Toddlers and children being killed by parents etc?

[faithfulbird20]

What can we do about this? It seems like so many kids are being killed. Get health visitors to visit more often?

IMO it needs a bigger society fix where children aren’t having children and all experiencing utterly dysfunctional parenting and families.

health visitors? cant see that doing much

There are so many children...it's painful to even name them knowing they died a painful death...wtf is wrong with people...it really needs to be addressed...so many innocent young children....treated worse than animals...I'm just shocked I must have atleast heard about 10 kids being murdered within the past 6 months...

Has this gone up since the virus?

So many in the news this week.

Social workers are drowning under caseloads, the community support and early intervention services like SureStart centres that would possibly spot warning signs have being closed, nobody wants to report anything suspicious….in one case family members noted bruising and photographed it but it’s not clear if it was reported.

I don’t know what the answer is, the fact that it’s happening in homes up and down the country right now makes me want to weep. It feels so bloody hopeless.

What would help change this?

I've mentioned this on a few threads.

I'd like a few things to Happen but something like, a trigger system where police have to attend a house if its showing the sw couidnt see the dc say twice when asked.

The police have to go to the house, see the dc, the dc must be seen by a medic and signed off as it were.

If all is fine, the care givers are simply told to not miss sw meeting and if tyere are signs of abuse then that triggers the next level.

I think it would remove this sw being blind sided by a feckless parent out of this part of the whole picture.. It wouldn't change anything from day to day work but sw Jane for instance knows her back is covered because she hasn't been able to pin down sue... She knows the system will flag this up triggering a police visit...

The parent or as it seems, random partner who Abuses also knows there is no escape, the child will be seen.
I think people would think twice knowing there is no way out.

Oh and again at this stage the dc has to be seen by a medic, so no lying or fobbing off either.

Also ban physical hitting and also educate that no dc is evil or naughty at all and dc don't get punished by facing walls etc.. Flood the air ways with this and make by standers culpable

It needs a holistic approach

Invest in decent social services, social workers, pay them what they deserve so they don't all keep leaving (which is understandable)

Invest in prenatal and postnatal care for women - the postnatal care we have in this country is basically a third world standard. No one gives a fuck when a woman has PND - and that's if we get as far as a diagnosis.

Equalise the mental and domestic load between men and women. In almost all households women take on the drudgery and mundane work with little acknowledgment and thanks and everyone's surprised when it grounds her down

Much better MH services.

Closing the rich/poor gap

The big one: Better consideration of safeguarding in family courts. The myth is that women get their way in the family courts when actually it's the other way round and violent abusive men are very easily given access to their children and weaponise them to terrorise their exes.

I could elaborate wildly on all these points which I know are a bit black and white. But that would be a good start.

Services have been destroyed by cuts over the years. More money needs to be invested into social services, health services and third sector support services. Families who are struggling will be picked up earlier, or services will be able to spend more time with families, and consequently the risk reduces. I'm a children's social worker, have worked 2 x 13 hour days this week and 3 x 10 hour days. Most days I start at 8am and finish after 6pm. My caseload is huge, I'm drowning in work, putting in long hours and still have so much work outstanding. Every social worker, health visitor and midwife I know is the same.

@KitchenKrisis

I've mentioned this on a few threads.

I'd like a few things to Happen but something like, a trigger system where police have to attend a house if its showing the sw couidnt see the dc say twice when asked.

The police have to go to the house, see the dc, the dc must be seen by a medic and signed off as it were.

If all is fine, the care givers are simply told to not miss sw meeting and if tyere are signs of abuse then that triggers the next level.

I think it would remove this sw being blind sided by a feckless parent out of this part of the whole picture.. It wouldn't change anything from day to day work but sw Jane for instance knows her back is covered because she hasn't been able to pin down sue... She knows the system will flag this up triggering a police visit...

The parent or as it seems, random partner who Abuses also knows there is no escape, the child will be seen.
I think people would think twice knowing there is no way out.

This is a brilliant idea, but I know when I had to call the police about immediate concerns for a child, we waited hours for the police to arrive and authorise an emergency 48 hour removal. This was for a baby that was already on a CP plan, the baby was eventually removed by social services but it is not a quick process.

There are not enough police, and there are not enough social workers. Funding for vital services has been cut to the bone, and people should really fucking consider the impact of those cuts on the most vulnerable in society when deciding how to vote next time.

I'm not sure it's more endemic now than it ever was, I mean historically I imagine it may have been far more common than it is now. But all the same, it seems more could be done to stop kids falling through the gaps - I'm still surprised at sometimes how often authorities just seem to give up when parents won't let them see their kids. I mean, if it keeps happening either those kids are in danger or perhaps the parents are scared to admit they need help that could be given without any necessity to remove the children - but one way or another they should be seen.

It would help sort parents who need help from kids who need help if the message was clearly given that most social service interactions do not involve removal of children - a lot of people feel that involvement = your kids taken away, but that's not usually the case at all.

