Another child who starved to death by sounds of things.

[JakeBullet]

On the BBC news website.

Police found the mummified remains of a 4.5yr old child in a cot (in 2011).

Wearing clothes which would fit a six month old!

So

He didn't start school and nobody noticed.
Mum was an alcohol and cannibis user and nobody noticed.

Can't link as am on phone but can hardly believe that this child slipped so easily beneath the net and nobofy realised until his body was discovered two years afyer he dies!

Surely we have to be asking that ALL children are seen once a yeae for a mandatory welfare check.

I agree about monitoring.

I hate and resent child health surveillance. I had pnd and anxiety and now have far more monitoring than I ever need as am pregnant again. They call it support but it is surveillance. I know this because I work in the system.

My children are developmentally well ahead, fit and healthy, doing all the 'right' things but because both of them had failure to thrive in their first six months because of breastfeeding and I have 'mental health issues', I get stupidly checked up on by people who offer absolutely nothing but a visit to write notes to say I've been monitored.

Meanwhile I am working with kids who have witnesse and experienced sexual abuse and serious domestic violence and have been severely neglected who never get the therapy everyone involved says they need because parents don't engage.

Universal mandatory monitoring just freaks out the normal and worried well of us who just have our humanfoibles. Meanwhile these tragedies will still happen because people hide or avoid their actions and it is virtually impossible to track and intervene meaningfully where this happens. You'll still find essentially vigilant women with high standards of care but just feeling down or fearful taking up more time than those that pose actual risk. It's hard.

I find it absolutely astonishing that anyone could treat their precious one in this way. It's given me some disquiet - in that I am vehemently opposed to corporal or capital punishment but if I heard that this woman were to hang for starving her child to death, I could not be sad about it.

I'm so sad about this story - I came here just to find people to discuss it with. I'm really pregnant so probably hormonal but cried and cried about the Daniel Pelka case. If anyone reading this has a child they don't want, they can come and live with me and my family, for free, no questions asked, you can keep the child benefit.

I get that this can happen but I just don't understand why. If you don't want your baby, just put it up for adoption - there are hundreds of desperate families who want to care for your children. They would be so grateful to you. If you aren't managing, call social services, your GP, the police, anyone.

If you see a child and think they aren't looking great - just ask a question, judge the reaction. This used to happen all the time. I remember when I was young being in a supermarket and my mum being livid because I was complaining that I was hungry and someone stopped her and asked if she was feeding me properly and someone else stopping him and telling him not be so racist. I'm not saying I enjoyed the nosey neighbours but .... well... perhaps it's good to feel everyone is keeping an eye out for everyone else.

It also seems that the news have found, or are trying to create, some sort of weird interest in these cases - there seems to be a new one every month all of a sudden. I'm nearly at the point where I don't watch the 10 o'clock news as I can't take more pics of these poor kids and children in Syria dying (is everyone else hardened to the fact that these people are REAL - this isn't a film - the person on the screen is really suffering in real life).

Sorry for the rant. I'm just really upset. I almost understand why people are religious.... there seems to be nothing left to do but pray.

Poor little chap :(

yumcha888 - I totally agree. There seem to be a few of these cases going on at the moment.

I am also enormously pregnant and am much less hardened than usual (although I don't think I would be hardened to this). I really struggled to get pregnant and can't believe that anyone lucky enough to have a child would treat him or her this way.

Omg this is just pure evil.
While I don't condone alcoholism and heavy cannabis use, they do not produce murderers and parents to neglect to the point of death.
Poor, Poor Boy. May he RIP now.

I read the other day that there is no law requiring anyone to report child abuse. I think that is shocking. If there was a clear law that said if you had reasonable grounds to suspect a child was at risk then you HAD to report it, I reckon that would reduce situations where people are not confident enough to report their suspicions, and might save lives.

Erebus is right. Not so much about the tax- but for these cases to be eliminated, we'd all have to accept much more interference from the state and from each other. I don't know whether any other countries do have better child protection; it would be very hard to 'read' the statistics.
Poor mite.

BigA, one would hope that greater reporting would save lives, but it could also lead to misjudgements, with well treated children being removed from homes and malicious reporting. I'm not saying it shouldn't happen, but its not a straightforward 'report made, life saved'.

'Mandated Reporting' doesn't appear to have any great effect in countries where it is law- they don't have lower death rates than the UK. When children die in the UK one of the main problem reported in the serious case reviews relate to information sharing and communication between professionals. I don't think mandated reporting would change that.

