The Missing Blog

So This Is Christmas

2011-12-14T05:45:00.000-08:00

It is our 15^th Christmas without Damien.

How has Christmas changed? Totally. I used to be all about Christmas. Loved it and planned for it. I enjoyed spending time with my children and we had our traditions that we loved every year. Favourite shows to watch, school plays, favourite foods to prepare and decorating the house. All the things that one does in anticipation of the wonderful unfolding of Christmas and the family joys it brings. The wonderment of little children and the squeals of delight as they see the presents under the tree. I loved to walk home from work through town and see Christmas lights happily dangling across streets, bustling with shoppers laden with bags of holiday food and gifts, heading home as the day turned to night. I loved Christmas and the feelings of happiness and joy were tangible. Now we have had 15 years of loss. Damien is gone. I don’t feel the joy anymore. We have a hole in the center of our family and we don’t know why.

After Damien went missing in November 1996 we went about our usual preparations, but instead of joy, I felt fear. The tree was trimmed and presents were purchased and placed under the tree. We waited every day for the sound of him coming home, but it never happened. We honestly thought he would be home by Christmas. It was unthinkable that he would not be found by then.

This was the beginning of the new, changed Christmas. The joy was gone and I tried ever so hard to keep it all together for my other children. I did all the same things. School plays and festivals and shows and traditions. But I was quaking inside with sadness. I felt guilty the second Christmas doing anything because he was not here. It was clear he was nowhere to be found and probably would not be walking through the door. But for the children’s sake we went through the motions.

I think that is how Christmas has become…going through the motions and trying oh so hard to ‘feel’ the joy, but quietly and methodically avoiding the knowledge that this is all for show and there is no joy at all, not as I knew it. Putting on a good face and making it the best that I can for the children. I listen to the Christmas music old and new. I am trying to muster a tiny tiny glimmer of feeling, but it is gone and I am numb. No matter how many Christmas programmes I watch, it is gone.

I have grandchildren and I watch the shows with them that I watched with their daddy and his brother Damien, and his sisters. I am trying so very very hard to feel something, but it is just so difficult to find any feelings at all. I am numb. I love to be with the grandchildren and watch little faces…. but still - I am numb. I think every soft mushy, tender, soppy, warm, happy, gushy, sentimental feeling is gone.

I feel content the grandchildren are excited. I am satisfied that my effort to continue to do Christmas has given my children the desire to continue with the traditions and enjoy the anticipation of the season with their own children. I hope I saved Christmas for them a bit by not giving up completely but by making the best of a bad situation and doing the right thing for those left behind to cope with the loss of a loved, cherished child, and brother….

By Valerie Nettles

Mother of missing Damien Nettles

Missing People is producing a number of pieces of guidance for families missing a loved one. The first guidance sheets are now available. Click here to visit the Family Guidance pages.

A Missed Call

2011-11-03T09:41:00.000-07:00

It is 4 a.m. on a Sunday morning.

I wake up worrying about a missed phone call from the UK (we now live in America, though our son is still missing in the UK). I had missed the call yesterday, but it was not a number I recognized and they seemed to have left no message. I wake in the wee hours of Sunday still wondering who it is. It must be about Damien?

At 6 a.m. I check my old messages again and this time find that I have a voicemail, left on Friday, from this person who “has information on what happened to Damien”….evidently my husband listened to it and forgot to tell me about this call, but that is another matter!

I call the person back, having now realized who it is, and by 7 a.m. I am in possession of ‘new information.’ Or is it information? It was a “someone said something to somebody but we don’t know who that somebody is and the someone who told somebody was afraid to come forward.” That kind of thing.

It was the second this week….

We have had this same scenario many, many times over the years with “information”. I publically, loudly announce that anyone can come to me with sightings, tips, etc., and I am eternally grateful to everyone who does. I am sure, way back when, in our ‘normal’ life, this ‘information’ would have thrown me into a complete emotional tizzy and scarred me for life. But now, each lead is just another possibility and I have no feelings at all - just another frown line and crease in my brow.

I think that people have to turn off a ‘valve’ somewhere to avoid going into a complete melt-down. I have learnt to think methodically, analyze the facts, and place them in this compartment of my mind reserved for shattering information. It is a learned self-preservation mechanism. I am so pleased to hear that Missing People are working on a program with trained therapists to develop an understanding of this emotional dilemma, the definition of ambiguous loss, and all the trimmings that come with having a missing person situation in the family.

So please don’t worry about upsetting people like us. Please don't stop coming forward. If you have any information, speak up. Yes, it is difficult to hear but it is a fact of life that families like mine live with, and we’d rather have to bear the haunting details than have none at all. We are hanging on desperately, hoping for the next piece of the puzzle. Anything, no matter how small it may seem to you, could end up meaning something big to us, and help end this life of not knowing.

By Valerie Nettles
Mother of missing Damien Nettles

Something worthwhile...

2011-10-20T08:42:00.000-07:00

Eight months ago I was bored and looking for something to do. I typed into Google, "spare time", "useful" and "worthwhile" - then hit return. Just below a link to Appalachian Clog Dancing and above another to Macramé Your Own Hammock sat the link to Missing People. As I can’t dance or tie a knot I clicked on Missing People’s website. If you’re reading this then I’m guessing you’ve seen the website yourself and know the mix of emotions looking at the faces of people who seemingly just disappear, can evoke.

Fast forward a couple of months and I’m attending my first weekly training session with other volunteers of different ages, experience and backgrounds. For one evening a week over a twelve-week period we learn about the missing issue. It’s not a big issue, it’s a huge issue, centered around the shock wave that hits the lives of ordinary people when a loved one disappears. Because of the complexities involved, the training packs a lot in. We’re introduced to the type of calls we’ll receive and the people who’ll make them: the police, the families of those left behind, the missing person as well as hoax and suicide calls, each needing to be listened to and supported in their own unique way. We assess risk, role play different scenarios, test and re-test what we’re learning.

By week six certain procedures are sticking to the flypaper of my memory while others zoom around like a flock of starlings - I’m relieved to find from my fellow volunteers that I’m not alone. The training’s fun and we’re well supported, but we’re also a little nervous about taking our first call.

I approach my initial shift not with a sense of dread but terror. I’m petrified I’m going to say the wrong thing. When the first call comes through I listen and do my bit. Afterwards I’m told it’s gone well, although I thought I sounded like Mickey Mouse talking to Pluto. That was a few weeks ago - with each call I take it gets easier. Tomorrow I’ll be looking forward to my fourth shift, relieved that in the time it normally takes to macrame a hammock, I’ve learned skills that for me, personally, are far more worthwhile.

By Glenn P.
Helpline Volunteer at Missing People

Looking for a challenging role starting in the New Year? The charity Missing People is looking for passionate people with good listening skills and computer literacy to become helpline volunteers. To find out more about the role and complete the application, visit our website (Deadline: 8 December).

Julie Etchingham: Little Boy Lost

2011-10-06T01:58:00.000-07:00

Think of all that’s happened in the past twenty years. The death of Diana, 9/11, the rise and fall of New Labour, Iraq, Afghanistan, the explosion of the internet, the financial boom and the economic bust. As all this has ebbed and flowed through our lives, one family has endured the seemingly never-ending torment of a child who went missing when he was just a toddler.

Close your eyes and you will probably remember his face. Ben Needham. The archetypal blond, blue-eyed boy was just 21 months old when he vanished, without trace, on the Greek island of Kos. There was no instant media to report it, no mobile phone network to set alight with it – and the police didn’t seem to care.

But Ben’s mother Kerry has never given up on what has become one of the longest-running missing persons cases in British history. And her patience and drive to find out about her son may be about to pay off. The investigation is being re-opened.

In a special ‘Tonight’ programme to be aired tonight, we follow Kerry as she makes an emotional return to Greece, where astonishingly, sightings are still being reported – even though Ben is now a grown man. She suffers the agony of DNA tests raising then dashing hopes, but also meets a doctor who is convinced he saw Ben at his hospital around 9 months after he disappeared.

Finally and dramatically – Kerry also meets the Public Prosecutor on Kos who tells her she is now prepared to look at the case afresh, harnessing all the new technology available. A charity has made posters of a digital image of Ben as he may look now. They are going up all over Greece – in the hope Ben may even recognise himself.

Like the family of Madeleine McCann who cling so desperately to the prospect of even the smallest breakthrough, Kerry’s steadfast hope is remarkable. The Foreign Office is backing her efforts and the head of the charity Missing People Martin Houghton says he’s delighted the Ben Needham case is to be given fresh momentum - and says it’s the power of such hope which can drive people forward during their darkest moments.

By Julie Etchingham
Presenter, Tonight

Watch Kerry’s remarkable journey: ‘Little Boy Lost – the Search for Ben Needham’ - Thursday evening, 6 October, 7.30pm on ITV1. You can also help Kerry and all those searching for missing children by visiting www.missingpeople.org.uk/benneedham.