Yearly check ups with health visitors for all children

Encouragement for children to attend nursery, where staff are trained to look out for safeguarding issues.

More encouragement for people to report things they have seen to social services

Infomercials on what to look out for as signs of abuse (P E.N.S) for the general public also for the people living with the abuser/s (sibling, auntie etc)themselves who may not know that what the abuser is doing to the child is harmful

Cartoons and children's programs showing children how they can ask for help if they think something bad is happening to them e.g tell a teacher, a sibling, a friend

Parenting classes offered to all parents

Council noise complaints being investigated when they involved children screaming or crying too much

Elle your talking about what's in place.

I'm talking about the gap between sw liason with a feckless lying person avoiding them and stopping that gap.

That's the gap where baby star was Tragically killed and Peter connelly.
So moving forward I'd like to see an automated trigger put in place, which takes feckless persons excuses out of the equation because a search will be triggered if the child isn't found at their supposed address.

At the moment, the system seems to be geared around the parents, or feckless person randomly with the dc. Hopefully a trigger system to check the child's safety would make abusers think twice because its less likely they can keep the dc hidden.

Most of the time all will be OK and nothing will happen but on those occasions where abuse looks likely then they can do the removal stuff.

It's just something to remove what seems to be the huge weakness of a sly abuser running rings around "over worked" sw.

I think a huge cultural shift is needed. Children should be a serious consideration, a commitment that is made knowing that you will always have to put them first.

I don't know how to make that happen but I think mandatory parenting classes would help.

I also think more checks are needed, barely a soul saw my DS for months in 2020. What a perfect situation for an abuser- no nursery, no HV checks, no GP, no groups, no friends, no family. Awful.

Although there are some very good ideas here, I can’t see what investing into pre/post natal support, education and so on is going to achieve in most cases. Aren’t most of these murders and abuse committed because the ‘caregivers’ are just plain evil, rather than the struggling type that simply snap or are suffering delusions and so on?

@MamaRaisingBoys maybe they are plain evil. I just can't imagine hurting my boy, but I think that's because I know that he's a human with feelings too. It almost seems some of these "mums" almost don't see their children as people, they're just accessories.

I don't know if it would help, but teaching coping methods could save a few children. And showing parents that what they do shapes a child into the adult they become may encourage some to at least think about their actions.

@ALittleBitWorrriedNow

Has this gone up since the virus?

Yes . Massively.

Much, much harsher sentences for the evil perpetrators of these crimes. Abusing or killing a child should mean life in prison and no release (or ideally the death penalty but that’s not going to happen).

Social workers who have some understanding of the real world and aren’t fobbed off by the likes of chocolate smeared over a child’s face to hide the bruises - WTF?! Get rid of the dead wood and attract better, more streetwise people by offering higher salaries.

Social workers need better training ie more opportunities to shadow etc before being thrown in at the deep end. What you learn in uni is minimal as you are covering such a wide range of topics from adult mental health through to children with disabilities.

Social work caseloads need to be realistic. Some social workers I know have above 40 cases. After spending 1 or 2 days in court each week they have minimal time to actually visit the kids and then there is a mountain of paperwork to complete.

Better conditions for social workers would also mean they stay in the job longer. I've worked in social work teams where the most experienced staff member had only been there 18 months!

Sure start centres did some brilliant work but they just don't exist in the same capacity anymore. There are other service gaps too- long waiting lists to get adults mental health support, no domestic violence support services etc.

@KitchenKrisis

Also ban physical hitting and also educate that no dc is evil or naughty at all and dc don't get punished by facing walls etc.. Flood the air ways with this and make by standers culpable

I agree with the physical punishment (I'm in Scotland where it's already against the law) but I don't that we can ban time outs which is effectively what making DC stand in a corner is. Time outs have never worked with mine but honestly don't see how that's in any way comparable.

Obviously in the recent case there was a process of abuse behind it but it wasn't that act itself that was abusive.

I think the danger of the media circus around these cases is that people, understandably, jump in with knee jerk reactions and push unrealistic "fixes" when it's the government we need to be lobbying for change.

We had a horrific case of a Mum, her 2 dc & her dd's best friend murdered by the mum's partner near us a month ago. It turned up that there had been many warning signs about the partner but he had moved areas, he had many convictions including for domestic violence. More needs to be done to protect women & children, if someone if convicted of violence then there needs to be some kind of monitoring of their movements, police & social services need to be made aware when an offender moves in to an area & women need to be made aware of the fact the man they are in a relationship with is an offender, especially if there are children living there.

I can’t see what investing into pre/post natal support, education and so on is going to achieve in most cases.

^

Contact with professionals who are trained to spot when a child is being abused??

Change is needed to recognise the effects that generation after generation of people who are unable to parent having child after child is having. Parents who are unable to put their own needs behind those of their child be it through ill health, addiction or just pure selfishness. Children are being damaged from the day they are born in some cases but because the bar is set so low in terms of what is expected from parenting - ‘good enough’, this is accepted.