To think this mother should not have been arrested?

[KeinBock]

Apologies if this has been posted before, but this story is just so heartbreaking. The baby is seemingly being adopted against her mother's wishes. Surely any mother would kidnap their own child to prevent this from happening?

With fostering and adoption there is no right way. Adopt the child very quickly, it will be happier and healthier in the long run but mistakes are more likely and the birth parents are not given a chance to change things. Wait for ages, the parents might change but if they don't you have a baby passed from family to family getting older and older.

What people don't understand is that SW is a job where you try to minimise harm. You know full well that you can't prevent it. There are often no right answers. Shit job that someone has to do.

Haven't had time to go through entire thead ... but I thought, from prfess reports, that mother had been in a violent relationship, which cause SS to take the baby into care. Don't know any more than that - if she got out of the relationship or not. I don't suppose we'll ever know.

Aurora - the facts are, that children are left in, and returned to, terrible home situations FAR too long/too often, not taken away unnecessarily. As someone else has said, people who know the facts - Social Care, HVs, sometimes Nurseries or schools can't publish the truth, whereas some areas of the media love to stir and print whatever rubbish - or at best, one sided bias - about whatever story they like.

My heart breaks for her it really does. Part of me was hoping they had got away abroad somewhere never to be seen again but others with more common sense are right, we don't know the full story.

If a violent father was the only concern and the mother has now left him, would adoption still be going ahead or would there have to be other concerns? Does anyone know?

If you look over time, the rate to which children get taken into care fluctuates, depending on the current political climate.

Every so often a specific death of a child will result in a 'something must be done' phase and we move into a pro-removal phase. After a while, the 'staying with the family' phase will start to become more prevalent and the numbers will go down again.

But regardless of the rate of removal, child deaths at the hands of their parents is fairly static (80-120 per year).

What is scary is that the outcomes for children in care are often no better than if they had been left with their parents and adoption breakdown is all too common.

By all accounts to far (although we can never be sure) is that the birth mother did everything SS asked but still decided to place baby up for adoption. I would of done the same

That's the trouble - the only accounts we have are those of the mother's family, and they are inevitably very one-sided. That's what really irritates me about these cases, the Mail (and others) print the reports purely so as to pursue their own Social Services-bashing agenda, and in the knowledge that they will get away with it because SS aren't allowed to give their side of the story due to their duty of confidentiality. However, it is interesting that we have been told that this child was removed because of her mother's violent partner, and so far as I am aware no-one is denying that or seeking to assert that the mother had got him out of her life.

I certainly do feel sorry for this woman: her life is clearly chaotic and it's awful for anyone to have their child taken away. However, she has already demonstrated that she can't keep the child safe and the child absolutely has to come first.

As for the suggestion that this is all the fault of whoever "let" her snatch the child and they should be charged - . On that basis we should shove everyone who ever gets burgled or assaulted into the dock - how dare you let it happen?

It is difficult.

On the service I would think get rid of the father, move homes and do every parenting and course available that SS wanted me to go onto and more. During contact my phoned would be off and I would be make sure I was on time looking clean and tidy.

But would that be enough for SS and the courts it another matter.

And to be honest if there was ever a chance the decision would be overturned she has NO chance now and it's very unlikey she will get the meet the adopter or have letter box contact silly silly girl

Being in a violent relationship doesn't mean that she was innocent does it?

From the reports I have seen it just says she was in a violent relationship for all we know they both could have been violent.

Also I would take what ever the extended family with a pinch of salt as they would have either bee uninterested or unstable to care for the child as extended family are the first people ss look at to take on the children

DietCoke, if the violent partner were a one-off, if the mother has got him right out of her life and made sure he can't get anywhere near her again, and if she has completely demonstrated that she will put the baby first and keep her safe, then I'm sure everyone would be happy for the baby to come back to her. Unfortunately it often is the case that some women simply lurch from one violent relationship to the next and are so needy that they will do anything to keep the partner of the moment happy.

We obviously don't know the facts here, but clearly everyone concerned has taken a long time before deciding to go for the adoption option, so the possibility of the baby going back to her mother or her mother's family will have been explored carefully during that time - it's always the first option they look at.

Imagine the SW. Sat in their office, the DM calls up for a quote, you can't give one. The DM spouts all the usual nonsense but you know that the child was at risk, often there are far greater risks than the extended family might know. For all the DM knows the wider family is abusive and has their own agenda. But it's OK because SWs just carry on doing their jobs with hellish caseloads and worrying about the people they work with.

