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So if people's children are taken into care by the state – whatever the circumstances – we ought to consider the right to legal representation to be discretionary.

This country has a history of making bad mistakes later uncovered at public enquiries which would not have happened in the first place if appropriate legal representation and respect for basic human rights had been in place.

As a species we seem simply to make the same mistakes over and over again often because the cleverest of us can sometimes be the most naive.

Shameful.