany has no direct contact with any visitors to the site.

7th & 8th April 2008.  The tracker recorded six visits to Bethany’s website from the CLDF server, lasting an average of 17 minutes and 23 seconds (a total of almost one hour and forty-five minutes).

8th April 2008: The NSPCC Child Protection Hotline received a call from an “anonymous” charity worker, stating that Bethany’s website was putting her “at risk” by naming the town where she lived, and allowing visitors to contact her. The caller also claimed that we had “put pressure” on the charity to include pictures of children on their forum, and claimed that they had previously warned us about the content of our websites. This is not true.  The NSPCC consequently took no action other than copying the report to our local Social Services Department who closed the case after talking to us on 25th April.

25th July 2008:  After receiving a copy of the file from Social Services I wrote to CLDF Chief Executive Catherine Arkley expressing our concern at their action in reporting us to the NSPCC.

8th August 2008:  Catherine Arkley wrote back saying that she had shown the team our letter and would take no further action.

9th August 2008: I wrote to Catherine Arkley asking her to identify the worker who made the call, and contact the NSPCC to retract the complaint.

1st September 2008:  Catherine Arkley replied, admitting that CLDF made the report to the NSPCC and expressing a “major concern” that we had found out who reported us. CLDF had made the complaint on an anonymous basis because they “believed this the most appropriate way.”

10th September 2008:  I replied, reminding them that any information on Bethany’s website was already public via other sources, re-stating the safety precautions in place on the site and pointing out that due to her age and medical condition, Bethany is never alone. Furthermore, by looking at the CLDF website it took me only a few minutes to trace a ten-year-old girl’s school, home address and telephone number.  There were many downloadable photographs of this girl and quite a few other children, with similar information, especially in the “Big Yellow Friday” Photobucket collection. If Bethany’s website has put her “at risk”, then these children are obviously at an even greater risk. I pointed this out.

29th September 2008:  Chairman of CLDF Trustees, Thomas M Ross OBE wrote to state that he was “satisfied” with the actions of CLDF and that he would “consider the matter closed and do not intend to write further.”

6th October 2008:  Bethany was admitted to hospital for a pre-liver transplant assessment and received a CLDF information pack (a plastic folder containing some sheets of A4 paper, crudely stapled together), which contained no less than thirteen requests for donations to cover costs!

MY PERSONAL OPINION

This charity betrayed the trust of a seriously-ill five-year-old girl who asked their worker to look at her website, and I strongly suspect their intent was malicious. They made a cowardly anonymous complaint to the NSPCC hotline, using exaggeration and lies to give their report credibility, wasting the time and resources of this charity. They are guilty of putting many other children "at risk" by posting pictures and personal details on their own website, whilst reporting us for allegedly doing the same. When we were in hospital, in need of support, all we got from CLDF was a few information sheets with thirteen appeals for money. Hundreds of people, many with serious liver problems of their own, have worked extremely hard to raise money for this charity, who then go and spend it on some sort of witch-hunt against the very people they are supposed to help.

MY PERSONAL ADVICE

If you or your child have any liver problems, be extremely cautious if you have any dealings with CLDF. Do not allow them to put your details on their database, or give them any personal information, and do not contribute to their funds. They are not to be trusted.

MY PERSONAL CONCLUSION

In almost six years of having a “liver child” CLDF has given us no support whatsoever. They have caused us the unbelievable stress of a Social Services investigation when we already have enough to deal with. There are only two charities that have been helpful to us – the Sick Children’s Trust and Donna’s Dream House. They have provided unconditional, practical and immensely appreciated support, and neither have asked us for a penny! If you want to support a charity, please support either of these. We operate the Donna’s Dream House website for them, and raise funds for the Sick Children’s Trust. (Details of our next event are on christmasinthornhill.com). And I promise you this – the CLDF will never see the inside of my wallet!

SPECIAL NOTE TO "ANON" OF LONDON:

Thank you for your message of 24th July, if you had given me your e-mail address I could have replied privately. The point of this page is to let the world know that some sad, vindictive, insignificant little person at CLDF had their "moment of power" by reporting us to the NSPCC for doing exactly what the CLDF are doing themselves, namely putting details of children on the internet. (Read the paragraph above dated 10th September 2008).

Their pig-headed arrogant "holier-than-thou" attitude, and their refusal to acknowledge this and withdraw their complaint from the NSPCC means we are having to take legal action against them to clear our name.

I have all the correspondence, including their original cowardly anonymous complaint, and would be glad to let you see it. Then you may realise what we are up against.

I cannot yet give details of the legal action, but when it is over all the documents will be published on the internet. Yes, I am bitter against this so-called charity. While our daughter was seriously ill, we were wasting precious time being interviewed by Social Services and trying to defend ourselves from these malicious allegations.

It is commendable that you are running in the Marathon, but it must be distressing to realise that the money you are raising will be spent on hiring solicitors to defend our claim in Court and paying enormous Court costs and damages when they lose. It must be distressing to other fund-raisers to see that these CLDF staff (who are paid substantial salaries - see the accounts on the Charity Commission website) are spending vast amounts of time conducting malicious campaigns against the people they are supposed to help. For instance, the tracker on Bethany's website tells me they spent hours looking through every page of the site at least four times! And that was just the beginning!

I will do anything in my power to stop people supporting CLDF, unless they simply pick up the phone and tell the NSPCC that they were wrong. That is all we want. But somehow I don't see them doing that, and they will live to regret it.

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