Take more babies away from bad parents, says Barnardo's chief

[bubblebutt]

Many more children need to be taken into care at birth to stop them being damaged beyond repair by inadequate parents, the chief executive of the children's charity Barnardo's has told the Observer

How you can you say that when they the parents don't know how they will turn out themselves till after the event

Martin Narey called for less effort to be directed at "fixing families that can't be fixed" and for social workers to be braver about removing children at risk .

what tosh some families can be fixed and yes some cant but come on that means all babies that are under the SS would be taken into care because he fears another baby P and that is so wrong on many levels. A lot of families out there are going to suffer because of this reporting.

After revelations about the neglect and dysfunctional background of two young brothers from Doncaster who viciously attacked an 11-year-old boy and his nine-year-old nephew, social workers have once again come under fire for failing to intervene at an early stage.

this is alleged neglect and abuse no one knows this except the kids and their parents SS have to do a report and have to get all their facts together BEFORE they can remove a child. This takes time not 2 minutes. Another reason mistakes are made as there isnt enough Social Workers.

The brothers, aged 11 and 10, had been known to social services and police for several years. Their mother had allegedly given them cannabis as toddlers and forced them to forage for food in bins, while their father was allegedly a violent alcoholic. Despite this, the pair had been taken into care just three weeks before the attacks. The case has led to Doncaster social services opening an inquiry, its seventh serious case review since 2004.

What do they expect the SS to do wave a magic wand and its all better it doesnt work that way.The 2 boys are damaged now and need help as much as the other boys do.

Calling for more children to be in care from the moment they are born, Narey, a former director general of the Prison Service and previously a permanent secretary at the Home Office, made clear he was not reacting to this case in particular, but to issues with Britain's child protection services that needed urgent attention to avoid failing many more troubled young people.

Yes he is and a lot of families are going to suffer because of it.

"If you can take a baby very young and get them quickly into a permanent adoptive home, then we know that is where we have success," he said. "That's a view that is seen as a heresy among social services, where the thinking is that if someone, a parent, has failed, they deserve another chance. My own view is that we just need to take more children into care if we really want to put the interests of the child first.

So some one struggling is going to leapt on and the child taken away all cos she isnt coping the way the SS want and some want you to go after there arses cleaning em when they are old enough to do themselves Oh there is SS like this out there or the one that comdemns you if you cant cook and give your kids microwave meals all the time or something out of a tin god forbid they do that,

"We can't keep trying to fix families that are completely broken. It sounds terrible, but I think we try too hard with birth parents. I have seen children sent back to homes that I certainly wouldn't have sent them back to. I have been extremely surprised at decisions taken. If we really cared about the interests of the child, we would take children away as babies and put them into permanent adoptive families, where we know they will have the best possible outcome."

If the family is beyond repair so be it but what if they have turned there life around and can get their kids back why take that chance away as some SS do just that. they seem to tar every bad parent with the same brush hence why the SS shouldnt be there after 3 years as it makes them jaded in what they see everyday.

He said he understood his views would be seen as "illiberal heresy": "I think if social workers were courageous and sought to intervene quickly, and were supported properly in that, we would see far fewer problems."

As above and also there would be a national out cry from parents that have done nowt wrong but asked for help to be told they are neglecting their child(ren) when they clearly need help to be a better parent. Not penalized this way.

While foster care was on paper a good option for older children who had to be taken into care, he said, a shortage of suitable placements meant that children were suffering from a lack of stability. "What troubles me is the number of children I meet who have had vast numbers of placements. Last week, I met a 15-year-old girl and her foster mum. It was her 46th placement. The woman said that whenever there was a row or disagreement, the girl went to pack her bags. She expected to be sent on.

there isnt enough foster parents in the world as they are told to see the foster side as a business and it so isnt its helping and nuturing and caring for a child that needs your help

"It is undoubtedly a good option when children have been taken into care to replicate the family in foster care placements, but I have spent the past four years meeting a lot of children in care and I can tell you that it is by no means anything out of the ordinary to meet a child whose foster placements run into double figures. There comes a point where we have to accept that it is not working."