A Patchwork of Legislation

2011-09-21T02:23:00.000-07:00

Nicola Sharp

I joined Missing People as Director of Policy and Advocacy in June 2011, just as the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Runaway and Missing Children and Adults embarked on its inquiry into support for families of missing people. The inquiry examined a range of issues across four oral evidence sessions, with the second session examining what ‘presumption of death’ provisions are available in England and Wales.

It came as a surprise for me to learn that we do not have a specific piece of ‘presumption of death’ legislation, unlike in Scotland and Northern Ireland where Acts were introduced in 1977 and 2009 respectively. Listening to the oral evidence given to APPG members, I was struck by how complicated the legal system is for a family who believes that their missing family member has passed away and who need this to be recognised by the courts in order to administer that person’s affairs. As things currently stand, families may have to go to court on a number of occasions to have a loved one declared dead for a variety of different purposes. Not only can this be expensive, time consuming and confusing for families, but it can exacerbate the already difficult emotional position they find themselves in.

What I also found puzzling is that each of these processes requires different standards of proof, meaning that there is the potential for a person to be treated as alive for some purposes under the common law, but dead for others by virtue of statute law. I thought that Patricia Barratt, a senior associate at Clifford Chance, summed the current system in England and Wales up well when she said that ‘this is a confused area of law; a patchwork of statutory legislation, primary legislation, secondary legislation and probate laws mixed with common law provisions’.

Contrast this with the system that exists in Scotland, for example, where a missing person can be presumed dead during a single court appearance for all purposes, and it is not difficult to see why many of the families that Missing People supports in England and Wales perceive this to be very unfair. Moreover Missing People, like many other agencies that have contact with families when someone is missing, struggles to provide guidance and support to families in these circumstances.

Following the end of the inquiry, the APPG made a series ofrecommendations to Government about the support required by families whensomeone goes missing. Missing People was delighted to see that one of these recommendations was for the Ministry of Justice to take steps to consult on presumption of death and set out a timetable for legislative change; not least because this is something that we have been lobbying on for some time as part of our Missing Rights campaign.

This was followed, in July 2011, by more positive news – an announcement that the Justice Select Committee has decided to hold a short inquiry into presumption of death. Missing People is now working closely with families in England and Wales to submit written evidence to the inquiry which highlights the shortcomings of the current system. As part of our submission, we are keen to compare and contrast the experience of a family in England and Wales with that of a family that has used specific presumption of death legislation in Scotland. Records show that 171 people have been presumed dead since legislation was introduced in 1977.

If you have used the Presumption of Death (1977) Act and would like to support Missing People’s work around this issue so that other families might have access to a better system, then please consider getting in contact via e-mail nicola.sharp@missingpeople.org.uk or telephone 020 8392 4525.

The language of loss

2011-09-19T02:39:00.000-07:00

Sarah Wayland

A few weeks ago a significant Australian missing persons case came to a close, of sorts. The remains of a young boy who vanished almost eight years ago were discovered and the media went into overdrive about what this might mean for the family and for families in general.

Working in the field of missing persons for the last few years has given me the opportunity to explore unresolved loss – its complexity, its challenges and its language. We don’t tend think about the language of loss in our day to day lives but language can have such a powerful impact - for families to describe what has happened to them, for the media to report it and for the community to attempt to respond to it.

Look at any missing persons report in a news publication or social media site and the words hope, answers and closure are usually there – families are asked to hold onto hope, they plead for answers to a multitude of questions and the media attach the need for closure as if there is a way to tidy up such an ambiguous and unrelenting loss.

But the issue I keep coming back to is why, as a society, do we need to be so black and white about a loss that is neither. Families of missing people have told me that to have someone missing is to live in that space in between – not just in between life and death, but between hope and hopelessness, between answers and more questions and between closure and not being able to move on…

Regardless of the type of loss people rarely move on from it – it becomes part of their story, they carry it with them for the rest of their lives – just the same as families and friends of missing people. The language is just another way for our community to rationalise the unimaginable – as a community we don’t tend to cope well with not knowing and having someone missing is the ultimate not knowing – whether it be for short or long periods the place where families sit in-between is filled with so many unanswerable questions.

The location of remains is not good news (despite many media outlets and social media sites referring to it in such a way) it is just another step in the journey of living with an unresolved loss. The what if questions may still remain, the longing that things may have been different and the discovery of the person may signal that hope is over – the finality of the loss creates a whole new set of challenges for those left behind.

I stated in an article I wrote a few weeks ago that:

We know that in any person’s lifetime they will be faced with sudden and unexpected challenges. We lament at how bad things happen to good people. The loss of a person who is missing creates an additional complexity – it is no worse or better than any other loss but it is different. It is different because families of missing people are forced to live in that space between the possibility of life and death. A place where some days they imagine the return of a loved one and then other days they are hit with the stark reality that that person may not be coming back. Regardless of what they feel on any given day the ‘missing’ part does not allow them to speak with certainty about their loss.

Our new ways of connecting with each other via social media may have some benefits – it allows families of missing people to know that others are thinking and are supportive of them and it lifts the veil of silence that sometimes comes with such a complicated loss. As long as we try to keep supporting each other through whatever losses, the ambiguous and the more clear cut ones, we can only create a better community that is open to thinking realistically about loss and all of the complexities that come may come with it.

Sarah Wayland has been working as an Australian social worker in the missing persons field since 2003 and was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to study the international approach to counseling and unresolved loss. She visited agencies, including Missing People UK, in 2006. She is currently completing postgraduate studies in the field of hope and loss at the University of New England, Australia and writes a blog about the challenges of loss at www.thatspaceinbetween.com

Changing Phases

2011-09-02T06:48:00.000-07:00

These last few months have been surreal for our family.

We have spent the better part of 14 years wondering what happened to our son Damien. The brick wall that we have been trying to climb has finally given way in terms of the investigation. It was sudden and unexpected that the case changed from 14 1/2 years of being a missing person case, to a possible criminal case. Although we suspected this might be a possibility, it was still a shock to hear those words: 'possible murder’. We are still waiting on the outcome and every day is a hill to climb until we find the answers we hope will be forthcoming and in our hearts we are keenly aware that there may never be any answers that will give us the final and ultimate peace of “just knowing the truth”.

How do you go from one stage to another? I feel stranded now, treading water in that I cannot fight anymore – the police are listening and taking things to another level. I've had anger in me since day one, not at Damien, but at the blatant lack of consideration of the police that left our family hanging in a terrible limbo without any direction or support. The cold, cynical comments and the promises that kept coming and repeated by one senior police officer after another assigned to Damien’s case over the years. I had anger, and anger helped to channel my actions and to mobilize me to push and take up the search Damien ourselves and whatever publicity came our way to keep Damien’s face and story out there. I have always felt someone, somewhere may know the answers, but for so long I hit a brick wall. However, that seems to have taken a new turn, albeit almost 15 years on. The odd thing is that now I have nowhere to channel my fury….it has dissipated, or perhaps just simmering somewhere waiting to be ignited if need be… and I am left with a new set of circumstances to consider and all the “what ifs” that go with this new phase. Bottom line is that Damien is still a missing person and until we find out the truth we will never give up on him but I am in new unchartered waters that I cannot predict.

I say phase, as I have found over the years that my strength comes in phases and when it does, this is when we will have a spate of high profile publicity and events for Damien. It is like riding on a wave and a tide of passion – a crusade. Suddenly we find a right time and a right place to give it our all in finding answers for Damien. Afterwards, as with all waves our resolve comes crashing down again and back to earth and stark reality that we still have nothing and still Damien is nowhere closer to being found. This takes you to another phase that is a self-preservation phase, where you are exhausted emotionally and the overwhelming need is peace and anonymity and solace to recharge and rethink for the next phase. I sometimes feel that I am turning away from Damien at these times, and I do feel guilty about it –it is as though I have left him somehow, lost and alone. However, I have to take time to just ‘stop’ and back away, take stock. It has to be done, but the expense is in my soul which is tortured by guilt for stopping and physically needing rest. There is no balance…rest is just physical, but emotions never go away or ceases to exist. It is constant.

I always knew that one day the situation could perhaps change and I know that I am ready to meet the challenges of whatever happens. One thing I have learned is that there is nothing that I cannot handle now and I will keep going from one phase to the next as they present themselves and I will come out the other side stronger and more determined. We live in hope we may find peace and yet ready to continue the uphill battle if needed and fight Damien’s corner, because if we don’t….who will?? Watch this space…..

