Two fathers, Will Orr-Ewing and Pete Montgomery, have taken the novel and welcome step to challenge the Department for Education (DfE) that current laws do not protect children from smartphones in UK schools. The pair are working with specialist lawyers to bring the claim that despite compliance with DfE guidance, many schools’ smartphone policies are in fact unlawful. The fathers acknowledge that the UK has good safeguarding traditions but claim that the creep of devices into children’s lives, allowed by unlawful school smart phone policies, breaches safeguarding standards. Their claim is called Generation Alpha CIC.
At present the team are gathering evidence from parents and later in the year will repeat a call for evidence from professionals, which is likely to include GPs, Paediatricians, Child or Adolescent Psychiatrists and Educational Psychologists. To be clear, the legal team are seeking written statements only, with no need to appear in court and there is the potential for anonymity if it is justified. If you have any further questions please contact the team at: evidence@generationalpha.uk.
The one-liner from their website is We’ve accidentally failed a generation of children. Let’s fix this. At Health Professionals for Safer Screens, we wholly support the efforts of Will and Pete. This is an opportunity for our clinician members to translate their professional experiences into legal action, in order to safeguard childhood in the UK. For more information, visit their page here.