Baby P witch hunt

Have you read the serious case review ? It's a fact that there were failings in the system. I have extreme sympathy for the professionals involved and the way their lives were ruined. Mainly because, they did fucking care. But the system was (and still is) broken ,and they were used as scapegoats and easy targets. CPS Decided not to prosecute after the mum being investigated twice. Why did no heads fall there?

The witch hunt was extremely political and there was pressure from society and the media to see "heads roll ". The higher ups caved to that pressure. It was all a shit show.

The criminals were dealt with by the justice system, not a lot to milk there. A broken system though, generated headlines and campaigns for months and months. It wasn't the system on trial by media though, it was named individuals that did the best they could, with what they had , within the restrictions and laws they had available to them.

It wasn't a single social worker or doctor that had the power to remove the child . It wasn't a single social worker or doctor that decided he was to be returned to his mother.

Baby WAS failed. Primarily by his "care" givers , but also by the system.

The reason why lessons must be learned and procedures scrutinised is that you can't stop people from killing their kids . You just can't. You can ensure there are systems in place to intervene and protect these children. Given all the cuts though, that's just lip service.

SS as they stand atm are still underfunded, overworked, understaffed, under resourced. Lack of sufficient foster carers , adequate placements, funds, alternative support etc. Time lines are ridiculous, the number of chances given are ridiculous.No lessons have been learned.

Wasn't there something like that with Arthur Labinjo-Hughes? His uncle reported the abuse to the police and they said that if he attempted to visit his nephew himself he'd be in trouble for breaching lockdown rules? Lockdown didn't contribute to Baby P's death though.

Absolutely agree with this. Much of the time they have no interest in their own family members or ignore what their own child is doing to their children but then complain about the authorities. What about looking in the mirror?

A few people have tried but weren't listened too. Lockdown also made it easier to parents to behave like this.

Hang on. Lucy Letby was guilty.

I agree that the McCanns have had vitriol directed at them.

As bad as things were at the time that these deaths happened, they are much worse now. Fewer people take up the profession and social care budgets have been repeatedly reduced, year on year.

Remember that documentary on Winterbourne View a few years back? What do you think is happening now?

You can be different to your own upbringing if you want.

You can better yourself it's possible.

Lack of opportunities?
Opportunities are out there for all.
I

Their lives would be less stressful if they didn't have children.

People always forget that if moone worked in those horrible roles, the scum would get away with much worse.

If I was a doctor I'd bever have been willing to work in such a clinic.

I'd never be a social worker for the stress and tragedy.

So who is going to fill those roles?

No malice meant, but it's not going to be people with the best skills and options, certainly not long term. The riskiest jobs need the best qualified and capable and you can't attract those people with excessive workloads of emotionally traumatising cases.

Sick of seeing kids killed and abused and constant blaming of The System as though its some passive situation. Its not. Its wilful underfunding and investment.

It sickens me more than inadequate scum get paid to breed?
Having children is optional they don't have to have them, yet they keep on having them?
Even when arrested she was pregnant again it's disgusting.

I think this witch hunt has inadvertently put more children at risk.
-public have less trust in social workers and services, so less likely to seek support.
-Less people want to actually take up such a valuable profession.

Blame culture is poisonous for creating safe services.
-if something does go wrong do you think practitioners will be open and honest. The way this was dealt with I think would lead to even more secrecy and defensiveness.
-Duty of candour brings fear to practitioners, fueled by how this was dealt with, from start to finish.

i really hope lessons are learned about that process.
Appreciative inquiry, is a much better style in my opinion.

I watched this documentary a few years ago and it
has stayed with me ever since
Now when anything happens and there is a witch-hunt for people, I always think what are the true events that happened.

I remember thinking this at the time but it wasn’t a popular opinion, MP’s and tabloids were very quick to point fingers.

