I don't understand all the anxiety about SWs

[Loveweekends10]

I see so many threads on here where people are anxious about social workers. I really don't get it. I can honestly say that before I came on mumsnet I never gave them a second thought.
Is this anxiety whipped up by the media? Is it low confidence in some parents that they don't think they are dong a good enough job with their kids?
I'm also shocked about the amount of people that say they fell out with someone and that person then rang social services to get at them.

I do sometimes wonder, if the social workers who have been there a very long time,have lost some compassion along the way.

Well no big jessie because whatever we think of the grandparents that was what was agreed between the parent and the SW and something different happened, are you still ok with that ?

And as for getting on with your parents, mine repeatedly beat me with a leather belt so obviously they aren't people I want in my life but my mother works in A and E and reports other parents all the time, nice eh ?

In some cases it's not so much a lack of compassion that's the problem, but downright malice.

I think it would be a good move to recruit older people to the profession. Maybe a recruitment drive targeting the over 40s.

Well, actually, yes, I am okay with that.

I know adults with abusive parents who spend their own parenting years placating their own parents, due to fear that their own parents will make a malicious complaint in order to get care with the grandchildren, and be successful.

And then what would happen? The grandparents could (in some cases would) claim that they grandchildren had admitted that [insert awful thing] happened in confidence to their adored grandparents.

And then it all gets messy.

Oh dear.
Why does anybody think any profession is bad? It's because there are some bad ones giving the rest a bad name. People are scared that they might get a bad one. Politicians, policemen, teachers, it's all the same. And unfortunately any profession with authority will attract more than your average number of bad seeds.

On these threads people always talk about children being removed and suggest that as long as that doesn't happen everything is OK.

I was under investigation after some fruitloop claiming to be a neighbour reported me with a load of made up allegations, no idea who or why.

SW turned up, I let her in as I had nothing to hide. DS was lovely, healthy, bright and well cared for. She was horrible, really insensitive about the miscarriage I was still having (suggested it was a good thing as she assumed I "couldn't cope" with one), when her initial allegations didn't go anywhere she proceeded (as is usual) to hunt around for anything she could use against us. Accused me of neglect because there was washing up in the sink. Eventually my husband discovered she had no right to be there without permission and he asked her to leave and let me rest.

Her report was full of inaccuracies, such as saying we had no toys for him (she complained they were messy, she had seen them) and our refusal to let her inspect upstairs (because we asked her to leave after an hour as I was unwell) was seen as suspicious.

We did complain to the local MP, and SS. It still took 3 intrusive house inspections (they wanted to check for consistency) and over 3 months to get the file closed. During that time it dominated our lives. 3 months of stress, letter writing, phone calls, we had done absolutely nothing wrong beyond leaving some dishes dirty when I was having a mc.

Someone asked what the problem with being "known" is. Well, when I go to the Dr, or HV, and they pull up mine or DCs notes, a flag comes up alerting them. It doesn't say we were innocent, it doesn't even say the file is closed. When I went to the Dr to be signed off with stress in early pregnancy, she had to tell SS I had MH issues, even though it didn't affect DCs. I was shit scared it was all going to start again. I had to take DS1 to A&E yesterday, as he fell and hurt his arm, and again, I'm dreading the call. They don't have to take your children away to seriously impact your life.

Well big Jessie you'll be delighted to hear these grandparents ended up being award 50/50 care, despite their being police records of violence towards the child's mother. There's also a very good chance they will be awarded access to the child she has had with her new husband too.
Marvellous system isn't it.

A grand parent awarded 50/50 custody? There is definitely something you don't know or aren't saying

Was the custody case going on while she went abroad by any chance?

No the first she new about them wanting custody was when she came through customs and was stopped.
The long and short of it was that they looked after the child whilst she worked. Before school, after school, holidays etc and then moved in with her new partner 200 miles away. The grandparents were upset, claimed she won't cope and the court decided the child had such a strong relationship with the grandparents that she was to share care with them.

*knew

Mutny that, or a case of there being not enough cynical procedures about nice, concerned grandparents in the system.

Especially about grandparents who've been hand picked by SS to adopt children

I have no experience of whether abusive/manipulative grandparents can successfully play social services these days. I'm inclined to suspect that they generally can't, but the threat is often enough to keep their adult children grovelling.

I think the story which Wanderingsoul told was in Take a Break magazine (not saying that is where she heard it). The problem with reports such as this in the national press is that SS can't comment on them due to confidentiality. Same as with the children being taken into care because they were obese stories. SS were clearly very frustrated that the story was being slanted in this way and there were clearly more issues than the parents were feeding (no pun intended) the press but SS were simply not allowed to comment.

Of course there will be bad social workers - there are bad GPs and bad surgeons etc etc but they are in the minority and I'm not sure why such a huge amount of fear exists about SWs other than that these scare stories in the press creates it.