As above

Philippa Stroud of the thinktank Centre for Social Justice reacted cautiously to Narey's comments. "If the model is to move children very quickly to adoption, not necessarily from birth but certainly under a year, then that is something we would support," she said. "We need far more early intervention to try to stop this disintegration of the family we are seeing, but we would like to see more working with these families. What we recommend is the model of the mother and baby going into care, filling that hole and giving the whole family a chance. "With child protection, all the legislation is actually in place: it's the implementation that is the issue."

So if this is the case why do we see baby P stories all the time. I feel that the child protection and SS should be overhauled and the government needs to bring in more and they shouldnt be allowed anymore than 3 years in that field and then moved on if they wish to return they have to wait 3 years to do so. Also the work load of a SS shouldnt be anymore than 5 families and this is for full time workers not the part time.

The numbers of children taken into care rose slightly following the death of Baby P, the 17-month-old boy later named as Peter Connelly, who died in London in 2007 of injuries inflicted by his mother and her boyfriend, despite being seen repeatedly by doctors and social workers. But Narey says it was only a temporary increase.

How many of these babies, children whom parents hadnt done anything wrong really to their children and they where taken because of the mistakes of another SS office hmmmm that worries me more.

"As soon as these cases recede from the memory, everyone will get reluctant to move these children all over again. Only 4% of children adopted from care in England are under the age of one and the figure is even smaller in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

I for one hope it doesnt recede from memory as we need to be reminded of baby P and the others out there that their own parents didnt give a stuff about them. We need to address these mistakes and take stock and agree we where wrong. Not hidding behind we did nothing wrong and it wasnt our fault crap. If known abuse of any kind you amass your info and remove the kids. Not this wishy washy oh we didnt see this or that or she wouldnt let us in crap either. Also if on the "at risk registrar" they should visit more than once a week or what is the point of being on the registrar in the first place. Also no written warnings either. They should just turn up on the door. Again this would mean a full over haul of the SS departments all over the world.

"Less than 5% of the children taken into care in England last year were aged under a year old. Some 3,500 children were adopted in Britain from care, at an average age of four."

This is to do with the birth parents wanting their children back and fighting the SS over it and it takes on average a year to go to court with all the evidence they have against the other to proceed and sometimes this can be stopped if the paperwork isnt done right. Also the parents themselves could have turned their lives round and can show they have so this again hinder any proceedings. Also the SS could be dragging their heels too as one SS could be busy on other cases so it is again delayed. Not good for the child is it.

I copied and pasted this as its the article of said subject and it has angered me the silly man he is. I have added my own bits to it and wondered what you all thought.

"here itthe piece"

If no social workers believe the system is perfect, why is it so difficult for the social workers on this thread to believe the instances of bad practice described by others on here?

I thank nina, wahwah, stagger and other social workers for responding to my questions and explaining in detail how issues like DV and mental illness are dealt with by social workers. It all sounds sensible.

However, bad practice is bad practice, which as social workers in the business, you cannot deny happens. No amount of best practice or scrutiny in the courts is going to work if checks and balances fail because procedures were not followed and the court fails to do its duty.

Stagger, you had the unfortunate experience of being investigated in a DV situation which you described as a disproportionate response by the social workers. Nina, you described pro-men judges whose decision on contact orders you advised against.

I am perfectly happy to keep an open mind as to how often the system fails and even that the system works well a lot of the time. But I am deeply saddened by the vitriol hurled against johnhemming and others for speaking out against certain practices.

I understand that it can be a bit of a postcode lottery as to the quality of social work in a borough. So I don't find it difficult to believe that certain (not all) people who have experienced the system might have come across a raft of bad practice that leads them to be greatly disillusioned by their experiences.

I would have much more respect for social workers if they came out strongly against bad practice in their area of work, than aim their volleys at critics of the system. Personally, I find the questioning of motives of johnhemming and others' experiences and views deeply distasteful and frankly alienating.

