Children
My Mother’s Ruin: The orphanage which made my mother’s life a misery…
Long abandoned, this grim orphanage for the children of Liverpool seamen has reopened — as a tourist attraction for believers in the paranormal. I went back to the institution that made my own mother’s childhood a misery.
A 100-year-old shoe box holds the secrets of lonely war time mothers of illegitimate children
Unearthed in the Scottish Highlands, an old shoe box contained letters from a generation of lonely and desperate illegitimate mothers confiding in an agony aunt who was not what she seemed
It’s completely heartbreaking to hear your child say: ‘I don’t want to live anymore’
Anorexia nervosa in primary school children is on the rise, I spoke to mothers who face a daily battle to keep their children alive
Type 1 Diabetes: Every day you’re left thinking: ‘Did I damage him today?’
Type 1 diabetes is a lifelong and potentially lethal affliction that has reached epidemic proportions. It is incredibly difficult to manage — young sufferers and their families tell their moving stories.
A high-pressure autism treatment is changing these little boys’ lives
Tough love. Critics say it is demanding and cruel, and the Department of Health won’t recognise it. But a high pressure autism treatment is changing these little boys’ lives.
Edward Timpson and his mother, Alex on fostering 90 children
I had thought about fostering for years. Alex, mother of the then children’s minister, inspired me to get on with it.
Lessons from a state funded boarding school
How disadvantaged and vulnerable children are given the chance to shine alongside the sons and daughters of the wealthy.
Child Trafficking: The Road to Nowhere
Every year, hundreds of children are smuggled into vans like this and end up in foster homes – only to disappear again
The number of children needing foster homes has risen from 49,700 to more than 59,000.
Five foster carers talk to me about how it feels to care for other people’s children..
The Mayor of London’s Music Fund five years’ on: How did the scholars get on?
Fives years’ ago I met musically talented children from poorer families all over London who had been chosen to receive financial support and mentoring so they could continue to play their instruments. I went back to find out whether the scheme had been a success
The academy where pupils sign a pledge to behave
Rigid discipline and academic vigour are helping to transform the lives of students at a school in an area scarred by deprivation and gang violence.
Our Family Outing: when two of your children are gay
My sister describes how she and her two kids came out.
The agony of mothers who lose custody of their children
Fathers often lose contact with their children after divorce, but more and more mothers are going through the same searing experience
Autistic Adults
Autistic children are a magnet for media attention, but what sort of lives do they lead when they grow up?
Inside the School for Angry Infants
It costs £123,000 a year to send severely traumatised children who have been multiply excluded from primary schools to The Mulberry Bush School in Oxfordshire, where experts help unravel years of abuse and neglect.
Thalidomide: Born Fighting – thalidomide survivors’ 50-year battle for justice
Fifty years after the Thalidomide scandal broke, thalidomiders talk about their fight for justice and their battle to live normal lives.
Music Scholarships for London’s Poorest Children
Talented children who might otherwise slip through the music education net are being helped to fulfil their potential by mentoring and financial support
Home Schooling
Across Britain, thousands of children skip school altogether. When the system fails, is home schooling the answer?
Thalidomide: Call the Midwife
Fifty years’ ago, The Sunday Times played a crucial role in uncovering the Thalidomide scandal. As the story is played out again on Call the Midwife, I met the mothers and their who took it and their children who suffered horrific deformities.
The camera doesn’t lie
In Britain, 40% of all sex crimes are against children, and at least 35,000 attempts to access child abuse images are blocked every day. Caroline Scott and Michael Bilton spent six months talking to the men and women fighting to bring the perpetrators to justice and to the young victims they are trying to save
Women who lose custody of their children
Fathers often lose contact with their children after divorce. Now, more and more mothers are going through that same searing experience.
Young Carers: Crying out to be heard
200,000 children in Britain look after sick or disabled relatives with little support
Dyspraxia: cure or quackery?
A journey through ‘treatments’ for my son’s learning difficulties
Young Carers’ Appeal
How the money was spent
Brain Injury in Children
20,000 Children are brain injured each year, yet only a handful receive specialist rehabilitation
It’s completely heart-breaking to hear your child say ‘I don’t want to live anymore’
Toby is nine years old. Last year he began starving himself. His parents, teachers and Doctors have no idea why. Caroline reports on the rise of anorexia in primary school children.