I'm not against it, if there's clear evidence it results in better outcomes for children I would support it, but I'm not sure it would ultimately prevent deaths and I have a few concerns - for instance, can services like ChildLine work with that in place? Can a child tell a counsellor on the phone that they are being abused (excepting situations where there life is in danger) and still be confident that no one will come knocking on the door?

I would love to see mandatory annual checks, but given that some people actively seek advice on MN on how to avoid going to Developmental appointments with their HV, and are given it, I imagine that it wouldn't be very popular.

She called for pizza... hours after her little boy starved to death...? I can't even comprehend this...

I think as NinaNana says, you cannot ever eliminate risk....I know we shouldn't just say "oh well we can't eliminate risk so when these cases happen we should just accept it" but I would like to see far less blaming of everyone involved and more acknowledgement that some parents do bad things and remain undetected. Obviously where mistakes have been made this has to be acknowledged and addressed.

On re-reading the BBC report it seems this woman had serious mental health issues. I don't know if her child was born here or abroad but it seems he definitely had a GP. At the very least it seems he should have been deemed a Child In Need.

I know from my time as a HV that we used to get letters about children who had not been seen by anyone and we followed them up but usually it was "this child has not been seen in the past year" rather than two or three years. I also dealt with a case where a child simply went missing....Mum always maintained the child was returned to family in her home country but that child was never traced.

Sometimes I saw children who had been missing for months or years and found that the parents had simply been moving around a lot - especially if they were travellers etc

I disagree, certainly it's the parents fault or whoever is abusing or neglecting that child but it is also the social services,teachers and doctors fault too. It is part of their job to monitor and look out for signs of neglect or abuse. If they miss what seemed in the case on Daniel signs that were staring them in the face, then they need to take responsibility for it.

To day it's just the parents fault is wrong IMO. If the parents aren't taking responsibility then someone else needs to and although I agree social worker and teachers workloads are huge, it is their job. So if a child dies because they missed the signs they are partly to blame. And I say that as a teacher myself.

There hasn't been anything in the news yet about her several other children - were they being well treated..? Apparently they were seen walking to school etc, not noticeably unwell. I mean like in Pelka case, it seems one child was significantly worse treated than the others. Why??

I also cried my eyes out at this and the Pelka one it's just so awful that there are loving potential parents desperate for children who would give these poor little things a wonderful home in a heartbeat.

DH (enraged on seeing the news story) reckons people should have to take a "parenting test" preconception to ensure they're fit to bring up a child. I can't entirely disagree...

Parents are often overly defensive about external involvement in their families, and the law allows them to be.
I used to work in a community school as a primary teacher, years back. The expectation was that we did a home visit every term, to communicate with the family and see what we could do to facilitate a relationship.
How many MNetters would accept that sort of invasion?
We need to change the law so that parents of children can be held accountable for their health and welfare from birth, and that SWs and heathcare professionals and teachers have right of access to the child on a regular basis, and that parents cannot lie or deceive or obfusticate without serious consequences to themselves.
Until the welfare of the child is prioritised over everything else, children will continue to die at the hands of their relatives.

I've just realised (sorry I'm slow) that it wasn't as tho he'd just missed school, he'd have missed 2 years of school. I didn't know there were other siblings. Odd that they didn't mention their brother.

Erebus. I so agree with you. People dont want state intervention and do want to look at someone to blame when something like this happens.

Its people often in disfunctional set ups, no father, no mark 'boyfriend' because the mother puts her needs before her children's. They make crap decision after crap decision and we keep talking about 'supporting' them.

I am going to get flamed here but its easy to have a child who you assume will be paid for or supported by someone else or to not even think one way or the other whether you want a child - it just happens with some no mark that then disappears.

Maybe we should be judgemental and put flags up when people have children with no thought to the responsibilities. Of course it isnt going to happen, they will be given chance after chance, and no one know wants to be accused of racism or picking on people. So nothing is said.

I have always said that people should be made to have a dog before being allowed to have children.

I am sick of people excusing this sort of case 'oh they've had a hard life'. In which case there would be a whole generation of kids in the 1920s and 1950s beaten, starved and gassed to death by ex-services parents traumatised by the death and destruction of war.

You know that if you don't feed a child, it dies. You know that if you don't eat you will die, and therefore it is the same for other human beings. You know that it is sad when a child dies. When someone is sick and/or dies you call the doctor. You don't order a deep pan and get shit faced.

I am so sorry for anyone in social services - every case like this the cry goes up 'its their fault!' Ok sometimes they mess up, lie or miss important signs, but where are the grandparents all this time - who are often the ones pointing the fingers and looking to 'go to court' (we didn't see them for a few years as she had drink problems... Etc). Often the SSs hands are tied in red tape, and some of the parents are sneaky, sly bastards who could lie their way out of hell.