The other thing people fail to realise is that a SW won't have just one child like this on their caseload. They might have lots at any one time where there is the risk of a tragedy. Imagine going home in the evening carrying that around. That someone might die overnight. And, you might worry for ever that you should have made a different decision.

hadabadday as someone who did all of that and plenty nmore besides however it wasn't enough. I needed therapy for my previous issues and in the 11 months since the placement order was granted I have done heaps more but I am still learning and getting better.

And social services dont tell you what you need to do. They are interested only in the child not the parents.

Op, if you are unclear about how child protection investigations and decisions to remove children come about, maybe this will shed some light.
www.childprotectionresource.org.uk/category/the-law/key-legal-principles/significant-harm-key-legal-principles/

If this had got to the stage of adoption then very many months would have passed of SW trying to engage with this mother and work with her. The courts will only agree with a care plan for adoption if it can be shown it is a last resort, there is no other realistic option for the child.

I am sure she loved her child very much. But we have to be clear what we mean by 'love'. Children need 'love' to be a verb i.e. I will show you I love you by feeding and clothing you and keeping you safe and warm. They emphatically DO NOT require 'love' as 'outpouring of emotion' if at the same time their mum cannot feed, clothe or keep them safe.

If she was in a relationship with a violent and abusive man then my guess is that she could not or would not leave him. The risks, physically and emotionally, to her child would be too great.

"YABVU to believe Daily Mail bollocks."

Ditto!!
Especially because the DM seems to have an agenda against SS, no matter what. It is the fourth story they publish trying to depict abusers, rapists or partners of abusers/rapists as good parents!!

Take that with a pinch of salt. Sorry for the mum but as Miracle said above she has only made things harder for herself and proved that she isn't able to put her child's needs before her own. I couldn't agree more.

The fact of the matter is ots people are very ill informed about how adoption fostering ECt actually works I was a foster carer for 7 years and have now adopted and I can't tell you how many people still ask me about children's homes ECt I dot think I ever had a conversation about children in care were I haven't had to correct people.

and may I say the Attitude on here is exactly why children often go on being abused and nothing gets done because people symphysis usually lie with the mother and not with the children I often get well sw should have done more when often sw have been involved with the families so long some of the sw can recall being a sw to the mums mum

DietCoke - if the violent partner was the ONLY problem and she was prepared to leave and stay away, then the court would not approve a care plan for adoption, it would not be lawful.

However, sadly, it is incredibly rare to have a case where a parent has only one problem that can be easily fixed in isolation to the rest of his or her life. Many of the parents I represent have a variety of problems stemming often from what was done to them as children; they don't understand healthy relationships, they may have problems with drink and drugs etc, etc. Often people need many years of counselling/therapy etc, even assuming they can get insight into their problems quickly enough.

And the view is that a child simply can't wait a year or two for their parents to sort themselves out.

I do wish that SS was allowed to realise some information.

Also sometimes extended family (all I had was my mum) can't care for a child. She was diagnosed with cancer just before final hearing and lost her battle 16 days after court concluded. So wasnt able to provide a LONG TERM stable home.

Fusedog do the foster parent also have to make reports.

Say Lola was your FC and during contact spent the whole time on her phone not interacting and generally not doing much would you then report that to SS.

Family law week has just launched its full transcript service so it may well be that the final judgement in the care proceedings in this case will be reported soon.
www.familylaw.co.uk/articles/full-transcript-service-launches-on-familylaw-co-uk

However, this seems to make no different to certain newspapers who have the judgment in front of them and still print whatever old crap they feel like.

Come on down Christopher Booker!

There would have to be written reports about contact, so either the foster parents writes them up or there is another supervisor.

the court will need to know how the mother behaves at contact, what the bond is like between mother and child etc.

So yes, if you noticed that the mother wasn't interacting very well or at all, you would certainly write that down.

poster HadABadDay2014

Sort of usually foster carers don't attend contact they have contact centre workers, as often foster carers can be at risk from the parents eg false allegations and often as foster carers are the children's primary carers especially with babies they won't physically go to the BP if your there.

so the centre staff make reports on what's happening during contact and we make reports on how the child presents before and after contact

So for instance a child may be very distressed no not wanting to go to contact or a child may have been told various things during contact by BP that is played out during the hours and days after contact also this happens usually with older children BP tell them if they make a allegation they will get to come home so they often coach the children when in reality they will simply be moved to a different fc

Also if the parent actually turns up or is late is record and who they bring you would be surprised how many BP try and bring some random along to contact

I once had a baby brought back who smelt strongly of weed they sadly were having unsupervised contact