By Valerie Nettles
Mother of missing Damien Nettles

Never a Dull Moment

2011-08-17T10:21:00.000-07:00

I’d never really thought about the ‘missing’ issue - about how it feels to be a mother when her son doesn’t come home after a night out, or what it must be like for a teenager who’s run away and doesn’t know where to turn. 250,000 people go missing every year in the

, and yet most members of the public have never put themselves in the shoes of those affected. It’s an issue that feels far away – one we’re confident we can side-step forever. But chat, like I did, with the Missing People helplines staff, who receive 114,000 calls for help every year, and they’ll tell you that the ‘missing’ issue is one that reaches far and wide, and inevitably touches every community.

I first found out about internships at Missing People through a volunteering fair at my university. I’d already heard of this inspiring charity through a friend who volunteered there part-time, and was excited to see there was an opportunity as a Communications Intern – the perfect role for me to gain relevant work experience for my Journalism degree, whilst learning more about this devastating, but seemingly distant, issue.

I applied straight away and was lucky enough to be chosen for the three month internship. I couldn’t wait to get started, especially as I was to join just before May 25, International Missing Children’s Day 2011 - what brilliant timing. My first task was to support the "Big Tweet for Missing Children," a 24-hour Tweeting marathon during which the charity tweeted a different missing child's appeal every 30 minutes and asked its supporters to RT and spread the word. I was in charge of researching different celebrities we could invite to take part, and we wound up with 27 celebrities tweeting for us, including Lily Allen, Victoria Beckham, Stephen Fry, Sarah Brown, Alan Carr and Denise Van Outen. It was great fun and, more importantly, the Big Tweet was a big success, with over 15,000 people clicking on our missing children appeal links.

There was never a dull moment, and I found myself doing all sorts of jobs, with no two days being the same. My many and varied tasks included drafting press releases, creating daily coverage reports, sourcing case studies for journalists, and keeping up to date with the large volume of requests for information that the charity's Comms Team receive from the media every day.

I enjoyed everything about my internship at Missing People, but the most meaningful experience has to be attending the first ever Parliamentary Inquiry into support for families of missing people at the Houses of Parliament. The inquiry into the lack of support offered to relatives of people who disappear took place over three days in June and saw Kate McCann, mother of missing Madeleine McCann, and Peter Lawrence, father of missing York chef Claudia - amongst other bereft parents and families - give evidence to Parliament about how often they are without any government support. I found this both really interesting and deeply moving, and was privileged to come back and help at the later sessions.

All too quickly, three months have passed and I’m off to continue my degree. I would definitely recommend applying for an internship at Missing People – there are usually several to choose from. Not only have I learnt a whole new range of transferable skills and seen what happens in a communications team, but I’ve come to grasp the scope of the 'missing' issue, and the importance of Missing People as the UK's only charity to offer a lifeline when someone disappears.

By Laura Barrett

Missing People Intern

How We Keep Publicity Safe

2011-08-11T09:32:00.000-07:00

Last week, Missing People posted a missing person alert on Twitter (@missingpeople) for a young boy who had gone missing, and an amazing 2,753 people clicked through to his appeal on our website. That afternoon he was found. This is one of many wonderful success stories, and highlights how useful new social media is to us as a charity to expand our search and get the message out there.

The charity is occasionally asked by members of the public to spread the word about a missing person who we haven’t been asked to search for either by police or family. While we would like to lend our immediate help, sometimes the complexities of the issue and our responsibility to the missing person and their family mean we can not always sound the alarm as quickly or as widely as we’d like. We’ve had recent incidents where members of the public have been upset by the charity not re-Tweeting a missing person appeal until we had vetted its legitimacy. We always need to make sure that publicity is the right thing to do, and this time delay may frustrate some. I would like to take this chance to shed light on the reasons.

Here at Missing People, our walls are covered with posters of the people we are helping to find. The charity’s mission is to offer a lifeline to missing people and their families left behind, and publicity plays a big part in that. We usually produce both a poster and a website appeal for a missing person on the same day the police or family asks us to help. We work quickly to get publicity out because we know that public awareness helps. It helps to find people who are missing. It helps make people safe. It gives hope to the family that something is being done; that someone cares. Without members of the public reacting to the publicity that we do and caring enough to make an effort, it wouldn’t work.

The charity has more than 7,500 followers on Twitter, and receive over 34,000 hits on our website every month. We have over 2,000 thousand places in the UK where we can distribute posters. Despite our haste to get publicity out there, we are always careful that publicity is the right thing to do. The power of publicity is great but unwieldy, and that means you must be very thoughtful as to how and when you use it. We know more than anyone the importance of reacting quickly, but it is imperative that we secure agreement from parents and families before sharing their loved ones’ details. We must also check that the police are OK that we do publicity on every single case.

Sometimes there are reasons why doing publicity would be wrong and worse, publicity may put already vulnerable people at more risk. Think of someone with a mental health problem, panicked to see a Tweet about themselves in their local community; put off from seeking help for fear of being ‘found’. Think of someone fleeing years of domestic violence, seeing a newspaper appeal for themselves and feeling driven ‘underground’. Harder to reach. Harder to find. Think of the mum, trying to protect an elderly grandma from the news that her granddaughter has disappeared. And occasionally, think of less well-intentioned requests for publicity; someone calling our Helplines seeking to track down a person who owes them money or a daughter who has fled from a forced marriage and is fearful for her safety.

These are the reasons we always check with the police and family members that it’s OK to proceed with publicity.

The issue of ‘missing people’ is a complex one, and we must approach the issue of publicity with all those nuances in mind. We aim that if someone saw publicity of themselves they’d feel able to contact us in confidence for help. We consider how they would feel – reading about themselves. We also consider how hard it could be for someone who has been missing to then ‘walk back into their life’, knowing that publicity about them has been distributed throughout the local area or been featured in the national media. We don’t want to make it any harder.

We are incredibly grateful to people who have “Joined the Search” by downloading our posters, or re-Tweeting our appeals, and as an organisation we have a responsibility to make sure that the information we share is accurate. It’s imperative that the public trusts what we say and that means we publish only what we know to be true, not what we believe to be true. We need to make sure that any publicity; posters, media appeals, tweets, will help someone to safety. Trust in Missing People is dependent on getting this right.

By Helen Morrell

Services Manager, Family Support

You Don’t Know What You’re Missing

2011-08-03T03:37:00.000-07:00

Our son Andrew Gosden went missing aged 14 in 2007. His 18th birthday was on 10 July 2011 and in all that time we have had no confirmable news or sighting of him.

A few weeks ago, our friend Sandy called round to tell us the good news that he has secured a place on the course he wanted to pursue and that he now has the next 3 years of his life planned. His enthusiasm and joy are always infectious and this occasion was no different. We could not be more pleased for him nor more impressed by his achievement of obtaining a place on a course for which competition is fierce.

Sandy and Andrew spent a good deal of time together growing up. I remember their X-Box and Playstation battles, sleepovers, snooker games and church activities with one another.

Now, as I reflect on Sandy’s achievement, I cannot help but wonder what I have missed in my son’s life. Most likely, we would have seen him tackle GCSE’s and A-Levels, apply to University, take his driving test. There would have been so much time working and enjoying life together. Birthdays to celebrate, Christmas gifts for him, holidays together. I know my wife and daughter were having the same thoughts, but no one dares share them for fear of upsetting one another.

All this normality has instead been replaced by years of searching, leafleting, media interviews, email campaigns, sonar scanning for his body in the Thames. Normality has been replaced by depression, anxiety, fear, frustration... the list seems endless. And most recently the results of the Police commissioned forensic psychology report accords with our own worst fears; the odds would suggest that our son is dead. But of course, we cannot know for certain as there is no body, so remain in limbo.

Should you happen to read this blog and have children of your own, I beg you to take a moment and consider how you might feel if it were your child. What would you be missing in your life? Could you afford to hold onto any hope of an answer? How should you construct the future without knowing where your child is? Is it possible to ever escape the fears, depression and sadness, and return to anything that ever feels right again?

The charity Missing People has recently been instrumental in achieving the first ever Parliamentary Inquiry into services for the families of missing loved ones. There are many issues - emotional, practical, legal, financial. If my words here have touched you, perhaps made you pause for thought, I would beg you to visit their website - www.missingpeople.org.uk - and consider what support you could give. Perhaps a donation, perhaps a letter or message of support, perhaps a few minutes looking at the faces of the missing and asking yourself if you could have seen one of them? Maybe you could share the charity's website address on your social network page and help to raise awareness of both the wider issues and of the thousands of individuals affected so profoundly.

Please take a moment to wonder what it is like if you don’t know what you’re missing...

By Kevin Gosden
Father of missing Andrew Gosden

For more information about Andrew, visit helpustofindandrew.weebly.com or www.missingpeople.org.uk/andrewgosden.

Show your support for families of missing people on Missing People’s Wall of Reminders.

