Why were the injuries reported by the school not followed up over a longer period? I've read the safeguarding case raised by the teachers was closed within 6 days. And whilst I agree home schooling should be denied in this circumstance, you can't force parents to bring the child in and I hardly think she'd have been so much safer if she only spent 3/4 of every day at home and 1/4 in school. If they thought it was 'unsafe' for her to be home 24 hours a day, why the hell would it be ok to be there 18 hours a day (school is about 6 hours)?
Do we really think the type of people who will kill a child will care about attendance letters? Plenty of children are 'on roll' and not in school in reality and at risk.
I really think the homeschooling issue is such a red herring, but a useful political distraction away from the real failings. When a child has unexplained injuries and then parents homeschool there should be consistent and frequent social worker involvement. The issue is the failings of the safeguarding system and that no-one is following up regularly, and teachers are not the ones to do this. They did the right thing and seem to have been effectively ignored by social services.
And some parents homeschool to safeguard their children from the fact the school expects their assaulted / harassed child to continue to attend a school where their attackers / abusers still attend too. I have a horrible feeling they are using this tragic case as a way to just ban homeschooling. Who gets to define 'vulnerable'? For some children the school is where the abuse is happening.