No wonder child protection in Haringay is such a mess when this kind of gobbledigook passes for English

[mabanana]

From the Guardian:
A conference in January will focus on improving child protection.
Sharon Shoesmith will be a key speaker. Her topic: 'Breaking Down Silos: Inspiring Ownership and Sharing Responsibility For Measuring Impacts and Outcomes Across Partnerships.'

Now, wtf is that supposed to mean? It actually makes me quite angry that this kind of doublespeak is being used. It cannot help people think clearly about what must be done. It is the kind of language that makes it OK to sack and legally silence whistleblowers who want to say, in plain English, something is wrong here and we are failing children.

You can't randomly accuse people of MSBP.

There was no need to in this case anyway. Plenty of visible evidence.

I think they should have a rule to remove a child from any house covered in dog and human -waste- for want of a better word. Apparently this house was (although that's from a newspaper report so not necessarily reliable).

Thinking about the Jonathan Ross bbc incident & that the pm commented, someone resigned & there was an apology & something will be done. With this situation I wonder what will be done? It's still tax payers money paying for a system that ignores child abuse.

Given that social services is paid for by the public, should be accountable to the public and works FOR the public, then yes, I think it should not hide behind gibberish and jargon instead of plain English. I see even attempts to translate this rubbish into English her perplexed even those who claim it is crystal clear to them.
This is totally different to the technical language used by scientists or medics. It's just not necessary. I totally accept that this may be a response to even more jargon used by government departments, and I doubt it makes the job of ordinary social workers any easier. I know several social workers, all of whom complain incessantly about the inefficiently of their management and none of whom talk like this about their work.
I suppose what she is trying to say is 'How to encourage your team to take individual responsibility for children and to share information with other relevant organisations'
Which, of course, is ironic, given that Haringay fired a social worker who tried to do just that.

Thanks for the 'insult' Edam-clearly its not ok with you to think critically about whats happened. I'm just someone who questions the information we are given on a daily basis. If you actually read my threads you would understand that I am not defending anyone or making excuses for anyone.

Neither am I saying that the press are 'lying'only that they may have an underlying agenda and that, as yet, we do not have all the information.

I've worked as a social worker for 11 years and am well aware of the piss poor practice which can go on.I agree that those practitioners should be accountable for their actions and that sometimes doesn't happen.

If you heard the news this morning you might have heard that even within the social services department it is claimed there were disagreements between frontline workers and their managers as to what action was needed. Call me patronising and defensive but its not as simple as 'social services messed up'.

Dittany I agree I'm not well informed about this case because I don't have all the information-information which will trickle out as time goes by. However I do read and watch the news so I'm not quite the ignoramus you seem to think.

Opinions are fine by the way, its just some opinions are based on assumptions and prejudice (like saying 'social workers' get something into their heads and won't be swayed from it'). I'm sure some social workers would agree with you Dittany and Edam-I'm just not one of them.

The reason I'm posting these threads is because its something close to my heart and because a dreadful thing happened which clearly shouldn't have.

Off to do my media studies essay

Dittany. Please re read your post and realise that you are projecting a lot of your anger about this onto me for daring to question the evidence on which you base your opinions.

I haven't accused the press of 'lying' and do not believe there is such a thing as 'concrete information' in a case where there are so many diverse opinions/ experiences.

Not all the social workers in this case appear to have believed this mothers lies.
You are choosing to look at aspects of my arguments, blow them out of proportion and ignore the points I am making where I'm actually agreeing with you.

I didn't disagree that all staff working in these circumstances need to keep in mind that people lie, manipulate and deceive. I just didn't agree with your supposition that specific training would enable us to spot 'liars'.

I've never once played the victim, I chose to get involved in a profession which is, and should always be, subject to scrutiny and debate. In my view this should enable us to practice more effectively and reflect on both bad and good practice. However I don't agree with witch hunts.

Read the last sentence of your post. You see I find that condescending- I'm not here to represent my profession but my own views on this subject. I wouldn't waste my time on defending my profession to you as you have already made up your mind.

I'm just trying to say that the situation is far more complex than your posts suggest. That ok?

As I said before on another thread.

The reason SS are being criticised so much over this is yes they did mess up BIG TIME but the fact is when was the last time we heard about SS rescuing an abused child that is now living happily with their adopted family and are successfully undergoing counselling?... Never the media only likes to pick up on the bad stuff.

The only information I have on this case is from the papers, news and internet but I have managed to come to that conclusion myself so it's not a case of thicko tabloid reader or whatever.

Surprisingly we do have minds and we can work things out for ourselves.

But yes I do think a Public Enquiry needs to be held because we need to realise/discuss and lay blame where it belongs before this happens again, which it will only difference is we probably won't hear about it as a case alone it will be the case in the aftermath of Baby P...

I'm late to this debate but can i point out that all public services hide behind this meaningless jargon. I notice an interesting inverse correlation. The less work the perosn does the more they use it.

I had a classic this morning in my professional journal.

It heralds the arrival of the 'RCSLT's Quality Self-Evaluation Tool*

It is little more than yet another meaningless document that will allow us to talk guff about 'quality indicators' the 'client's experience of the service' and 'reflect'.

In other words, it means yet more time away from providing what people want which is a plain old fashioned face to face service (now there's a mad idea eh?!).

Two cracking books written by whistle blowers in the police force and exposing this sort of nonsense are

'Perverting the course of justice' Inspector Gadget

and

'Wasting police time' PC David Copperfield

Very very funny and very very scary.

*Be extremely suspicious of any bundle of papers referred to as a 'tool' or a 'toolset'.

Dittany, I do know about the whistle blower, police and the intial report. However I didn't choose to bang on about them as if they represented the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

You will only ' further exchange' with me on subjects of your choice.Hmm interesting.

Look up the term 'witch hunt'-its far from about being a victim. Its about those who victimise others. You have views and you are entitled to them but so am I.

And like you I don't intend to carry on banging my head against a brick wall-all I intended to do was widen the debate.

You'd be surprised at what people will do to protect themselves.

My exposure of some weaknesses in the system I worked in got me hauled up on disciplinary charges.

It ain't difficult to patronise some dittany and your one of em

No hard feelings and good luck to you

It is very difficult for professionals to raise concerns about wrong doing by their colleagues. I've dealt with some whistleblowers and their careers being destroyed is frankly the least of it.

My sister's a nurse and she's aware of some horrific malpractice. But if she dared to take her concerns any higher than her own manager (who is responsible for the culture anyway) she would never work again. So she does what she can by trying to protect the people in her care, offer them respect and decent treatment and raise issues gently where she thinks she can do so without a backlash.

I don't know whether the Haringey whistleblower is someone who was genuinely horrified by bad practice or someone who is getting their revenge in. But it's entirely possible it's the former and she's suffered as a result.

A lot of this malpractice is by SS, by the way. Who dump people at the door of my sister's workplace, with all their possessions, and take away their accommodation. Or remove people who don't want to go where they are being sent with no notice.

Nurses and carers are equally guilty of treating patients like shit. And that's routine, accepted and normal.

Oh, and doctors!

That's probably the case, was just trying to be fair to Haringay (not that they deserve it).

Actually the most shocking part of the case for me was the doctor who was charged to physically examine BabyP a few days before he died and didn't because he was "cranky".

We can argue all we like about psychological issues like the lying, the judgements that had to be made by the SW because they are not and never will be exact sciences. But the baby had a broken back and was NOT examined when the appointment was to check on the physical development of him.

agreed, the doc should be up before the GMC sharpish and suspended until the case is heard.