Wood End Assessment Centre: Wigan's secret imprisonment of children
Abuse in childhood is most evident in the internal life of the adult. Many of us went into the care system simply to be cared for only to find ourselves stuck in a kafkaesque nightmare at Wood End. In future blogs I'll be talking much more about this. I was imprisoned in Wood End Assessment Centre in Wigan in 1984. Injustice relies heavily on silence and fear. I've done it my way. In 1985 I speak of it in The Leig
h Reporter in 1995 I featured Wood End in a BBC documentary about my life called Internal Flight. It is the only video evidence of the place available. I featured Wood End in 2013 at the Houses of Parliament in its first ever TED talk Child of The State . I featured Wood End in a Sony Award nominated BBC Radio 4 Documentary of the same name Child of The State in 2010. I featured Wood End in my play “Something Dark” which toured the world. Something dark was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and ABC Australia. I featured Wood End in a series of blog posts. I mention wood end in various articles written for The Guardian.
In 2013 it featured in The House Of Lords (with reference to my Ted Talk). Over the past few days I've contacted some of the men - the ones who came through to my blog - victims of the regime at Wood End and interviewed them.There are many who've contacted me via email. I urge them to contact me again. The police are now investigating Wood End. They say it was a "brutal regime".November 14 2016 addition: Please read the comments on this blog.