A new research project about missing adults

2011-07-27T08:34:00.000-07:00

When talking about the missing issue, it is easy to focus on the many children who disappear each year. After all, they make up two-thirds of missing reports, and it’s incredibly distressing to imagine a vulnerable child, out in the world alone, with nowhere to turn.

But there’s more to the picture. Thousands of adults are also reported missing every year in the UK. And every one of those adults is someone’s child, or someone’s sibling, or friend. And just as young missing people face risks while they are away, a recent study of missing adults revealed that “over one third of adults had felt themselves to be in danger at some point while they were missing”.

That said, the situation is more nuanced: adults have the right to leave their home and job if they wish, and to break off contact with family and friends. Classifying adults as missing is difficult, which means it is a struggle to measure the number of adults missing in the UK or fully understand what their experience of missing looks like.

A research team, from the Universities of Glasgow and Dundee and Grampian Police, is aiming to fill this knowledge gap with a new research project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. The project will focus on missing adults and families of missing people, as well as the police officers who search for missing people. We are glad that the charity Missing People is supporting our research by sitting on our Advisory Group.

Our research will examine how different agencies involved in searching for missing people use their different knowledge, skills and resources to intervene in missing 'events' and 'processes'. In particular, we will investigate the geographical strategies employed by the police and families to search for missing people at local, national and international levels and how such strategies change and develop over time.

Call for participants

We will also want to talk to former missing people in order to understand more about the experiences of going and staying missing and particularly identify intentional and unintentional uses of space and place during missing incidents. This information on will help us understand more about 'going missing', or being reported as missing.

Would you like to discuss your experience of going missing?

We’re hoping to talk, in confidence, to adults who have been missing. Where possible we would like to speak in person, but can also conduct interviews by telephone. We would especially like to talk to people who were missing for more than more than 3 days, and especially those people missing for more than 14 days.

Speaking first hand to missing people and their families is really important as it might help interested parties, such as the police, charities, families and returned missing people, better understand how to respond to the concerns that missing people themselves face.

If you are over 18 years old, have ever been missing for more than 3 days, and would like to share your experience of this time, we would like to hear from you.

Equally, if you just want to find out more about the project you can contact me by email: olivia.stevenson@ges.gla.ac.uk; telephone 0141 330 8655 or 07582 903 175; or leave a message on the project’s Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/OliviaStevenson2.

For further information you can view the project’s website at: http://www.sipr.ac.uk/networks/missing_persons.php

By Dr. Olivia Stevenson
Research Fellow
Geographies of missing people: experiences, processes, responses

Coming soon to a community near you – the charity Missing People

2011-07-20T04:19:00.000-07:00

As one of Missing People’s new Local Co-ordinators, I am responsible for co-ordinating the search in the London area, raising awareness of the crisis services available, and supporting families of the missing at a local level.

At the moment there are only three of us – in London, Yorkshire and the West Midlands – but the charity’s aim is to have a co-ordinator in every region by the end of 2013, ensuring that everything possible is being done to help vulnerable missing people and their families left behind. Lots of groundwork is being done to pave the way for Local Co-ordinators across the country and this is progressing well so far!

For the first time this week I am going to be visiting the family of a missing person who are in great need of support and will be working out with them how best we can offer the help they need at this difficult time. I was delighted to have had the opportunity to spend time with Wandsworth and Westminster Missing Person Units over the past months to talk through our strategies for joint working and supporting families in the future, which has been very useful indeed.

We are now on the look out for volunteers to join the search and help us raise awareness of the charity in the local community, starting with Londoners. We are building a team of people who give up their time to talk to local community groups and businesses, inspiring them to join the search and helping to raise vital funds for the charity.

We have been really pleased with the response from community groups such as the London Lions, Rotary Clubs and Church groups who want to help us raise awareness about Missing People and who have already started to raise money for us. Could you help us to inspire more groups and individuals to Join The Search?

To find out more about how you can help and be a part of this new and exciting work please visit: www.missingpeople.org.uk/inyourarea

Beth Knebel

Missing People Local Co-ordinator for London

Join the Search - Bake a cake!

2011-07-06T02:42:00.000-07:00

There are so many ways that you could help support the search for missing people. You can download an appeal poster from Missing People’s website, collect change in a Home Money Box, or leave a message supporting our campaign for families left behind on our Wall of Reminders. You can also bake a cake. Yes, joining the search could be as simple as combining eggs, butter, flour and sugar in a bowl.

The Missing People Cake Off is a fun and easy way that you can join the search for the 200,000 people who go missing each year and help their loved ones left behind.

Why not organise a Cake Off day at work or school? Recently Police constable Bev Sissons supervised a big cake-bake at the University Church of England Academy in Ellesmere Port. Bev, a Cheshire Police schools liason officer, and her team of children from years eight and nine baked, decorated and sold nearly 200 cakes to raise money for Missing People. (See their photo on the left!)

Bev said, “It was a good project which the kids enjoyed. We raised £70 very quickly. Missing People seemed like a good charity to support, as it provides a message-home service for people who have suddenly decided to break with their families. What is just as important, the charity's helplines also cater to children and adults who are even thinking about running away."

There are a variety of ways you can create a unique event - pick a cupcake theme or encourage your friends or colleagues to come in fancy dress or non-uniform! Or hold a competition for the most eye-catching cake! We would suggest a minimum donation of £1 per cake. Make sure you send us any photos of your creations for our cupcake Hall of Fame!

You can email any photos as well as queries to me at chrissy.birtwistle@missingpeople.org.uk.

To whet your appetite, here are a few of my favorite cupcake recipes:

Romantic Rose Cupcakes
Libbie's Chocolate Cupcakes

Caramel Pecan Cupcakes

And my very favorite - those made by a colleague for the Missing People's office's very own Cake Off.

Clare Cook's Cupcakes

Ingredients

125g butter (very soft)
125g self raising flour
125g caster sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking powder
Milk

Method

Preheat oven 190c. Line muffin tins with cupcake papers.
Put all the ingredients except for the milk into a food processor and blend until smooth. Add a couple of tablespoons of milk so that the mixture is of a dropping consistency
Spoon into your prepared paper cases & bake for about 12-15mins, depending on your sizes.

I usually use “buttercream” style icing, which you can get from most supermarkets, and ice the cakes using an icing bag and wide nozzle. Glitter icing looks very effective, as do daisies made of edible paper (again available in the shops)!

What's YOUR favorite cupcake recipe? Tell us in the comments!

For more info on how you can join the search, visit www.missingpeople.org.uk/jointhesearch.

By Chrissy Birtwistle

Supporter Care Officer at Missing People

Ann Coffey MP: How the Government can Make a Difference

2011-06-29T03:32:00.000-07:00

I recently chaired the UK's first ever Parliamentary Inquiry into support for the families of missing people.

Listening to the stories of devastated families of missing people is a very sobering experience. You can literally feel the pain in their voices.

They told us from the heart what families left behind need the most to help them at such a traumatic time – in terms of emotional, practical and legal support. We must listen closely to them and reflect their views in our inquiry recommendations.

It has been a privilege over the last couple of weeks to chair this inquiry and it has made me more determined than ever to fight for help to make life more bearable for families.

During our four sessions we also received very detailed evidence from the agencies involved.

What emerged strongly from the testimonies from parents, siblings and partners was the strong need for emotional support and counselling and how important it is to have the same standards throughout the country. That is why I hope that one of our recommendations will be for all families whose loved one goes missing to be “signposted” or put in touch with organisations that can provide both practical help and emotional support.

I would also like to see a recommendation that each family will be assigned a named police officer as a single point of contact. One of the mums, Nicki Durbin, told us of her horror when she heard a body had been found nearby and she could not get past various police answer phones to check if it was her missing son Luke. If she had had a named officer she would have been able to contact him or her direct for help and support.

We also want legal processes that enable families to manage their affairs easier, including a Presumption of Death Bill. Peter Lawrence, the father of missing York chef Claudia Lawrence, also spoke eloquently about the need for a guardianship mechanism, which would allow family members to manage the mortgage and bank accounts of a missing person.

We must also have improvements to the system of matching missing people reports to unidentified bodies. We need to ensure as many matches as possible take place. There are currently about 1,000 unidentified bodies, which means a thousand families left in limbo, not knowing if their loved one is dead or alive.

It wasn’t just me who was moved by the families’ stories. James Brokenshire, the Home Office minister, said he was acutely aware of their pain and Nick Gargan, the Chief Executive of the NPIA Missing Persons Bureau, said: “There’s not a police officer in the country who wouldn’t change how they respond to missing person reports were they to listen to the testimony of the three mothers we just listened to.”

Let’s hope that when we put in our recommendations to the Government in the summer that they will listen to the voices and wishes of the parents and the professionals, which will be reflected through our report. None of our recommendations will be particularly costly but if implemented would make all the difference in the world to the families who suffer what we all fear the most – someone we love going missing.

By Ann Coffey MP

To show your support for the families of missing people, please leave a message on Missing People’s Wall of Reminders at www.missingpeople.org.uk/wallofreminders.

Rachel Elias: Everyone Deserves a Name

2011-06-22T03:30:00.000-07:00

Last week I joined Peter Lawrence, Jacqui Hoyland and other families to give evidence at a Parliamentary Inquiry into missing people and the support for the families left behind when a loved one goes missing. Our belief is that no family should have to face the trauma alone of having a missing relative, and that legislation must be passed so that families have access to specialist support to help them deal with the unique legal, financial and emotional challenges they face when a loved one disappears.

My brother Richard Edwards went missing from London on February 1, 1995. He was 27 at the time. My family and I live in limbo. I describe it as a ‘suspended loss’. When a loved one dies you can find peace in a resolution. But I feel guilty if I grieve, as if I’m giving up on him. Mum and Dad still live in the house we grew up in – hoping one day Richard will come back to find them. It took me years to stop jumping up every time the doorbell went or the phone rang, hoping it was him.

Richard and I were extremely close growing up, even sharing a bedroom until I was 11 and he was 13. He was always looking out for me – the typical overprotective older brother. In May 1991, his band the Manic Street Preachers signed a record deal. Richard was thrilled. But over the next three years, while away on tour, he pushed his body to the limits. In 1994, I was relieved when he checked himself into a psychiatric hospital, but he discharged himself early, so he could go back on tour.

In February 1995, Richard was due to fly to New York for a gig but didn’t turn up for the flight. His manager reported him missing straight away, but the police didn’t take his disappearance too seriously at first. People miss flights all the time…but alarm bells went off in my head. Richard was Mr. Reliable. In those first hours I kept hoping Richard would walk through the door. But as the hours turned into days and weeks, a feeling of cold dread settled in my stomach. Yet even in my darkest moments, I never dreamed I’d still be wondering where he is today.

It was two weeks before the police found his car, abandoned in the Aust Service Station car park of the Old Severn Bridge. While conspiracies and theories rage – there have been alleged sightings of Richard in India and the Canary Islands – I concentrated my search in practical terms. I investigated every lead I could think of. I phoned the hospitals and coastguards, and wrote to monasteries in case he’d run away to a retreat.

After the initial desperate search, my family reluctantly tried to find a body. I contacted coroners around the Severn Estuary to see if any unidentified bodies found in or near it matched Richard’s. I spent days just driving around Cardiff, looking for any clues. I’d climb down to the riverbank and just stare at the water, wondering if my brother’s body was under there submerged in its sediment.

There were many articles in the press about skeletons and body parts that the reporters said belonged to my brother. And then there was the time the police approached us directly as a family to bring us news of the bodies without forensically reviewing the body parts beforehand.

Tomorrow’s final session of the inquiry is an opportunity to explore the systems currently used to cross match unidentified bodies and missing person reports, and I’ll be urging improvements in these processes to ensure as many matches are made as possible. Families of missing people should know that everything possible is being done to find their missing loved one. Whilst this might sound like a very simple objective, many families do not have this basic reassurance. At the moment, there are an estimated 1,000 unidentified bodies at any one time. This represents 1,000 anonymous dead - the un-named and the un-mourned - and the 1,000 families left in the dark about the fate of their loved one.

Cross matching reports of people who remain missing with unidentified bodies or body parts provides an important means of bringing an end to tragic cases. Successful cross matching can also assist criminal investigations, can allow civil procedures to be completed but most importantly of all can allow the deceased - the unknown victims - to finally have their identity restored to them.

I’m giving evidence on behalf of all those who have faced a painful struggle against bureaucracy following the disappearance of a loved one. I urge the Government to take some very simple steps to ease unnecessary heartache and confusion.

By Rachel Elias
Sister of Manic Street Preachers lyricist and designer Richard Edwards
Family Representative of Missing People

To show your support for the families of missing people please leave a message on Missing People’s Wall of Reminders at www.missingpeople.org.uk/wallofreminders.

Families of missing give evidence in Parliamentary Inquiry

2011-06-15T10:45:00.001-07:00

On Monday, three mothers of missing children – Kate McCann, Nicki Durbin and Sarah Godwin – gave evidence at the UK’s first ever Parliamentary Inquiry into support for families of missing people. Each came to Parliament to talk about their own devastating experience of having a missing loved one, as well as the support families in this situation need and what they themselves could not find.

As Policy Advisor at the charity Missing People, I am constantly overwhelmed by the generosity of families facing the most unimaginable trauma as they try to make things better should you or I face a predicament as terrible as they have. Helping the All Party Parliamentary Group on Runaway and Missing Children and Adults to prepare the inquiry has been no different: families have eagerly agreed to share their painful stories in Parliament in hope of helping others.

The committees of Parliamentarians hearing their experiences will assess alongside other evidence whether current support measures for families are enough, or whether improvements are needed. Any recommendations they make will then be passed onto the Government for consideration and, we hope, implemented to help families.

The case for improving support is compelling. As Nicki, mother of missing Luke Durbin, said in Monday's opening session: “There isn't an hour of a day that goes by without me thinking about Luke. If my house was burgled, I would have got support... when I reported Luke missing, there was nothing. And there still isn't anything."

This landmark inquiry has the chance to change this injustice. And with the reactions vocalized in the first session, we have reason to believe that real progress will be made.

In terms of Government policy, Home Office Minister James Brokenshire stated: "We are acutely aware of the pain caused when a loved one goes missing and we are working hard to ensure the best arrangements are in place to support families.”

And on a police practice level, Nick Gargan, Chief Executive of NPIA Missing Persons Bureau, said: “There’s not a police officer in the country who wouldn’t change how they respond to missing person reports were they to listen to the testimony of the three mothers we just listened to.”

It is Missing People’s job to represent the stories of all families left behind, so that every agency does their utmost to support these families. This is what my colleagues and I will be seeking to do when we give evidence at the inquiry when talking about the Missing Rights campaign, which was organised in cooperation with families.

The three aims of the Missing Rights campaign call on the Government to ensure that:

Families of missing people know everything possible is being done to find their missing loved one.
Families affected by a disappearance have access to support.
Families left behind are spared the pain of unnecessary financial and legal bureaucracy.

We realise that what families really want is to have the person they love back with them, safe and well. And whilst they do not have this, we believe they should at the least have their agony eased by having basic reassurances around their search for their relative and access to support. Yet as it stands, there is no legislation in place to protect missing people and their families left behind.

Nicki was right in that if your house is burgled you are automatically offered victim support with emotional, practical and legal assistance, whereas if your child goes missing you may get nothing. This Parliamentary Inquiry has the potential to put this shameful situation right.

By Holly Towell

Policy Advisor at Missing People

To show your support for the families of missing people please leave a message on Missing People’s Wall of Reminders at www.missingpeople.org.uk/wallofreminders.

Avoiding the Void

2011-06-08T02:46:00.000-07:00

Nineteen years – an eternity and a few short years; how can it be both?

On 20 May, 1992, my son Quentin (better known as Q) went ‘missing’. What’s the relevant definition of that word ‘missing’? In some countries they’re called ‘The Disappeared’, a more accurate description of how it feels perhaps but with overtones of politics and violence – something that happens in South America, Africa, Iran, but not culturally what you expect to happen to a white boy, age 18, walking out from his normal family home one afternoon and never to be seen again.

In the days, weeks, months and years that follow his disappearance, what happens to those left behind? At first there’s bewilderment, anguish, chaos and confusion. Feverish searching, shreds of possibilities, hopes pounced on and shattered, guilt, fear, doubts, hopelessness and helplessness. In fact almost every painful and passionate emotion is passing through the thoughts and feelings of family, friends, loved ones at any one time. And this goes on relentlessly, an emotional roller coaster without any true highs.

Daily life starts to reshape itself in the shadow of this disappearance; practicalities demand attention, we have to look after ourselves and each other again. The flurry of searching, the involvement and compassion of those around us slowly recedes. Anniversaries start to tick by – the first birthday, Christmases, the date he disappeared. Each one is different and has to be managed in its own way. At times it’s hard to accept this ‘normality’ because life isn’t normal any more; at the centre of everything, in the corner of every waking moment, is the knowledge and the pain of your child just not being there.

Where is he?

How is he?

Is he?

That last question is the hardest thought. But humans have survival instincts embedded in our genes so even at the times of greatest difficulty we find ways to hang on and keep functioning. Each person will find their own way and sometimes you lose it, wanting to numb the pain, escape the anguish, step off the endless circle of questions with no answers. Anywhere but here please.