To Nananina i find your behaviour one i have come across before, i believe you to be suffering from cognitive distortion.Look it up its actually a mental health issue that alot of people with power over others suffer from.

As for the other social workers on here i have had not one response to the plan of action regarding 'barring orders' instead of children taken into care.

As for help being a victim of DV no there was no help from either Leicestershire or Devon apart from child care during a a few months of stress dealing with my relationship. Fat lot of good that turned out to be because quite frankly the hidden agenda for social services to provide child care is one that just makes their lives a whole lot easier when it comes to removing the child into foster care aswell as getting nursery nurses to supply a nit picking report on child and mother in ready for their evidence in court.

As for John Hemmings facts he has my case files and has reported the facts correctly which are..

The last incident my son had witnessed any DV was in december 2004
There was a suffle (no injuries) in March 2006 where he was not witness to dv.
As for the serverity of DV,why in my case were there no broken bones or the need for hopsital/medical assistance was my dv classed as 'serious incidents' by social workers.
Why on a police report did the officer who had pressured me into maiing a statement whilst i was distressed at 3am on a school night without reading the statement but forced to sign said i had a broken nose and fractured collar bone.Aswell as my son having a small red mark which the police officer recorded was a result of getting caught up in the dec 04 incident (not true).
This 'red mark' was later on recorded as a 'graze' and my husband was convicted (without my knowledge based on this false police report for a section 1 offender status of common assault against a child.

When we were separated for 3 months during that time my son slipped on the path after late night shopping and broke his collar bone, this later on was constantly brought up in reports as a possible incident of dv...are you getting my drift??

I could go on about other things such as social workers lying on Oath but id be here all day and night and to be quite honest i dont think the social workers here would believe me because its their job NOT TO believe people. Hence the problem of cognitive distortion and behaviours.

So the question i would like to ask social workers or anyone else here is why was my son taken from me whilst i was separated from my husband in October 2006?

Answers on a postcard although im sure nananina will come up with some theories of her own or 'possiblities' which i am quite happy to correct to make her believe the social workers in my case were WRONG, thats if she can get her head round that fact.

AWR, I simply can't give you an explanation. What you describe doesn't give me any idea of why actions were taken and it would be wrong of me to pretend that I did.

I think barring orders are Irish, but we probably have an equivalent here in terms of injunctions / non molestation orders. As I have explained imo the victim should not be made accountable for the behaviour of the abuser and if they are able to use the support to protect themselves and their children, then from my perspective they have done what they need to.

If there is not a shared understanding of the concerns or reason to suspect that the abuser is nor receiving a consistent message from the victim and being allowed to return against any agreement, then clearly this would change things.

I want to make a distinction on here. I am using my professional knowledge to inform my posts to bring a social work perspective, but I am not responding 'as a social worker' and as I would in my work, as I am not at work. I have responded to some posters in a very different way, as is appropriate in this setting, but I obviously would tone it down a notch irl!

Please do not think I am complacent about poor practice. I know it happens and I condemn it and deal with it. I just believe it to be the exception not the rule in my LA.

Dittany, any thoughts about the table I directed you to?

WahWah how exactly then do you deal with poor performance in your LA?

When you have dealt with it - then how long has it taken for action to take place?

I am interested in this given the delays that are evident in the conduct committee of the GSCC.

For example Louise Grimshaw back in April 2007
removed ?Child A? from the care of ?X? without ? (a) lawful authority; (b) reasonable excuse.
She took ?Child A? to her own home without ? (a) lawful authority; (b) reasonable excuse; Her sanction was a 6 month suspension.

There are more examples on the link?

www.gscc.org.uk/Conduct/Conduct_hearings/recently_concluded_hearings/

AWR I am sorry to hear that you did not receive adequate support with regards to dv and of your case.