Absolutely tragic- I would say that Baby P and Victoria really stand out in my mind mind as being particularly bad but sadly there have been many more since
In my experience, some families are extremely canny in evading questions and procedures. It’s often that after the case is over that multiple failings are exposed but that doesn’t mean that individuals are always to blame. It’s like the dots are there but not joined up until afterwards when it’s too late for the child.
To call Baby P’s killer the mother’s partner is a complete misnomer; this was a guy who she allowed to live in her house with his equally vile brother- an abuser himself.
I will watch the documentary OP

The untold story of baby p? I watched this about 10 years ago and I was so shocked and have never forgot it. I was at uni at the time studying nursing and I remember at the time in a class we were learning about “the Swiss cheese model” basically tragedies are very rarely one big error by one person or one system. They are lots of little small errors done by good people who usually are over worked and have no choice but to cut corners due to the systems that they work in. Most of the time that small corner cutting with be fine and no harm will come but every now and again lots of little errors by lots of people will line up like the holes in the Swiss cheese and something terrible happens. I think that’s what happened with baby p and instead of saying the system of overworked professionals failed him, people who were trying their best in awful circumstances were scapegoated

I worked in the legal department of an authority in SE England throughout the 1990s.

We would see the same families' names crop up time and time again, as one child after another was made subject to child protection orders. One family will stick in my mind for ever. The mother had a baby virtually every year, except for the year that the father was in prison*. And every year, one more child was removed from her care because of abuse and neglect. In the end, there was enough historical evidence for subsequent children were removed at or soon after birth.

It was heartbreaking, and I really felt for the children, but also for the CP workers for whom it must have felt like being on some sort of treadmill.

The impact on the staff was tremendous, and it led to more than a couple of ill-health early retirements. How hard it must be now, when local authority resources are so much more overstretched.

*for threatening to kill a social worker and smashing up the social worker's car.

it was terrible how the doctor and social worker received the blame

A list of improvements were ordered to be made in the case of Baby P - but no apology for the underfunding by the Gov which no doubt contributed to the problem.

Or that the procedures that WERE in place (on the advice of Gov or their advisors) were inadequate or unsuitable. They can’t have been great if they failed this badly.

it’s easy to be wise after the event. And to let others take the blame whilst obfuscating your own errors and major contribution to the sad event in a mass of new reports and improvements - that’s for you Ed.

Absolutely this. I was 17 when Madeleine McCann went missing and my first reaction was, "Who the hell leaves their babies alone and goes out for dinner?"

Yes. It was awful. And social workers (in particular) continue to be especially singled out for pilliory by the media and society at large even now. I work in mental health (older people's now but previously forensic mental health services). There is no money, our t and c are shocking, we are understaffed and resourced, stretched to our limits, and there is very little collaboration or cooperation with the NHS or other services such as the Police. Systemic lack of joined up thinking. It's worse now than ever before. It's literally impossible for us to help people sometimes. Plus a large percentage of our service users are on drugs. But if a service user does something catastrophic it's automatically blamed on 'the social worker who missed it'.
You would think cases such as Baby Peter, Victoria Klimbie etc would have led to improvement and changed thinking. Things have got worse not better.

Those brothers should have had more scrutiny put on them. Especially from the police and benefits people (long term unemployed, but not hounded like other benefit claimants). On the local news, it was reported they would abuse and torture their own grandmother, but nothing was done.

, the McCann's would still have a daughter if they hadn't left her alone in an unlocked apartment to go off to dinner with their friends.

Yes they're victims but they're victims caused by their own lack of judgement and actions.

I think it's because the services are there to protect and they failed. Social work isn't a job I could do and it's so much responsibility. However, having dealt with social workers frequently when I was a teacher I can't tell you the sheer frustration of reporting constantly and nothing being done.

One instance in particular, this social worker was totally taken in by the mother of these kids who very clearly being dangerously neglected and there were also signs of abuse. The mother was very manipulative and at a meeting the head was trying to tell her this is serious with everything that had been going on and she just would not listen. Every day I reported something on cpoms it was an awful time. The mother then moved to a different council area and no doubt the entire process started again. It was a pattern, they'd moved several times to different local authorities.

God knows what has happened to them since I often think about them, but that social worker believed the lies the mother told over experienced professionals who saw these children day in, day out. If I ever found out something awful had happened to those kids I would absolutely hold her patrly responsible for failing to protect them when she could have, 2 years this went on for before they disappeared to another part of the country. That's negligent.