Over the years since 1992, it has become a process of ‘managing’ my thoughts and feelings, knowing that to stay in the pain of it all is like living in a big black hole, without lightness or relief. I can’t stay there in that void anymore. I have learnt to gradually pull myself out of the emotional hole, accept the possibility of never seeing Q again, and accept the knowledge that I might never know the facts of his life or death. I have to honour his life whilst living with his and our loss.

There are not the right words to explain how this emotional journey has evolved; it’s been a long, slow and lonely task but after so many years I can usually keep painful emotions in a fairly secure part of me. I can now talk more freely about Q and our story and I can start to work with others in similar situations, although this interaction is both cathartic and difficult.

As a ‘technique’ for myself I have an image of the painful stuff being like a deep, dangerous ravine – to look over the edge into the blackness is to tempt vertigo and falling into those dark depths. I know I have limits so the skill is in gauging how near to the edge I can go without tipping over.

That’s what I have taught myself over the last 19 years. I am a long way from being an adept practitioner but at least I’ve got this far and I am thankful for that. But I would give anything not to have had to learn all this.

By Sarah Godwin
Mother of missing Quentin Godwin
Family Representative of Missing People

Sarah will give evidence at the UK’s first ever Parliamentary Inquiry into the rights of families of missing people on Monday June 13.

The Big Tweet: How did it go?

2011-06-01T03:57:00.000-07:00

It’s already a week since International Missing Children’s day and the Big Tweet. This was a bold experiment by Missing People to see if a new medium - Twitter - could be used to communicate an important and not always easy message to a wider audience. It was an approach with the potential to reach many people who were not previously aware of the issue and to create a new channel to be used in the search for the 100,000 children who go missing in the UK every year.

So was it a success? And what did Missing People and the families they support gain from this new tactic?

The results speak for themselves:

By midnight last Wednesday, @missingpeople had over 7,000 followers, up from 1,500 before the campaign was launched.
There were nearly 150 tweets for each of the 48 appeals sent out during the day.
#IMCD trended by 8AM - this means that it wasone of the most ‘tweeted’ subjects in the country at the time.
27 celebrities tweeted about the campaign, including Stephen Fry, Sarah Brown, Victoria Beckham, Lily Allen, Alan Carr, Denise Van Outen, and Anna Friel.

Visits to the website were up over 600%.
There was also significant press coverage, including stories on the homepages of Yahoo! UK and Sky News, and interviews with Kerry Needham, mother of missing Ben Needham, on ITV Lunchtime News, Radio 5 Live and ITV Yorkshire.

In other words, every goal was hit, if not smashed! Twitter proved itself a hugely valuable tool for spreading the word, and the event generated more buzz than could ever have been hoped for.

But it isn’t just about one day.

Cynics might point out that, in spite of all the buzz, coverage, and celebrity support, the Big Tweet didn’t help find any missing children on the day itself. But I’m convinced it will.

The real success of the campaign was the way that many followers old and new engaged with the issue, calling out to their friends and to celebrities for their support, keeping the tweets flowing through a solid 24 hours and beyond. What’s more, they’ve maintained their involvement, retweeting the ongoing daily missing appeals, and in some cases asking how they can get involved in other ways.

The Big Tweet was a resounding success on the day, and Twitter is now a key channel for Missing People. Most importantly, however, it has helped to create a platform for the future, and this is what social media does best. Now, when an appeal is sent out via @missingpeople, it reaches over 5,500 more people than before, all capable of spreading it still further. Followers can also provide other forms of support that are so crucial to the charity, such as volunteering or conducting local fundraising.

If you’re not already following @missingpeople, I urge you to do so and to pass on the message to your friends, as there is definitely more to come. This is a perfect and very simple example of using social media to make a difference.

I can’t wait for the headline: “Charity finds missing person by using Twitter” – it’s not as far off as you may think. One tweet by the right person at the right time is all you need.

By Gifford Morley-Fletcher

Director of Strategy, Inbound Marketing

Base One, www.baseone.co.uk

Twitter For Good: Why ‘The Big Tweet for Missing Children’ Can Make a Difference

2011-05-25T02:59:00.000-07:00

Today, Wednesday, May 25, is International Missing Children’s Day. A day to remember the hundreds of thousands of children that go missing around the world every year, and their devastated parents who will never stop searching for them. But how does a charity like Missing People get the word out? How do you make members of the public stop for a minute, think about your call to action and then do something to help? It’s a challenge faced by every charity: how can you best catapult your organization’s good works to the world?

As the lead of social innovation and philanthropy at Twitter, it’s my job to show non-profit organizations how to use Twitter to effect social change. Today, I reflect on the question of how a platform like Twitter can help in the effort to find missing children the world over.

Enter the “Big Tweet for Missing Children.” Beginning at midnight last night, Missing People has been tweeting an appeal for a different missing child every 30 minutes for 24 hours on their official Twitter account (@missingpeople). All you have to do to show your support is retweet one, some, or all of @missingpeople’s appeal tweets using the hashtag #imcd. Celebrities including Stephen Fry (@stephenfry), Victoria Beckham (@victoriabeckham), and many others have already lent their voices and rallied their own contingent of followers.

The viral nature of Twitter means that awareness around a cause can snowball. So whether it reunites a family, or simply spreads the word to a million people, ‘The Big Tweet’ proves that tools like Twitter can be immensely powerful for organisations eager for wide-scale social change.

Kerry Needham’s son Ben went missing 19 years ago at the age of 21 months. As she poignantly says, “Every morning and every night I look at his picture and it gives me strength. I am his Mum and I will never give up hope.” Missing People has organised ‘The Big Tweet’ for Ben, Kerry, and all the other missing children and parents who will never give up the search.

Today, I encourage you to show your support for The Big Tweet and retweet one, some or all of @missingpeople’s appeal tweets using the hashtag #imcd as they go out. In this way, individual activism can change the world.

By Claire Diaz Ortiz

Author of Twitter for Good
Social Innovation and Philanthropy Lead at Twitter, Inc.

@claired

For more information about The Big Tweet, follow @missingpeople on Twitter or visit: www.missingpeople.org.uk/thebigtweet.

Rock Choir: Singing for the Missing

2011-05-18T02:34:00.000-07:00

Singing is amazing. It’s a universal language and has the power to make us smile or move us to tears. And those of us who sing with Rock Choir know better than most just how powerful a song can be.

Almost 10,000 Rock Choir members, from all corners of Great Britain, gathered at Wembley Arena on Sunday 15 May for a mass sing, a gathering of like-minded choir members, thrilled to be performing at the UK’s premier music venue.

Rock Choir members don’t just sing, however. We are passionate about supporting two amazing British charities: Refuge and Missing People. Four hundred of us sang at the recent Miles for Missing People 10k Run in Regent’s Park and met and heard from the suffering parents, friends and families of the missing. It verges on the impossible to imagine your child, sibling, friend or classmate going missing; seeing that empty chair at the dinner table, the abandoned desk in the classroom or the jacket gathering dust by the door. So perhaps it’s up to us, those that are lucky enough never to have experienced this kind of suffering to support those who have.

Among all the high-adrenalin excitement and fun at Wembley we shared a quiet moment for Missing People. Posters featuring missing children were handed out to everyone in the Arena. Mine showed a schoolgirl smiling at the camera, a lock of brown hair escaping from her ponytail. The information on the poster explained that she was Carmel Fenech, sixteen years old, missing since 1998. With a jolt I realised that this pretty teenager would now be a grown woman, perhaps with children of her own. Other posters showed the familiar face of Madeleine McCann, another a curly-haired toddler and another a boy with a haircut you'd recognize as popular 5 years ago.

As we held up our posters, silence fell over the huge crowd leaving us all with our own quiet thoughts. Perhaps we thought about our own families and vowed to hug our children tighter that evening, to tell our partners that we love them or to contact an old friend.

With that thought in mind, the 25^th of May marks International Missing Children’s Day and Missing People is urging Twitter enthusiasts to take part in “The Big Tweet for Missing Children.” The charity Missing People will be tweeting an appeal for a different missing child every 30 minutes for 24 hours on their official Twitter @missingpeople account. All you have to do to show your support is retweet one, some, or all of @missingpeople’s appeal tweets using the hash tag #IMCD as they go out. If you have a Twitter account you can join in over the 24 hour period and if you’re not on Twitter yet, think about setting up an account in time for the 25^th. It’s fun and easy to do. Let’s make #IMCD trend!

When I got home on Sunday evening the voices of thousands of voices in ringing in my ears and the memory of singing with special guests Debra Stephenson, The Soldiers and star of the Go Compare adverts, Wynne Evans, I found a crumpled poster at the bottom of my bag. A dark haired teenager smiles back at me and I’m reminded that there won’t be a homecoming for many of these missing youngsters.

There’s a line in one of my favourite Rock Choir songs, Elton John’s “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down On Me”:

‘These cuts I have, they need love to help them heal.’