I know people,who have had bloody hard lives, neglected upbringings, abuse.... who did not grow into sadistic, feckless, heartless bastards.

Thanks for your support JB - I thought I'd be smashed to smithereens on here for stating my views! I think the 2 cases are getting a bit mixed up. Are you talking about the child who had been dead for 2 years - if so I immediately thought that the mother must have serious mental health issues. I have a psychiatric history myself and know the torment of mental illness that can only be understood by people who have this experience. This stuff about the pizza is just stoking people up - how do they know when she ordered the pizza FGS. Of course it is terrible for the child and his picture is haunting as he looks so scared.

You may be a teacher cleowen but you have never been on the front line doing child protection work, with hostile and sometimes very intimidating parents, so you won't know the difficulties and the stress that is involved in this work. Your only part in this is to report any signs of suspected abuse to Social Services and there the matter ends for you. I just hope you don't miss any signs.

Again I think the 2 cases are getting a bit muddled. I am fairly sure there were siblings in the Daniel Pelka case, as there were in the Kyra Ishak case. It is not unusual for one child to be scapegoated. In Kyra's case (as in Victoria Climbie) it was the belief that they had the "devil in them" and certainly in the Climbie case the Pastor at the church was in agreement with the aunt about this.

Silverapples There is a civil liberties aspect to be considered in your proposal. However the other issue is where would the time come from for professionals to have a "right of access" to the child at any time. Teachers and social workers are on their knees already with the huge workloads. In fact since this govt came into power and swung the axe at all public service budgets, social workers (especially in the inner cities) are struggling with dangerous caseloads. I heard from a very reliable source recently (and this in a Shire county) that very soon they will be unable to remove children from a home where there is abuse or neglect because the LA can't afford to care for them - can't afford to pay foster carers, and all the professionals involved in child protection cases outside of the Dept., e.g psychologists, GPs, psychiatrists, court fees etc etc.

You mention parents who "can't lie or deceive without serious consequences for themselves" but there are already serious consequences. At the very least a parent can be charged with a S47 Assault for over chastising a child, through to 30 years custodial sentence for the murder of a child.

Whatever drives parents to ill treat their children is something that you and I and other posters and the vast majority of society will never truly understand, but one thing I can be certain that they won't be thinking of is what might happen to them as a result.

I am putting my hard hat on now and retreating but I think it is an important fact that in 30 years of social work I have never seen a case of an abused/neglected child where the parent(s) step-parents, were not abused themselves as children, or where they had mental health difficulties, which were untreated. Many of these abusing parents were emotionally immature and there would be a huge gap between their emotional age and their chronological age. SO you have a situation where children are trying to parent children, almost always without any support network from family or friends.

Please be assured I am not saying that all children who were abused or neglected themselves as children will go on to parent their own children in the same way. Indeed very often when these adults become parents they ensure that their own children won't suffer in the way that they did.

I don't believe that anyone is evil per se. I think you have to look beneath to see what has driven someone to behave in such awful ways. As far as I'm concerned behaviour is a product of experience.

Thanks for your support JB - I thought I'd be smashed to smithereens on here for stating my views! I think the 2 cases are getting a bit mixed up. Are you talking about the child who had been dead for 2 years - if so I immediately thought that the mother must have serious mental health issues. I have a psychiatric history myself and know the torment of mental illness that can only be understood by people who have this experience. This stuff about the pizza is just stoking people up - how do they know when she ordered the pizza FGS. Of course it is terrible for the child and his picture is haunting as he looks so scared.

You may be a teacher cleowen but you have never been on the front line doing child protection work, with hostile and sometimes very intimidating parents, so you won't know the difficulties and the stress that is involved in this work. Your only part in this is to report any signs of suspected abuse to Social Services and there the matter ends for you. I just hope you don't miss any signs.

Again I think the 2 cases are getting a bit muddled. I am fairly sure there were siblings in the Daniel Pelka case, as there were in the Kyra Ishak case. It is not unusual for one child to be scapegoated. In Kyra's case (as in Victoria Climbie) it was the belief that they had the "devil in them" and certainly in the Climbie case the Pastor at the church was in agreement with the aunt about this.