I think that the power imbalance and cognitive distortion issues you raise are key to understanding this issue, especially when things go wrong. Anonymised judgements are also key to learning (although they are retrospective!), as would be a therapeutic approach.

Dealing with problem of child abuse has meant that government and the local authorities, who employ social workers have tried to produce legalistic and bureaucratic solutions. As a result of this I have no doubt that cognitive distortion and the power imbalances you mention will continue to occur.

I think that the risk of this approach is that the aim has moved from the rehabilitation of poorly functioning families, and a move to protect children from "dangerous parents".

In order to achieve their aims, social workers need to identify factors that would allow child protection authorities to determine which families were dangerous and which were not.

So society had to deal with the production of social workers and other professionals who offer their cognitive perspective on the problem of child abuse, and in turn contribute to the bureacracy of child care practice, which then impacts negatively on you, when they get it wrong, this has been confounded by the secrecy of the family courts.

There are also performance targets that social workers are given. Not only does the IT take up too much time, it encourages social workers to aim for the wrong goals. They must aim to move cases forward a stage within the required timescale ? if a case flashes a red light, it indicates they must concentrate on moving that case to the system's next stage.

For example Baby P's records were supposedly complete and up to date, but the complex sense-making that may have saved him will have been compromised as a result.

I come back to this thread reluctantly as I think the whole tone of it is becoming very distasteful. Snapple - yes I am baffled again - why are you taking issue because I mentioned that I have known some judges to be pro men in contact cases and also saying that I have cross examined in court and this is scrutiny of my work. I don't see your point - please explain.

You also say "imagine her response if someone had replaced the word judges with social workers" - the post to which you refer did actually criticise some CAFCASS workers (who are social workers) who I think underestimate the potential harm in recommending contact to fathers with histories of violence. I'm not really surprised that you don't understand my posts as you appear to have your mind closed to
anything other than posters that agree with your irrational and inaccurate comments and your need to totally discredit social workers.

Dittany - you say social workers on here need "to tone down their hostility" - are you serious. This statement actually underlines my suspicion that you are somewhat deluded in your thought processes. Just take a look at some of your posts and others like you and the hostility and anger and insults expressed in them. words fail me!!

However I don't intend to respond to you again as it is a total waste of my time.

AWR - phew you are clever - you can make diagnoses over the internet - cognitive distortion ?? Can I get treated on the NHS do you think. I am not going to try to respond other than to say that I think you have clearly had a very distressing time but will not have been helped by the involvement of JH - indeed I strongly suspect that he will have made matters far worse for you.

Incidentally SnappleI didn't actually know that the GCSC made public their findings and I have looked at the site. SO what more do you want? Surely the fact that any misconduct is investigated by the GCSC and dealt with should put your mind at rest about poor practice, or would you like capital punishment restored for such individuals. Incidentally NO sw on this site has ever saif that there is no such thing as poor practice. We have all said that of course it exists as in every othere sphere of life but you (and others of your ilk) choose to disregard this for whatever reason.

However I don't intend to respond to you again as your posts about me are getting very personal and insulting and there is absolutely nothing that I can say that will alter your opinion.

Happy and Lucky - THANK YOU so much for posting. I have often wondered why all these posters who are fighting for the "rights of parents" feel about the children in these circumstances and their rights to live a life free from harm and all other kinds of emtional distress.

I remain very very puzzled as to how some of these posters reconcile their absolute belief that social workers are out to punish parents and remove children at whim with the way in which they wil shout from the rooftops when the next child tragedy hits the headlines. Any slight chance of anyone being able to offer any explanations about this.

Blueshoes - I overlooked your post and glad to hear that you acknowledge that some us are trying to give explanations when requested.

