the law's an ass

Tom Rattigan was one of 168 men to be awarded a share of compensation worth £2m for a childhood of rape and mental torture within the North West's care home system.
He's lucky to be alive, having survived 15 suicide attempts and several mental breakdowns. Others, often struggling to cope without the support of family and friends, have slipped into a downward spiral of drugs and criminality.
But how can an average payout of just £15,000 compensate for a miserable childhood and a ruined adult life? And shouldn't the state have a moral duty to look after such victims, who were after all abused while in local authority care?
Shockingly, a moral debt means nothing in the eyes of the law. As Rattigan's solicitor, Peter Garsden explained, personal injury payouts are strange beasts indeed.
Pain and suffering counts for little towards the final total, which is made up mostly of provable loss of earnings. In the case of some abuse victims, their problems are so great that they aren't even fit for work.
So while workplace based discrimination cases routinely attract compensation worth many tens of thousands, a man or woman living with the after-effects of daily rape and torment gets the equivalent of a few pence a day.
Something's seriously wrong here.

click to read the Big Issue article: