Member

I therefore encourage the Government to review what has happened in Wales, but maybe with a different set of research and evidence than we have heard today. A recent literature review of 37 peer-reviewed studies noted the tendency to conflate correlation with causation. It also noted unrepresentative samples. There is a problem in Wales, by the way, with incomplete data-gathering, as different localities often collect data in different ways. Some of it seems ideological to me, rather than scientific assertions being normalised. I suggest that the UK Government should look at Wales, but not emulate it. For those of us who are concerned about this overreach by the state into the autonomy of parents who love their children and so on, conflating this with abuse is a really unworthy way of conducting a serious discussion. We all want children to be safe. Some people think that a tap on the leg is the same as abuse; it is not.