Re JH - I have absolutely no objection to him (or anyone else) speaking out against bad practice but what I object to as I have repeatedly said on here about JH is that he is posting totally inaccurate and misleading information. SO when he "speaks out against poor practice" it is based on a false premise because it is very evident fromhis posts that he fails to understand social work practice at the most basic level. He consistently posts statements that appear to be facts when in reality that is not the case. He can never ever evidence anything that he posts as facts. When challenged (as he has been repeatedly on here by myself and other sws he either ignores the challenge or posts something in reposnse that doesn't make any sense. At the risk of repeating myself I think it is very worrying for someone in public life to be engaging with people from this persepctive. As he is an MP I believe that people will naturally think that he knows what he is talking about and this will only serve to create confusion and possible anxiety.

For instance a recent assertion of his says "most children under 10 are adopted rather than returned home." You simply cannot make a statement like this unless you have

Obtained figures from specific local authorities for a specified period about how many children under 10 entered the care system, how many were reunited with their birth family, how many were placed in the care of relatives, how many in short term or long term foster care and how many adopted. It wouldn't be impossible to obtain such figures but I have every reason to doubt that JH has such figures on which to base his assertion.

That is just one example of many many sweeping statements that JH makes and I have ceased to challenge him as he ignores such requests and then changes tack and moves on to another aspect of childrens services social work and makes odd comments that don't make any sense. This has been noted by other social workers on here but it doesn't deter him - he continues inhis quest to discredit social workers and the courts from a position of ignorance (I am using this inthe rea sense of the word meaning lack of knowledge) Even more worrying he is being approached by individuals for help and assitance when they feel aggrieved by the way in which they have been dealt with by SSD. In my view this can only exacerbate their problems and cause them greater anxiety and distress.

NanaNina,

Know one on here is saying there is not a need for social workers.
No one is saying there is not a need to take children away from some parents.
What people are saying is your remit as sw's is to protect children that are abused and yes there are different levels of abuse and yes there is only so much money in the pot and so many hours in a day too much government inflicted paperwork and things do go wrong.

But... that's where sw's should stand up and be counted, you have a union and this is a labour government, petition the union as sw's on mass to allow ss to do the job at hand ergo protection of children like little baby Peter should be at the top of the list not allowing such children to slip through the cracks because you are called in as henchmen to cafcass to strong arm mothers into contact in the private law cases, not because you are called in by the police for every minor incident ( ie 'a push') of DV, not allow the government targets of children in care to re-evaluate which child you 'can help' (the adoptable one's that come with little baggage) and which children you can't (the one's like Baby Peter who will take time and money and would bounce back into care from adoptive parents because he is 'unadoptable ).

Why are we up in arms about cases like baby Peter? because sw's were involved with the child, he was known to ss, you guys keep banging on that your professionals so how could you not see what was right in front of your eyes? They discribe the mother as 'clever', I'd have to disagree, the signs were there they were just ignored or overlooked.

But then you'll spend hours on cases where mothers are trying to protect their child, trying to keep a violent ex away strong arming her into contact for cafcass, or you'll chase cases where the child is in the womb (like Fran and others) who have not proved either way that they can or can't cope with a baby (because it's not born) and there's no history of child abuse trying to get the child into care before it's born.

The people who are working to change the system are not your enemies, we all want the same thing, we want a system that works and we want children protected, maybe sw's should be working with us to change what's wrong rather than a blanket denial that ss has big problems.

Don't you think that the public would be 100% behind ss if they believed that the system worked?

The system will only change with the help of the people inside it.

Nananina- I have not discredited ALL social workers, it is not me that has been throwing up word like "child snatchers" and an "absolute belief of social workers to punish parents" and so on.

Yes, once again I find your post to be inflammatory and I am sorry if you find my criticism of your posts difficult to take.

Please rest assured I would not ever dream to assume that you are a valid representation of all social workers, so please stop asserting that I wish to discredit all social workers ? such comments from you have absolutely no basis.

I post a link to the conduct committee of the GSCC (not all findings are public by the way) and you respond with an nflammatory comment, questioning whether I would want capital punishment. Is this another way for you to avoid reason? Why would you assume that I want capital punishment - I find such comments insulting and uncalled for and have no issue letting you know this.

