The Jillings Report – A Comparison

On Monday Wrexham Council released a redacted copy of the Jillings Report, a large PDF document containing a scanned version of their copy of the ‘lost’ report.

The report itself was about physical, mental and sexual abuse at children’s homes in North Wales, with copies destroyed before it was published.

The 300 page report was also released by Flintshire and Denbighshire Councils on Monday morning. Two copies of the report have been released in Wrexham; a hard copy that is available to read in the library, and the PDF file on the Council website. The online copy will be available on the website for just 28 days.

In May we were given access to a copy of the Jillings Report (story here) and spent an afternoon reading the error strewn, typo ridden, ‘old school’ style document.

On Monday morning we were expecting to see near enough the same document emerge from the Council, thus ten minutes after publication we had the following public twitter based exchange:

@wrexham Apart from the redactions, the report has not been changed in any shape or form.
— Wrexham Council (@wrexhamcbc) July 8, 2013

@wrexham Can’t comment on the report you’ve seen, but the report on our site was the one that was found by the North Wales authorities
— Wrexham Council (@wrexhamcbc) July 8, 2013

A statement explaining the redactions was issued alongside the report. The document states that “The report can not be published in its entirety because it contains personal data and material that is considered defamatory.” This means that information that could potentially identify a living person / persons has been redacted unless they have been convicted of a criminal offence. It is important to note the full Jillings report does not name any suspected abuser who was unknown to the Police. So, no redaction covers up the name of a suspected abuser who has escaped investigation.

Other redacted information includes legal advice relating to how the work of the independent panel should be conducted and criticisms of the actions of specific named individuals (rather than failings of the council as a whole or its procedures which remain). Information that may compromise Operation Pallial has also been redacted. The full statement is available to read on the Council website here.

Using the version we had seen (we will refer to as ‘old’) and comparing sample pages word for word against the copy released (referred to as ‘new’) we have noted:

• Both reports are essentially the same document; so the old document was not faked or a mock copy. This is based off exact word matches and phrases, plus structure of the document.
• The old copy already had existing redactions, by whom we do not know.
• The old copy had the feel of a typewriter era document. Whereas the new copy has a more modern look eg. bullet points and other neat formatting.
• The differences between the documents are largely limited to grammatical changes. For example adding or removing punctuation, correcting typographical errors, correcting capital letters and the like.
• There is rewording, some which improves the flow of a sentence and others that could be seen to change a meaning. We have detailed these below.
• There are sections that are not in the old copy, but are in the new.
• There is one section that has been completely reworded, referring to why evidence was not collected from North Wales Police.
• One section that was redacted in the new version is fully visible in the older version, and we are unsure why it was redacted as it does not seem a reasonable reaction in our view.
• The inclusion of a surplus ‘sic’ could indicate to another version existing.

We are detailing some changes below, but overall we are unsure if the old version that we initially read was a draft, the full version or a collated version by someone unknown. It is clear it is genuine, but who and why that older version was created and redacted is unknown to us at the moment.

We do not know if the old report was recreated and tidied up, or if this was done simultaneously at the time the report was created, or at a later date.

Below are sample pages from the copy released on Monday with our highlighting of changes (significant or minor) or sections that do not appear in the older copy.

The dots above indicate additional or removal of characters, punctuation and the like. Section 5.2 is significantly different from the old copy we saw. Section 5.6 does not exist in the old copy.

The initial sentence beginning 19.1 is altered to include ‘above all other considerations’, adding extra significance to the section. Other changes are common punctuation and grammar, however the bolded section in the new report is not in bold in the old version. There is however a note that reads ‘(a report, and that’s highlighted’). Later ‘grave concern’ is changed from ‘great concern’, and ‘high evidence of trauma’ now appears in the new version as ‘high incidence of trauma’.

Again main changes are punctuation and grammar, however one word is changed as well to make a sentence make more sense. In the old version we read Clwyd County Council was referred to Clwyd C.C. rather than in full.

The above contains two pages of the new document that we have placed on a single page for ease of display. As usual the main changes are punctuation and grammar, however 4.4 is altered changing ‘interviewing facilities’ to ‘investigating facilities’. Sections 4.5 and 4.6 did not appear in the older version we saw.

The terms of reference page did not have 2.0, 2.1 nor 2.2 in the old version we read, and interestingly the section below contains a ‘sic’. This is an indication that any errors are carried forward from a different copy, and are included deliberately.  Oddly this error that has been ‘sic’ed does not appear in the old copy we read – it clearly says “in the light of a number.”

The above ‘findings’ page has several new additions to the old version we saw, with 3, 7,8 and 9 not appearing. The main changes are again spelling, punctuation and grammar. One word that has changed is the ‘investigation and decision-making’ phrase reading ‘investigation and decision taking’ in the old version.

This page also contains a redacted part, section 10. To be clear this is a recent redaction, likely to have been decided in the legal discussions referred to when we placed Freedom Of Information requests to Wrexham Council.

Section 10 is unredacted in the old version, and refers to three entities (not specific people) ‘balking’ and ‘losing sight’ of why disciplinary action was needed to be considered, ‘namely to protect vulnerable service users, in this case children in their care’.

For anyone who has an understanding of the overall issues, let alone someone who reads the report the three entities would come as no surprise nor the observation as a whole. This appears to be a needless redaction.

In this last sample page we have looked at, sections 11,12,13 and 14 do not appear in the old version we saw. Aside from the now usual changes, one phrase is altered to change tense from ‘is becoming’ to ‘has become’. Another word change occurs that alters meaning, with ‘women are dealt with in a punitive manner’ to ‘women are dealt with in a more punitive manner’.

The final section, 1, 2,3 and 4 on the above document, is a reworking of a single paragraph in the old version. The wording and gist are still there, however section 1 is completely new.

The above is a very simple and straightforward comparison between sample pages of two documents. It is uncertain as to why the wording and punctuation have been changed in the report, and could be something as simple as the ‘old’ copy being a rough draft, with changes made to make the report flow and read better.

Of course we intend to attempt to find out more and will hopefully find some answers to questions that have been raised.

If anyone has further details or information feel free to get in touch with us via this web form.

You can discuss the Jillings Report further on our forums here…