If singing can help to heal the wounds of those left behind in any way, then I’m proud to be a member of Rock Choir supporting Missing People.

By Sian Rowland
Member of Rock Choir
Supporter of Missing People

For more information about The Big Tweet for Missing Children, visit https://www.missingpeople.org.uk/thebigtweet.

A different definition of 'good news.'

2011-05-11T07:10:00.002-07:00

Age-progressed photo of Andrew

My son Andrew went missing on 14 September 2007. He was 14 years old at the time. His mother and I still have no idea why he chose to leave and have subsequently worked on many theories. All we know is that one Friday morning he emptied his bank account of £200 and took a train from our home town of Doncaster, South Yorkshire, to London Kings Cross. There has been no confirmable sighting or evidence that he is alive since then. We think it most likely that he planned a short term adventure but that something went wrong.

Around Christmas time of this past year, my wife and I learned that a new piece of sonar scanning technology could be used to scan the River Thames to see if Andrew might be found there. It was a friend who pointed out to me that when the good news for your family is an opportunity to perhaps find your child’s remains and therefore some sort of closure, it places the rest of your life very firmly in perspective.

Certainly it speaks powerfully of the never-ending nightmare that life becomes for those missing a loved one. Could they have been suicidal and hidden it from you? Could your child have been abducted, murdered, or trafficked? Could some terrible accident have befallen them? These possibilities are the ones that remain in the minds of the parents of a missing child, try as they might to push them aside.

And so it came about, through the efforts of a friend and the generosity of a firm (Liquavision) specialising in underwater search methods that we were the first parents of a missing child in the UK to carry out a search of this sort. For the technologically-minded we used a Starfish 990F 1.1MHz side sonar scanner - the first to be specifically developed to enable sufficient resolution to identify bodies. The team scanned the river from The Woolwich Barrier to Tower Bridge. They found a sunken boat, an upturned car, and many other things that do not belong, but not Andrew. We now at least know that Andrew is not a body in the Thames – it does not resolve the ongoing question of where he might be, but we can take encouragement from the idea that he is more likely perhaps to be alive.

From left: a sunken boat & mast, a fish (white) and an upturned car (left side of image).

Often when people go missing any underwater search involves divers struggling with tides and currents, zero visibility, extreme cold, limited time frames and much personal risk. All these problems are avoided with a scan and unclear targets can be examined more closely by deploying a ROV to take video footage and further scans of the target at close proximity, minimising the need for risk and maximising the chances of successful identification of a body.

I discussed this technology in more detail on BBC Missing 2011 yesterday morning. You can watch the episode here, and catch the one remaining episodes of the show tomorrow at 9.15 a.m..

On top of the emotional nightmare experienced by families of missing people, there is a great deal of practical frustration, with feeling like you don't have the resources or tools to move the situation forward in any way. It is a position of great helplessness. So while this pioneering sonar technology did not bring my family the answers we're so desperate for, I'm keen to promote it as it may prove the key to closure for other families left in limbo.

By Kevin GosdenFather of missing Andrew Gosden

For more information about Andrew, visit https://www.missingpeople.org.uk/andrewgosden.

To leave a message of support for families of missing people, visit www.missingpeople.org.uk/wallofreminders.

Louise Minchin: Casting a light on the missing issue

2011-05-04T10:18:00.000-07:00

Did you know that a child goes missing every five minutes in the UK?

As a mum, I find that a shocking statistic, and had no idea it was that many until I began presenting Missing for BBC One.

Through the programme we try to help find some of those children and well as some of the estimated 60,000 adults who go missing in the UK each year. The good news is that with the help of our viewers 17 of the missing people cases that we featured during last year's series were resolved.

But the search goes on for many more and Missing 2011 will be on at 0915 every morning next week on BBC One with more families that need your help.

Over the years I have spoken to mums and dads, husbands and wives, and perhaps most heartbreakingly of all, children, desperately searching for news of their missing loved one.

This year I have met an eight year old girl who can hardly speak about her dad without bursting into tears, and is still writing him letters and poems even though he has been missing for months.

What strikes me is that it doesn't matter where you come from, how old you are, or how much money you have - you are almost helpless when someone you love goes missing, and everyone feels the same sense of desperation.

200,000 people run away or go missing every year in the UK. That's more than the entire population of Newcastle. And it doesn't just happen in big cities like London or Manchester. People can disappear from every corner of the UK; every town and city. The missing issue can affect us all.

Through my work on the 'Missing" series, I have come to know the people who work at Missing People - a charity that can help those families when a loved one disappears. And while the Missing series puts a spotlight on the issue once a year, the charity does that 24 hours a day - every day of the year. They are there all year round - a lifeline when someone disappears.

The stories featured this year are just as heartbreaking as those in years past, and with each new season I find myself increasingly struck by the ripple effects of 'missing' on the family, friends, colleagues and community around that person. I only hope that by casting a light on the people affected - even for just one week - we can help raise awareness and call needed attention to this incredibly important issue.

Please watch us at 0915 on BBC One from Monday 9 May. If you can help please call Missing People on 0500 700 700 or visit www.missingpeople.org.uk/jointhesearch.

By Louise Minchin
Presenter, BBC Missing 2011
Follow Louise on Twitter @louiseminchin

The Reconnect Network: A significant step forward - but still split emotions!

2011-04-27T07:30:00.000-07:00

It is a strange feeling, writing this blog post. On one hand I am happy to offer what support I can to the work of Missing People - but on the other hand I am writing this because my sister Clare went missing in April 2009, with all the sorrow and pain that entailed. So I have split emotions...but that is nothing new. Throughout my whole experience of ‘missing’ I have found myself with split emotions.

The time Clare was missing was very distressing, but I also found the search for her very frustrating. During the search we could see the commitment of all the various agencies working hard to find my sister and giving their best, but it appeared evident to me that they had no method of talking to each other in a clear and consistent manner.

When they did talk to each other they appeared to ‘talk past’ each other; they appeared cocooned within their own world and processes without any real engagement with the other agencies or with the particular issue facing them. There seemed to be a vacuum between them which they were unwilling to bridge, and few conduits of effective information-exchange. Unfortunately, this resulted in a very ‘hit and miss’ approach to the search for Clare.

Being the kind of person I am, I expressed my frustration to everyone - Missing People included. This issue resonated with them as the charity had commenced the development of the Reconnect Network, an information-sharing initiative, with the Department of Health around that time. The initiative, which was designed to enable the safe exchange of personal information about vulnerable missing adults between agencies, was piloted in the Westminster area in 2010.

During the pilot stage, Missing People put out 40 requests to the network to trace vulnerable adults, resulting in nine letters being passed to those individuals. Alongside the Health Service, police and Westminster City Council, five voluntary and community organisations have signed up to the Reconnect Network: Westminster Mind, London Cyrenians, Thames Reach, the Passage Day Centre and the Connection at St Martin’s Day Centre.

The intention is now to roll out the initiative to a wider number of partner organisations, and with further local 'pilots'. Wonderful news! - Missing People facilitating more effective working between a wide range of State and voluntary sector agencies – the ‘Big Society’ in action you might say!

I have been delighted to support Missing People in this project, however the split emotions still remain for me. With concerns about future funding of the charity; the uncertainties about Policing work on missing person cases in the future; the frustrations of the ‘Missing Rights’ campaign when the proposal for a Presumption of Death Act is ‘knocked back’ because it does not affect enough people and therefore “the cost outweighs the benefit”. (I genuinely did not know that Justice in this country was based on a cost-benefit analysis assessment! A similar law has been in place in Scotland since 1977 – maybe their cost benefit analysis had a different outcome?).

....See what I mean, split emotions.

My frustration is not blind. There are those in power who care very much about this issue, and are on the side of pushing for change. Health Minister Paul Burstow attended the official launch of the Reconnect Network at the charity’s headquarters last week, and spoke powerfully about the need for improved safeguarding measures. I later spoke about the extraordinarily difficult experience of families searching for missing loved ones, and asked Mr. Burstow if, when he speaks with his Home Office and Justice colleagues, he wouldn’t mind passing along what he had heard from families at the ‘sharp end’ of the Missing experience.

I urge anyone supporting vulnerable adults with mental health needs to visit the website at www.missingpeople.org.uk/reconnectnetwork to find out more, and to get in touch with Jonathan Hirst, the Local Areas Development Manager at Missing People, to learn how you might be able to get involved in the Reconnect Network initiative. He can be reached at jonathan.hirst@missingpeople.org.uk.

We were an ordinary family...