I'll be happy to explain further the issue I have had with regards to your comments on the court system later today.

nananina "For instance a recent assertion of his says "most children under 10 are adopted rather than returned home." You simply cannot make a statement like this unless you have Obtained figures from specific local authorities for a specified period about how many children under 10 entered the care system, how many were reunited with their birth family, how many were placed in the care of relatives, how many in short term or long term foster care and how many adopted. "

All local authorities submit an annual SSDA903 return to now DCSF. This is an electronic return of changes in care status. I worked out how the data was collated and therefore was able to make specific requests to find out this information. (the year is the financial year that ends in March).

Anyone who would like copies of the spreadsheets (prepared by DCSF) can email me at [email protected] and will send them copies.

The point is that when the government calculated BVPI163 or PAF C23 they used as the denominator the number of children in care (over 6 months) rather than the number of children that went into care.

Hence they have pressed practitioners to adopt more children from care than was their intent.

Madness. I have initiated a judicial review (pre action protocol) of Ed Balls about this.

Snapple, I don't want to answer on behalf of nana but maybe she was questioning what additional safeguards would satisfy you in terms of social workers accountability?

The system is far from perfect but remember for every family that have had bad experiences there are many many more that have been supported well.

thanks to happyandlucky for posting a positive experience and providing some balance to some of the extremely negative and misinformed views expressed on here.

at least some of us are trying to make a difference in difficult circumstances. I've personally never met a social worker who does the job for the power or who takes pleasure in ruining peoples lives. maybe they exist but to make sweeping generalisations about social workers en masse doesn't help move things forward.

you find it 'worrying' that someone suggested you look at a link rather than summarise a complex set of procedures? Erm why?

meadows was also 'supported' by the legal and medical professions-a tiny little fact you've conveniently ignored.

Dittany, let me summarise. DV and protection of children is a complex area and there is some guidance to help ALL practitioners in this area recognise when children can be worked with by universal services, or targeted services, or referred to children's scoail care as children in need and clarification around those children who may be in need of protection.

re women's aid, their involvement and approval rather suggests that the procedures are not oppressive to women or misogynistic and this is important.

Now I've summarised, can you see how much has been left out of my answer? The matrix is a sort of summary and answers far better than I could.

I really don't think I could answer any question to your satisfaction and I'm not sure of the value in trying. It seems to be rather a waste of energy. Please let me know if there is anything that I can do, or should I really just give up with you now?

a cheap, nasty shot dittany,wahwah clearly has more than a grasp on what shes doing and you would realise this if you have read her posts.

as you should know child protection is a multi agency process with social services usually acting as the lead agency (unless there is a criminal offence, in which case the police co-ordinate as far as I know).

social workers rely heavily on medical evidence and legal advice when making decisions about childrens welfare. they don't operate in a vacuum and can't make unilateral decisions, whatever your fantasy is about this. Its not about deflecting blame or responsibility but about considering the reality of multi agency working.

In terms of meadows, he was an expert witness whose theories were widely accepted at the time by the medical profession not just social workers. as i mentioned above social workers rely heavily on the expertise of other professionals. Are you seriously suggesting that social workers are responsible for rogue expert witnesses and for medical theories that are subsequently discredited? You really do have some distorted beliefs

staggerlee and wahwah - i really think you are wasting your time and energy. you don't need to prove anything to randomers on t'internet.

Dittany, we can't be looking at the same things. It is complex. You are clearly not going to be satisfied with any response I give you. You have an agenda and that's fine, but i don't have to share it or give any more attention to it.

i know ceres and i should know better!

"you don't need to prove anything to randomers on t'internet."

nice. And with attitudes like this, people who work in child protection wonder why ordinary parents are concerned?

edam - you don't like my attitude, i don't like yours.

i'm being honest - this is an anonymous internet forum, if people want to do something constructive about the system i've given advice about how they can do that.

so no, i really don't care about what you, or any of the other anonymous posters on here, think of me.

There is no need to be rude. I merely objected to an extremely dismissive comment.