Everybody loved going to the park. It was peaceful compared to the chaos on the wards and they might have a drink from the shop before going back to `The Mansion.`

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The escorting staff were usually in a good mood as well because they could relax, have a kick-about on the grass, smoke and gossip to their hearts` content. The day was bright and they wouldn't get wet, which is no small discomfort in a wheelchair if one is not properly covered up. It meant a drive in the bus as well, that`s heaven if your senses are usually deprived of pleasant or interesting sensations.

Today they see the outside world for a change from the grim reality they wake up to every day. It`s been years since they were taken from their families and their new abode is a million miles away from the lives they had. Yet every time they go out it feels like they are closer to their homes, now being on the other side of the walls and fences that separate them from everything and everyone they had known before. Some were told in good faith that they would be better off in hospital care, to be looked after by doctors and nurses. They were told they would meet new people, make new friends and do new things; they would get help if they had a physical disability. But many were not told and could not be told why they were there, on their own, having such a learning disability as to make everyday language mostly meaningless, save for features like the tone of a voice. Those who did understand some words, some meanings would still struggle to figure out concepts like rejection by society but they would feel it, know it. Quite a few people would have been `moved` there because of increasing difficulties with their behaviour, perhaps unwittingly posing a risk to a younger sibling at home. Others had complex physical health needs that had become difficult for their family to manage.

In any case they were individuals; someone`s daughter, someone`s son, someone`s brother or someone`s aunt yet in `The Mansion` there were no family bonds. Few people said their names save for the nurse giving them their medicines or the auxiliaries waking them up each morning. That didn't matter too much though, when they were watching the world go by through the bus window because today was park day, a great day; they would forget how lonely they were at night.

There were some swings at the park and they occasionally had a go on them. Not that it was ever up to them and even if it was, which again it wasn`t, someone had to physically assist them onto the wooden or plastic seats. That could be quite some effort, more than many would make, so perhaps instead of `occasionally` it should read `rarely` but, as well as the fresh air, the breeze, as well as the sounds of birds and children laughing, as well as the trees, the interesting buildings, the cars and the people, as well as all of that, if they were lucky they might spend a few minutes feeling the enjoyable sensation of swinging freely through space. On this day they experienced just that, as the colleague who told me this story explained; the staff, including nurses, lined up the patients on the swings and kicked footballs at them to knock them off...

Young teenagers could perhaps be forgiven for finding amusement in that act; forgiven by their elders and peers for trying to recreate some of the adolescent-type antics of risk-taking celebrity stuntman Johnny "Jackass" Knoxville. Forgiven once, possibly, for thinking of this as a prank and for being oblivious to the bullying nature inherent in cruelly enforcing the participation of vulnerable people; forgiven for not being mindful of the physical risks involved in their thrill-seeking and forgiven for being ignorant, at their age, of the humiliation and fear that their actions were causing. Forgiving those adults deemed responsible, who were paid to support these people, is barely possible.

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Who could know how many times this happened, who could guess how many similarly abusive incidents took place and who could know how little some people care...

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