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?

Much better communication between services. Teachers, social services, doctors, police, it all needs tying in together. There have been instances of teachers flagging up a problem and social services not intervening, or being fobbed off by manipulative parents (Daniel Pelko).
Any suspicious behaviour, such as children turning up to school with bruises, should trigger parent classes.
The problem, though, is children being taken into care unfairly. I believe this happened a few years ago, and now, it seems that social workers can't do right whichever way they act.

Simonjt
...The way we are as adults is entirely expected, it is not a surprise. The issue is a traumatised child is pitied by the public, other parents etc like people on this thread. However the moment you turn 18 those same people see you as no more than a problem, a burden, a bad person. Unless we start seeing traumatised adults as actual people who need targetted and effective support nothing will change. My sister will continue to have children, she will continue to fail them because she hasn’t been parented, she hasn’t experienced love and no one has ever attempted to provide the help and support she actually needs. My brother however is a socially acceptable traumatised person, he is shy, withdrawn, quiet so he hits the good and worthy human criteria.

A society choosing not to support traumatised adults is one choosing to create more trauma.

Well put and I couldn't agree more.

@Pastnowfuture

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.

This. I'm a NQ social worker and it's supposed to be a gradual learning experience. I have been in post for 4 weeks and with minimal experience due to Covid at university. I now am working totally alone, there is barely anyone to ask questions to. Half the team are agency. I despair to be honest. I'm doing my best but it's ridiculous

Past now future

Which is why we need the trigger system so sw know the police or whoever has their back when they can't pursue the evasive parent. They know that child won't fall through the crack.

We also need far more support for dc with sen in school which can impact a person's life chances.
Teachers should have sen training and the Senco should be highly trained and skilled to give proper advice not just be a Co ordinator. Dc who are not engaged and suffer in school go onto have low self esteem which can lead to all sorts of issues.

The problem is human rights. The worst drug taker, laziest DP, horriblest DM has the right to have a child/ children and bring them up their way until it is so bad that someone intervenes. In the distant past they'd be in jail, workhouse, child might be taken away. But not now.

We need to make children part of society again instead of being considered 'parents choice'.

Mother's are expected to go back to work when children are little more than babies without much financial or practical support and told you chose this. But sometimes what you imagine you will cope with and how the situation actually ends up are different things. A mother may plan to go back after maternity leave but a baby that still wakes multiple times a night will make what was a good plan into something that is crippling. And mother's are still the ones who tend to do the worrying about work, home and childcare. Some families are great and true partnerships but not as many as there should be in society as a whole. We may be working to shift this balance but it isn't there right now for current families.

The cost of living and no support for more than two children may mean a low earning family is pushed into desperate situations.

I do believe that we, as a society, should be supporting all children. They are individuals and didn't make their parents choice. One day they will be working and earning and paying taxes to care for us in our old age so we need to support their childhood so they can support our retirement years. Just the circle of life thing.

We need to invest in proper support for parents in the early years, access to properly funded childcare and making sure every child doesn't get lost if a family moves area.

Personal responsibility and respect. We need a way for people to accept their own personal responsibility and respect the huge advantages that modern British life affords them. That would fix 90% of it all in an instant.

We aren’t just overloaded because there’s so many evil people. We are overloaded because a huge number of society think they can do what they want, when they want and society will pay for it and pick up the pieces at the end. We also can’t physically can’t fix everything in people’s lives. By trying to, the real problems get missed. It would also help if people weren’t so horrible to each other for no reason at all, just because they are selfish narcissistic idiots who want to get one over on anyone they can. Without all this rubbish so many terrible things wouldn’t get missed. People don’t see it though, they always put themselves first.

People have been raised to be reliant on the state as it’s ultimate parent which is endlessly forgiving and will always bail them out. It’s ever growing, to the point where there is more people reliant on it than people helping and paying for it. What happens then? Because right now it’s not pretty.