Rachel Meade

• UNLIKE Westminster City Council, who have at least had the good grace to apologise for their part in harassing social worker Rachel Meade, chief executive of Social Work England Colum Conway’s churlish response to her successful claim for damages, does not include an apology.

Instead, echoing the Post Office school of employee engagement, Mr Conway warns of his intention to, “continue to consider every concern we receive about a social worker”, (Social worker wins harassment case £58k over gender views, May 3).

He also declares that Social Work England exists to, “protect the public…” but does not admit that Rachel Meade needed an employment tribunal to protect herself, and he refers to, “the positive impact social work practice has on people’s lives, families and communities”.

Not in Rachel Meade’s case it didn’t.

And in spite of saying, “We are committed to learning from this case”, like the returning Bourbons, Mr Conway has “learnt nothing and forgotten nothing”.

Neither Social Work England nor Westminster City Council had the nerve to go after Private Eye magazine, where one of the supposedly “discriminatory” jokes for which she was condemned originated.

Rather than take on a powerful publication, well versed in law, they chose instead to bully a lone employee and attempt to ruin her life.

Well done Westminster Extra for ironically juxtaposing the whole sorry tale with your report on the following page (The law is being politicised to crush our right to protest, May Day special feature) in which former leader of Camden Council, solicitor Ray Chada boasts – not for the first time – about his many legal triumphs, including his recent successful defence of a retired social worker taken to court for airing her legitimately held views.

He is quoted at considerable length, with many examples illustrating how, “the current government is using the law to stifle dissent”.

And when he writes, “…allowing people to air their views is the sign of a healthy society… but then today’s versions of the Suffragettes are demonised and imprisoned”, he could be talking about Rachel Meade.

I wonder if Mr Chada would have defended her and condemned Social Work England and the city council for “using the law to stifle dissent”, or vice versa.

The reason these cases always turn into a train wreck is because lawyers are able to adopt a pick ’n’ mix approach to a smorgasbord of poorly-drafted and contradictory pieces of legislation, whereby anyone can sue anyone for anything; but none of which clarifies the extent to which the tolerant are required to tolerate the intolerant or who decides which is which.

MARTIN KENNEDY
Brewer Street, W1