2011-04-20T05:01:00.000-07:00

We were an ordinary family, doing ordinary everyday things as life hummed along in a comfortable hum-drum way. Then on 2 November, 1996, a wet, windy, cold night, my 16-year old son Damien went out with his friends and never came home. Never heard of or seen again. Damien has been missing for 14 years, 5 months, and 9 days at the time of writing this, and it is incredible to me that we still know absolutely nothing. It is incredible I cannot hold him, touch his face, hear his voice and laugh at his silliness. In a blink of an eye everything changed. I miss him more than I can ever put into words and it hurts deep in my soul.

It is the ‘not knowing’ that is the worst. We know nothing so imagine ‘everything’. We don’t feel he ran away as there were no signs or reasons that he would want to. Going missing was totally out of Damien’s character.

All we know is what we pieced together after we realised he was missing - his movements, who he spoke with, and more importantly a security video of him in the local chip shop surrounded by strangers. We later saw him on another CCTV camera on the High Street, walking alone, eating chips without a care. And then nothing more.

The attitude of the local Police when we reported our son missing woke us to the realisation that it was going to be down to us to look for him or find out what happened. With that in mind, we organised search parties, put up posters, did interviews with the media wherever we could.

250,000 people go missing in the

every year, and yet it appears that there is more hope for a lost puppy - with the support of the RSPCA - than there is for my lost boy and others like him. The missing issue is not new and yet there is a complete dearth of guidance or support. The charity Missing People is our lifeline, but the job is massive and the funds are short for one organisation to meet the needs of such a big issue.

In March 2008, I co-organised ‘The March for the Missing’ in London with Nicki Durbin, mother of missing boy Luke Durbin, to help raise awareness for the issue and to pressurise politicians into passing a bill that would offer support to families left behind. We truly hoped the government would listen to our voices and recognise our pain. Not enough has happened, which is why I am glad to partner with the charity Missing People as it asks the Government to ease heartache and confusion when someone disappears by giving families of missing people the same basic rights as victims of crime. The “Missing Rights” campaign, as it’s called, asks for three things: 1) that families of missing people know everything possible is being done to find their missing loved one, 2) that families affected by a disappearance have access to support, and 3) that families left behind are spared the pain of unnecessary financial and legal bureaucracy.

A campaign like this is necessary, as I fear the current economic climate will continue to chip away at the existing support. The recent announcement by the government that it will dissolve the NPIA in 2012 with no confirmed plans as to how the Missing Person’s Bureau will continue to function is one such example.

I wish I did not have this life of eternal anxiety and worry and despair. But Damien went out one night and never came home and we are sure someone must know what happened to him. Maybe now those involved have grown up and have families of their own, and they might begin to understand how we are feeling about our lost son?

Over the years we have done whatever we can to keep Damien in people’s minds on the Isle of Wight and further afield. In January we organised an ‘Event for Damien Nettles and the Missing’ at a local pub in Cowes, Isle of Wight. We raised funds for the missing issue and we celebrated Damien with musicians, some who were his childhood friends. I wished he could have stood with his friends, sipping a pint, instead of the reality.

When will it stop? When can we have a normal life? When can I bury my son? The answer is that it will not, while there is a breath in my body. And even after I am gone, my children will continue to search for their missing brother. It will never stop until we find him.

By Valerie Nettles

Mother of missing Damien Nettles

For more information about Damien, visit www.missingpeople.org.uk/damiennettles.

To leave a message of support for families of missing people, visit www.missingpeople.org.uk/wallofreminders.

Will missing people be the poor relation after police funding cuts?

2011-04-13T04:22:00.000-07:00

As the new financial year dawns, we should soon start to see the real impact of the cuts to police funding announced by the Home Office last year.

The scale of the cuts is significant. Government

funding for police is to reduce by a fifth over the four years, starting with a six per cent reduction this financial year.

Hardly a week has passed over the last few months without debate over how these cuts can be managed and to what effect. How much room is there to make efficiency savings? How many jobs will be lost? Where will they be lost? If there is any such thing as the ‘front line’ – how much will it bear the brunt of the cuts?

There are many demands on police resources. Solving crime, ensuring our security, reducing crime and disorder, preventing harm and protecting vulnerable people are all competing for a slice of a diminishing pie. Some police functions may have to be sacrificed to maintain service in these key areas. No longer accepting reports of lost property is one such function jettisoned by West Midlands Police this week.

So what does this mean for the police response to missing persons? Will we start to see police forces turning away worried relatives of a missing person? Will we return to the days of a tacit ‘call us tomorrow if he hasn’t come home’ initial response?

Will the available resource start to determine the level of risk for a missing person, rather than the other way round? Will the dogs, divers and helicopters be deployed only in the most acute situations?

These are important questions, not least for relatives of missing people. If your car is stolen or your house is burgled, then in most cases you will, with time, move on. If someone dear to you goes missing, our experience is that very often you will not. Relatives need to know that everything that possibly could be done is being done to find their missing loved one. Uncertainty about the police response leads families to start undertaking enquiries themselves and erodes trust and confidence in the police.

Recent ACPO guidance, published at the end of 2010, doesn’t appear to be battening down the hatches for a reduction in what the public can expect. The guidance affirms: “Missing person investigations should be regarded as a high-risk area of policing and given appropriate levels of priority and resource”.

If resources are insufficient to sustain existing levels of response to missing incidents, then we need to have an open debate about what can be expected and of whom.

We will also need to be alert to opportunities to increase effectiveness with fewer resources. Can the search for missing people be improved by investing in new technologies? Can savings be made by streamlining publicity for missing people, and by making better use of Missing People’s services? There is already strong evidence that improved data collection, analysis and inter-agency working can relieve the burden of missing person incidents on police forces.

As we enter a new funding era, Missing People will continue to campaign for the resources to ensure the optimum response to missing people.

By Geoff Newiss
Director of Policy and Research
Missing People

Lost Children Tents: What do you think?

2011-04-06T06:36:00.000-07:00

I have been a lost child in a sea of adults, and I have been a parent who discovers their child missing in a playground. Both nightmares ended within a matter of minutes, but the horrible experience stays with you.

Through my work as Chief Executive of Missing People, I have learned that words do not convey the terrible pain of having a child go missing and stay missing. There is no remedy, and no way of removing the ache. Nevertheless, the charity is dedicated to doing all that we can to be a lifeline for families of missing people, and to engage the wider society to play its role as well.

I have long been impressed by the way the lifeboat people, RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution), who “Save Lives at Sea”, have extended their services by providing local lifeguards on beaches. By broadening their scope of support, they increase the number of people who they reach with messages about staying safe at sea. I wondered what a local presence like this would look like for Missing People, and how it might help us to educate the public on the issue of missing.

This past Saturday – April 2, 2011 – the charity hosted its second annual ‘Miles for Missing People’ running event in Regent’s Park, London. The event was a great success – we raised £30,000 and brought together more than 1,000 people in support of missing people and the families left behind. There were so many children running around throughout the morning, and at one point it struck me: What if the charity endeavoured to provide a ‘Lost Children Tent’ at every major event attended by families? Festival providers would commission Missing People to provide a service that would use mobile technologies, wrist bands and central co-ordination to ensure that children stay safe if they get lost and are quickly reconnected with their parents.

In doing so, we would provide a small help that ultimately reminds parents of the much wider issue of missing children, and invites them to become part of the national community of support for the 250,000 people who go missing every year and their families left behind.

Practically, I imagine every person entering the event would be handed a free wrist band with the helpline number for Missing People, so that – in case a child is separated from his parent – either the child or parent could call the helpline and Missing People – alongside local volunteers staffing the Tent - would centrally coordinate the search and location of the child.

If it was a success, small scale versions of the volunteer-led Lost Children Tents could operate at every village fete and gala in the country. Our Lost Children Tents could also feature local long term missing people posters so that members of the public could wander around and sign up to Join The Search for those who have been missing for some time.

Finally if we were really ambitious we could roll it out for major international events like the Olympics! What do you think?

By Martin Houghton-Brown
Chief Executive of Missing People

Welcome to The Missing Blog!

2011-03-30T06:05:00.000-07:00

More than 350,000 reports of missing people are made in the UK every year. The Missing Blog aims to give a voice to all those involved and affected by this issue.

Written by families and friends of missing people, high-profile supporters trying to raise awareness of the cause, and volunteers and staff at the charity Missing People, we hope that this blog will offer a window into the issue of missing.

While this discussion is hosted by the charity Missing People, the posts reflect the different authors’ personal views of dealing with the missing issue, so do not necessarily reflect the organisation's views. You'll find a more general view of what the charity does on the Missing People website.

We value comments both complimentary and critical. However, we will not tolerate any aggressive or personal criticism of the blogger, or defamatory or objectionable comments. Due to the sensitivity of the field we work in and the issues that we address, we will moderate all comments submitted. For this reason, there will be a delay between the submission of your comment and it appearing on the site.

You can send us your feedback by emailing pr@missingpeople.org.uk. The Missing Blog is powered by Wordpress.