With regard to the removal of the FC then I think this is a bit different to the case of children with their natural parents. In the case of FC I have seen that there is a presumption which is very hard to rebut that the child is better of with a natural parent and this can slant the treatment of foster carers.

I have been on both ends of SS. I was a child from a violent home and placed into care and as an adult I have stood in court and been involved in having children removed rom their homes.

Our home life as children was very violent. When my mum left home and dad spent every minute drunk the house disintigrated into filth and choas. My older sister and me would be begging at the local shop for food on tic, we had no clean clothes, no adult care, and the two of us (ages 8 & 9) were looking after younger siblings (the youngest less than a year old). We didn't go to school and we stole money to buy food. During this time dad would be in the pub or at home sleeping it off till the next night. Despite SS being involved, reports and complaints from neighbours etc it was 2 years before we were removed to safety, and even then it was deemed temporary at the beginning although we stayed in care till we were 17.

As an adult I worked in a SS related position. The children in my care were children of adults with MH problems, Drug addicts, Alcohol dependant addicts and Class A peadophiles. The main aim of our role was to keep the families together as long as possible whilst providing a huge amount of support for them. Parents were given every opportunity to keep their children - even the peadophile!!! All they had to do was stick to the plan and show some committment to it and the children. In most cases they did (after a fashion) but there were some who couldn't and they had their children removed. But only after lengthy meetings with all concerned, court appearances, support networks.

It is really rare that a child would be removed instantly from the home. It is even rarer that a complaint would end up in court without substantial evidence.

My own children are always covered in bruises. They have competitions to see who has most. My youngest has had many trips to A&E, two of them serious accidents. And SS have never been involved not have I been made to feel they might be.

mosman you have no proof of any of this. You are drip feeding. I think its clear there is a lot more to this.
This is why people don't believe this stories, because they are full of holes. Rickets being blamed for fractured skulls, grand parents awarded 50/50, people not bring arrested for kidnap but told 'come back tomorrow'.

Mrs D they were the adoptive parents of my friend and the father punched her in the face in front of my very eyes when she was 18 and then 10 years later put her through hell and ended up with acess to her child. She still has PR but in reality she cannot fart without their say so.

why does my spelling and grammar go to pot when I am posting on MN [hblush]

Mosman I also think there has to be more going on that you are saying. Either your friend has not told you the whole story or there were things going on and she was burying her head in the sand and things escalated while (and because) she was on holiday much like the effect of ignoring a parking fine/credit card bill but obviously more serious.

Mutny - what "proof" would you like on an Internet forum exactly ?

OP YANBU.

What irks me on here, is when a poster identifies a child that is clearly at risk and people say "Don't phone SS, ring the NSPCC instead."

All that does is delay the child getting the help they clearly need and it's an attitude that arises from a misplaced fear of the SS.

Would also agree that SS have their hands full already.

'The long and short of it was that they looked after the child whilst she worked. Before school, after school, holidays etc and then moved in with her new partner 200 miles away. The grandparents were upset, claimed she won't cope and the court decided the child had such a strong relationship with the grandparents that she was to share care with them.'

So they put the needs of the child first, to have stability and a loving relationship before the desire of the mother to set up a new home with her boyfriend 200 miles away from everything that child had known.

'Can you imagine your rosie cheeked children being taken from their marks and Spencer's tv advert life and put into foster care for even a short while with shite food their mother wouldn't dream of feeding them, other angry, rough children who are used to nobody caring about them and are defensive and aggressive as a result ? '

It's ardly the M&S ideal family life that you are portraying, she dumped her child on grandparents for as long as it suited her and then stopped when an alternative came up. Then she decides to remove the child 200 miles? What did her child think?
In my job I come across a lot of child-pawns and they are often defensive aggressive and deeply unhappy.

Sorry if already been said, but the rickets story is true www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-17780954

However, that's not to say that I don't agree with seeker and the OP. That case was one of the (awful) rare ones that were wrong, but the blame there lies more with the doctors, in my opinion, than the SWs. They were following medical advice.

In any case, there is bound to be occasions where SWs get it wrong, however hard they try. Unfortunately, it's more likely to be the case that they don't act quickly enough and a child suffers harm, rather than swooping and taking innocent parents' children away.

I think people who are paranoid about SWs would be completely shocked to see what the kind of cases that SWs deal with. They work with (in the main) extremely chaotic families, who have experienced multiple generations of neglect/abuse/poverty. They simply couldn't get involved with large numbers of 'normal' families even if they wanted to, they're completely overworked and underfunded. And if they were snatching all these children, where are they going to go? Figures show that they won't be adopted, and there is a massive shortage of foster care, which is not as good for children as a permanent relationship in any case (not a dig at foster carers by the way).