Dr Stuart Waiton

Dr Stuart Waiton, a sociologist and lecturer at Abertay University, describes four key trends in society which have driven the Named Person plans. He explains how family privacy is being sacrificed and parents undermined.

Society has become “excessively pre-occupied with the issue of safety”, said Dr Waiton. He warned that this trend can produce a “very paranoid society in the way things are organised and how people view relationships”.

Dr Waiton also blames trends such as early intervention, society’s misconceptions of children and a lost understanding of the importance of privacy.

“It’s implicit in the Named Person legislation that parents essentially can’t be trusted”, he states.

He explains that in reality it is very very very few children who need state intervention, so to then say we need a Named Person for every child because of child safety fears is “ludicrous”.