And AGAIN, where the hell was the father?!

[PyongyangKipperbang]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c8elyx27p56o

Not suggesting he is responsible for their deaths but.....

They lived in squalor, the toilet and bath were both unusable due to being filled with rubbish so they used pots and buckets instead. He knew that the mother left them to go to the local shop and appears to be fine with that, and describes her as a "good mother". WTF?!

Two sets of twins in under two years and where the hell was he? Even in a strong team working marriage that would be a struggle, but a single mother doing it.....

I am not making excuses for her. What she did both before their deaths and in what caused their deaths was inexcusable. But if you knew that your childs other parent was struggling to that extent then you should step up, and if you dont know then you are not involved enough in their lives to know that they are living in filth.

He isnt directly responsible for their deaths but he is surely guilty of neglect?! How the fucking hell has not been charged with that?!

I didnt know you were allowed to refuse social services requests for information/visits.

I've always found health visitor interactions a complete waste of time and not a service I was ever remotely in need of but I would never have refused them their visits as I would be concerned that I would then look strange and suspicious for not wanting them to see the children or our home.

You don't have to engage with health visitors. It's not a requirement nor is it suspicious. Health visitors are for families who may need support. Plenty of people don't want or need that support. You don't get reported to SS for not using a voluntary service.

I know technically it's not mandatory but because I home educated my children I never wanted it to look like they were these "invisible children" that you hear about. Back when my eldest turned school-age, home education was considered to be a very irregular and peculiar thing indeed. Thankfully not so much nowadays.

We can spend all day talking about the dad but at the end of the day, we only know what we’ve read in the articles. Who knows how much he really knew about their home life. Who knows how regularly/irregularly he visited his children?

What I do know, is she shouldn’t have left her children to go to the shops. You NEVER do that. Especially when there’s an open fire (articles state that the fire was started by a cigarette or tea light) around. No doubt she was struggling. I struggle with two toddlers as a single parent let alone 4 toddlers. That doesn’t excuse leaving them alone on multiple occasions. The verdict of manslaughter was the correct one. RIP to the kids

It's not about opinion though. How do you expect social workers to see children when a) parents don't consent and b) the evidence needed to escalate isn't there? How do you think social workers can not 'allow' parents to fob them off? Do you not grasp that you need consent to work with families? Continuing to call and turn up without consent is harassment and is illegal!

I've been involved in a number of families where a grandparent or other parent has removed child/ren from the home and refused to give them back because of the risk or living conditions. It definitely is possible and should be done if the risk is high enough!

You thought social workers could force people to let them in? More power than police basically?

I understood that social workers didn't follow up on advice to go back to see the family and the case was subsequently closed. It's also possible for social services to intervene in the case of neglect, they can go to court and use the police to gain access.

As far as I'm aware they knew the children were being neglected which is why they were involved in the first place. However I think COVID meant that appointments were phone calls instead of visits.

I'll be honest and say that Covid time was bloody horrendous being a social worker. Visits were virtual a lot of the time which was worse than useless and gave a false sense of safety. Half the social workers were CEV and never left their houses so those of us working were doing twice as much. Parents were very good at using Covid test pictures off the internet to scare social workers into not going round and were enabled by the government to keep their kids off school for months at a time.
its no wonder children slipped through the cracks (if that's what happened here, I don't know) during Covid. It was genuinely awful working then.

however I just want to point out that yes while social workers can access a home with police and police can remove children they need evidence to do so. Children being a bit smelly or grubby isn't anywhere near the level of evidence you'd need for action like that. If someone had got inside the house and seen the state of it at the time the children died then that might have been a different matter but she didn't let them in. You can't force your way into a house on the off chance.

It's much cheaper to have a societal expectation that, however ground-down or worn out or ill they are, mothers must just plod along making things ok for everyone at the expense of their own wellbeing. And by and large they do. And that lets everyone else who would otherwise have to step in off the hook
I think this is very true but I also think things are changing, women are increasingly realizing that it's not in their interests to be mothers now that they have better access to well-paid jobs.

If men were primary carers across society there would be more support for them
I'm not so sure, caring is a menial task, people who perform menial work tend to be regarded as inferior and not worthy of support.

Exactly. The male care workers in this country (who are mainly migrants) are hardly held in high social esteem or paid well. Men don’t do care work BECAUSE they have a higher social status. Nor do rich women - they outsource it to poorer women.

If a child or children are on their radar, they shouldn’t allow the parent to keep fobbing them off and not allow SS to see them. To just sign them off because they couldn’t get access was, in my personal and non expert opinion, unforgivable. If you think it’s acceptable that’s fine. We’re all allowed our own opinions

Its not acceptable at all but generally speaking, Social Workers, in fact all community care professionals have huge case loads, 336k families on their radar, 21k social workers, some have case loads of 30 families, others far less.
Almost 1 in 5 social workers leave, over 2000 vacancies unfilled.....

If they are continually going back to see family X they aren't going to see the other families on their books are they?

& when they make a mistake, it's often fatal and then they get hauled over the coals by the public... all for 38k per year average.

You get what you pay for.

everyone playe a part in thhis but shhe lied in court claiming someone was wit them who didnt even exist

didntt take any responsibilty at all

And you can't keep going back to see a family if they don't consent. You simply cannot do that, it's harassment. You keep trying as much as you can but if they clearly don't consent to an assessment and you don't have the evidence to escalate it you have no choice

I get it's hard for social workers to escalate
. But it should be law that they have to be shown in. My father repeatedly & maliciously reported my mum to social workers when I was little. She was terrified she'd lose me, but she cared for me properly, & had nothing to hide & she always let them in. It makes me so angry that maliciously reported people like her feel they have to let them in, but people who are actually neglecting their children have no qualms about barring the door, and are allowed to do that. This is one thing where, 'If you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to fear' should apply.

You really want to live in a country where by law you have to let social workers in every time they receive a report? What if it's malicious? Think about the freedom and rights you're advocating giving away. Even police can't come into your house by law without a warrant or immediate evidence of harm. I'm sorry but that's not a system I want to live in or work under.

If she had been letting the father in, and then stopped, that would be an alarm bell. Also, her boys apparently smelt, noticed by teacher, presumably dad noticed too. He did report, some say? I haven't seen yet if he did. He should have taken them home, esp if he knew they weren't at school.

Perhaps the reason the father didn't march in and take them home is because he felt that looking after four little children full-time would be too much for him?

Guest, well yes, it was v upsetting for my mum to feel she had to let people in. In her case, it was malicious, as I said. But she had no choice, as my abusive father was trying to get sole custody & it would have been used against her. I do agree that it's really disturbing for that to be the only way forward. Maybe there could be compulsory entry if there were hygiene concerns, as w her, and unannounced school withdrawal? It's just that if you hear of this case or the other one pps have mentioned where she wanted to rescue the little girl next door, it seems so wrong that social services can't step in.
Crispin, that's true, but he did have family support. He could have kept them temporarily while social services helped her clean up? Ofc she could still have refused entry..

Glad to see this thread. I nearly started an identical one yesterday. Single mum to two sets of twins under the age of 4 - not surprised she wasn't coping. Disgusted he gets to walk away scott free.

Maybe he should have taken this into consideration before fathering the four children?

Quite.
And I'm sure she'd much rather a critical mumsnet thread than to have lost her four children and be in prison for manslaughter. But yes, let's prioritise him.

I mean, who could predict that a woman on her own with two sets of twins in two years might possibly struggle to cope

It's their little faces that really affect me, the smiles and the bright eyes. Then I think about the terror of their last moments, poor little souls.