Silverapples There is a civil liberties aspect to be considered in your proposal. However the other issue is where would the time come from for professionals to have a "right of access" to the child at any time. Teachers and social workers are on their knees already with the huge workloads. In fact since this govt came into power and swung the axe at all public service budgets, social workers (especially in the inner cities) are struggling with dangerous caseloads. I heard from a very reliable source recently (and this in a Shire county) that very soon they will be unable to remove children from a home where there is abuse or neglect because the LA can't afford to care for them - can't afford to pay foster carers, and all the professionals involved in child protection cases outside of the Dept., e.g psychologists, GPs, psychiatrists, court fees etc etc.

You mention parents who "can't lie or deceive without serious consequences for themselves" but there are already serious consequences. At the very least a parent can be charged with a S47 Assault for over chastising a child, through to 30 years custodial sentence for the murder of a child.

Whatever drives parents to ill treat their children is something that you and I and other posters and the vast majority of society will never truly understand, but one thing I can be certain that they won't be thinking of is what might happen to them as a result.

I am putting my hard hat on now and retreating but I think it is an important fact that in 30 years of social work I have never seen a case of an abused/neglected child where the parent(s) step-parents, were not abused themselves as children, or where they had mental health difficulties, which were untreated. Many of these abusing parents were emotionally immature and there would be a huge gap between their emotional age and their chronological age. SO you have a situation where children are trying to parent children, almost always without any support network from family or friends.

Please be assured I am not saying that all children who were abused or neglected themselves as children will go on to parent their own children in the same way. Indeed very often when these adults become parents they ensure that their own children won't suffer in the way that they did.

I don't believe that anyone is evil per se. I think you have to look beneath to see what has driven someone to behave in such awful ways. As far as I'm concerned behaviour is a product of experience.

I started a thread the other day wrt being followed when you move counties here

I started it before this case was reported :( but I had heard that more HV were being employed in Coventry and have experience of moving county twice (with a child in need) and it never being followed up. Obviously in my case my child is a CIN through severe and complex disability not through abuse, but I still believe the fact we were 'ignored' for almost 2 whole years put our family under immeasurable stress (I had to give up work as I was cracking up) and when it gets to that point, even within normal family you get to breaking point and I can see how neglect can happen, though not to that level obviously but I went to my GP and cried and shook because I didn't think i was keeping my daughter clean enough :( he wrote a letter for me to SS and it was only then they took steps to resolve the care she was receiving, which was minimal

I am a bit worried these posts identify me but tbh I am just telling the turth

Sorry didn't mean to duplicate the post. Just read your post Handcream - what I wonder is your definition of a "no mark" boyfriend? I can probably tell you - he will be someone who was "born to fail in life" born into a family where the parents had come from abusive home backgrounds, poor housing, financial problems, maybe drink problems, lack of support, no hope for the future, a family without a "voice" cus they are well..........no marks. This child grows up in that family and then guess what, he does what a lot of us do, he parents his children in the way he was parented, and so turns the cycle of deprivation and politicians of every hue have tried to break into this cycle but it is impossible.

Those of us who have been fortunate enough to grow up in families where we were loved and valued have parented our children in the same way, but that is no need to be so insulting and judgemental about people who have had the "odds stacked against them" since their first cries in the world. Well in fact there is evidence now that a baby in utero can be adversely affected when there is tension in the mother, due to domestic violence or other pressures of trying to live a life on the breadline.

I have worked amongst these most disadvantaged people for many years and the sad thing is they just accept their lives, and have no expectations of getting on in life, getting a better house, more money, support from family. They are living out the lives that their parents lived and so to them it is normal and their children will almost certainly do the same. Given the fact that I was in LA social work for some 30 years I was seeing the 3rd generation of children being born into these families who live on the margins of society.

Nicename I'm not entirely sure that I understand your comments about the 1920s and 1950s and children who were gassed. Presumably you are thinking of the holocaust? I think I've probably made my point but of course there will be people who have had hard lives and yet manage to parent their own children in a better way and carve out a better life for themselves and thank God there are. However for many this is not the case.

Nicename - I agree. We are swinging towards blaming everyone else for not stepping in and spotting it. When it is clear that the parent (or scumbag boyfriend of parent did something) we say that they had a 'hard life'. Well that's Ok then...., lets 'support them and understand them. Well in life there are just evil people.

Its interesting as well who some on Mumsnet give sympathy. The Yorkshire Ripper, Harold Shipman, Myra Hindley. All evil people. But get a mother who murders her children and some feel sorry for her or claim she has been let down by society.

We are becoming less able to give people personal responsibility for their actions and more being allowed to give excuses for what they do.

Do what you like and when you get caught claim you had a 'hard life'!

Nananina - of course I will be judgemental about people who abuse children.