Why are the bodies who are supposed to be looking after our children failing them?

[ElfOnTheTopShelf]

I would rather not go into all the nitty gritty details, but there have been two cases widely reported over the past two days where children are "known to" social services or to the police, but it appears that not enough action was taken to prevent a tradegy.

Why is this?

In general, I would assume that the SS/Police are doing a great job, otherwise there would be more, but it seems when they get it wrong, its spectacularly wrong iyswim.

What is causing these failings?

From what I have gathered from the news articles it seems that the SWs put too much emphasis and effort into the mother (parenting classes, providing a childminder, rehousing her etc) rather than the actual welfare of baby P. They were possible hopeful that the mother would improve her maternal skills and in turn this would inmprove the life of Baby P. Sadly this was not the end result.

Also, the legal system isnt geared up enough to put children into foster care quick enough. Too many opinions required (SS, GP, police, HV et al) and not enough communications going on between the lot of them

I am not an expert in these matters but this is how I see the failings taking place.

Its like a double edged sword, you read horrible stories (such as Fran Lyon) where they seemed to be all powerful in able to remove the baby from the home, yet other stories (such as those this week) where they have been unable to do something, despite knowing everything they supposedly knew.
Its such a drastic swing

what prevents SS from taking action? I realise this is probably needed in cases where they are not correct etc, but what hoops are they having to jump through which prevents them from being able to save these children?

The people I'm most MAD with after the man and woman who did that to a child are the gutter press.

The press are making up such a terrible case against the child protection social workers and their managers that they will give up the job and 1000s will be put off from training as social workers IS BRitain without any brains ? We already recruit from all over the world to find qualified social workers prepared to even talk to the likes of this parent and her boyfriend.. YOU and I couldn't do it - we'd get sacked for not being politically correct and saying the bleeding obvious: very few 17 year olds (with scarred backgrounds and vile boyfriends should be left in charge of small children.

I couldn't do it, I'd end up with hundreds of kids stashed in my house!

I have tried avoiding the press details on the past two cases (though sadly heard the radio report re the police being called by a concerned family member but were unable to find them before the mother allegedly killed her sons) so cant comment on waht the press are saying, but it just seems like such a waste that if SS's are aware (which they may not always be iyswim) that they are not able to do more than they did.

Thanks ElfOTTS for commenting. I've been at work all week, or unable to join in. Its good to talk

What job do you do?

The main conributor I think is that we are all human - both the parents who lie in order to harm their children and the police/ss/paeds who have to assess the siuation in front of them. They must be doing a pretty good job 99% of the time or there would be stories like this coming out far more often.

no duckyfuzz don't agree at all. - murderers are not human. Have to go and do some work now bt back later

Yes unfortunately they are human, evil humans, damaged humans even, who knows, but they are all humans and as such are capable of all sorts of things, we are not all sensible rational beings sadly

I worked for SS child protection, but not SW and I never met anyone who would not (if allowed) put the youngest child first. Sometimes SW and SW managers have to be cautious, particularly if the mother is pregnant (as in the case of baby P). They cannot take the unborn into care, so they need to build a relationship with Mum. Can you imagine being the SW who has to keep a relationship with mum to try to protect unborn, when they might have concerns about existing children. But I know that the SWs I worked with (and most likely the ones in Harringey) would have removed the child if they knew of the suffering of this child. I agree with March Some people are evil, or so weak they become evil. Why didnt the doctors make the child stay in hospital if they were so worried? I know of one case where this has happening.

Lack of accountability..

And doubly shocking that they can steal a mothers baby away at birth without any real cause to do so.

Because there's a national shortage of social workers, 12% of all posts are currently vacant, and in places like Haringey the work is so miserable no-one wants a perm. job, so many of the sw teams are made up of temps on short contracts, who are all looking to get out at the first opportunity.

Reading the relevant section of the Laming Report into Victoria Climbe's death, you get the impression everyone, top to bottom (esp. toward the top) is either clueless, useless or both.

I think when you look at how many children they see and compare that to how many slip through it's only a tiny amount being failed. Nothing can be 100% there will always be something slipping through. Of course even the small amount we see is too much, but you also have to remember that social services don't work alone yet they're the ones getting the flack when something goes wrong. Someone said that the social workers were trying to help the mother, maybe they'd been to court and the judge had ruled on the mothers side so the social worker was trying to work with that decision. The decision to keep a child with the parents or place them in foster care isn't down to a social worker or their manager, it's down to a judge.

Agree with Marchbirthday - the 'bodies who are supposed to be looking after our children' are the children's parents. SWs are receiving a lot of flack. Maybe we should sack 'em all and see how many children then end up dead/horribly abused. And no, I'm not a social worker, I can only imagine what an incredibly tough and thankless job they have. They are pilloried if they remove children from their parents. They're pilloried if they don't remove children from their parents. There are many parents/families who need and are receiving a lot of support from numerous government agencies, which helps make their lives easier. Very rarely, a case like baby P's occurs. SWs see this kind of abuse in many more instances than make the news headlines, but in most cases, action is taken to prevent tragic outcomes such as this.

"where they seemed to be all powerful in able to remove the baby from the home, yet other stories"

But Social Services DON'T remove babies, courts do! It's like saying that police throw people in jail.

"what prevents SS from taking action? I realise this is probably needed in cases where they are not correct etc, but what hoops are they having to jump through which prevents them from being able to save these children?"

They have to take the family to court and get a judge to agree for the child to be taken and they have to show they've tried everything else (they'll have been to court and panels a few times before then as each step has to be agreed to all round). The parents will have representation in court just like they would in a criminal court and if they're on legal aid that could be really good representation.

"The people I'm most MAD with after the man and woman who did that to a child are the gutter press."

Too right! I'm fed up of hearing "Why aren't the school controlling my kids?" Because they ARE YOUR kids! Why can't people take responsibility for their own children and why can't other people put blame where it's due, with parents!

"The main conributor I think is that we are all human - both the parents who lie in order to harm their children and the police/ss/paeds who have to assess the siuation in front of them."

Exactly and often Social Workers, especially CP ones, are over worked. I know of a paediatrician who wrote to the GP saying the mother had Munchausen's by Proxy but he wouldn't report it because of patient confidentiality so he continued to subject the child to exams. If that child had been caught later than s/he had who would have got the flack? "Why didn't social workers do something sooner?"

I don't want to sound too DM, but I am disgusted that the head of Haringey children's services hasn't resigned. If the controller of Radio 2 felt she should take responsibility for the Russell Brand/Jonatham Ross incident, then it's also the least that this person should do.

She wasn't soley responsible though, in fact she probably had little to do with it anyway.

At the risk of sounding very Daily Mail...

Is it to do with a culture that we have now in the UK that says that individuals do not need to take personal responsibility for their lives? That the nanny state is there to spoon feed them through life, to provide all they need and more. So when this sort of atrocity happens we don't turn our anger to the people who tortured and murdered a tiny child, we turn it towards organisations and government bodies. Yes of course Social Services etc should have been less rubish, of course the doctor should have been even vaguely professional, etc etc.

I have worked in an area not unlike Haringey and I have seen that in families with significant deprivation there is a real attitude of helplessness, no expectation at all that they can make any sort of difference to their lives, that they passively wait for someone else to come along and help. Obviously there are people who have come out of difficult starts in life and have done really well, and thankfully I know some great success stories too. But the passivity is there and it makes it so easy to absolve yourself of any wrongdoing, of anything, because simply by being poor you are already the victim, so you can never be re-cast as the perpetrator.

Oh, I don't know. I'm so upset about the bloody awful news this week.

I think Tallia22 has worked in SS CP, but TinkerBellesMum you are wrong to think the Head of the children's service shouldn't take accountability. Many heads rolled or retired after a bad Joint Area Review in Surrey that highlighted CP concerns.

The Head of Haringey is accountable if she wasn't out there shouting at the council heads to support her social care staff better. Many social services departments are the cinderellas of the councils. They are the last to get new equipment, other departments in particular finance put huge barriers in the way of social care staff which prevents them from doing their job. 25 children assigned to any worker (no matter how experienced) is far too many. Many social care staff end up depressed, demoralized and unsupported. The county councillors never see how bad it is because they do not have the clearance to go into those places and to protect client confidentiality, but very few councillors ever ask any questions about the SS Child protection teams until you get events like this. The council will fund huge print runs to encourage the borough or public to save paper, turn off electrical equipment at night BUT will they allow the Child Protection teams to have some temporary CRB checked staff to help with massive quantity of filing or employ enough back up staff to support the ever changing social workers ? NO CHANCE.

Social Services is a mess. Nt just CP (which I have worked with) but also the other sectors- elderly, mental health, disability (have some experience of elderly throug a friend and disability through my kids).

everything comes down to one factor: budget.
The SW's are ime almost always (there's crap people in every field after all). but the SW's have to juggle, to work out often o the basis of one visit who needs help and who they can quite literally cast adrift.

sadly there are going to be mistakes and I dont think that canever change, not when you take into account the number of successes.

I do think the head of services sould resign- accountability goes beyond that which you actively create. But the service needs to be reviewed in entirety. there are some parts that can only cope with adequate support- I know my old one used to hand masses of cases over to chariies who were ill funded and not SW's. I also kow the one I worked for went bust, so goodness knows who does the work now- nobody?