Mother 'not clever enough to raise child' has baby snatched by social workers

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What do we think?

Thank you for your 10 points dilemma. Much food for thought. It would be really good if jh and other knowledgeable posters would give their views on them too.
I certainly agree with your points 7 and 8.

I am happy with the points from dilemma, but additionally we have to sort out the system of quality control on judgments.

(this is badly done by the family courts at the moment)

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Jolly pirate - I endorse every word of your last post. SUCH a relief to hear the voice of reason.

Dilemma - you are clearly very knowledgeable about social services and child protection and also critical though from a position of knowledge and awareness. Are you willing to say what your profession is - it would just be interesting to know, as I think informed criticism is so much more valid than people who criticise the entire system from one personal experience (though I do understand how this can happen) or from what they have read in the tabloids etc. I agree with allof your points by the way.

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Eldritch - I did say I would come back to your request. I am not sure how useful my comments will be as I think there are others on here who are currently working in children services (WahWah and Staggerlee) whose experience is current and therefore more valid.

I qualified as a sw in 1978 and worked for 25 years in a l.a. initially as a sw (children and families) as it was called in those days, then a fostering soial worker and for the past 15 years I was a team manager for a Fostering & Adoption Team. Since I retired in 2003 I have been working independently on a part time basis, involved in fost & adop assessments, court driven parenting assessments and other court work including contact, Special Guardianship Orders etc. I also do training on attachment theory for foster carers, adoptors and social workers.

SO I am 7 years out of l.a. social work and I now have the luxury of taking 2 (no more than 3) cases at a time and picking and choosing when I work. I am 67 and a grandmother of 5 children with whom I like to spend as much time as possible.

I have been on these threads defending social workers and the cp systems as I honestly believe that the majority of social workers are hard working, committed people who genuinely want to do their best. Well at least this was always my experience. I am not going to pretend I didn't come across sws who I thought were possibly in the wrong job and I used to get very annoyed with sws (often young males) who did not understand children or child development.

When I began sw 30 years ago, I was nurtured by a very experienced team and especially one very wise woman who became my mentor (unofficially of course) and I learned my sws practice from her, not the college course. I felt very supported by the team and my manager and I had a very protected case load. If I was worried about a case there was ample opportunity to discuss it with more experienced colleagues and I was allowed to develop my skills and confidenc over time.

I think things have changed dramatically - I could see that when I retired 7 years ago - cp sws were stuck in front of screens typing wall to wall court reports and the volume of work was increasing daily as was the stress experienced by social work staff.

I know from ex colleagues still in practice that the situation is dire, with large numbers of vacancies, staff on extended sick leave and managers (in the words of a friend only yesterday) "treats us like units of productivity" - with senior managers squeezing everyone to cut costs, work harder and tick all the boxes for the OFSTED inspections. Above all they complain of the volume of work, not the nature of the work.

They are spending apparently up to 70% of their working day completing forms on a screen which means they can't get out to see the families for whom there is concern.

Obviously I come into contact with l.a. social workers in relation to my ind work and I see examples of very poor practice in one particular authority, with managers who do not have the expertise to guide Ninexperienced workers, nor the time to support them. I recently had a young social worker crying on my shoulder after a very difficult meeting with some grandparents, telling me that she had 29 cases and couldn't cope and was looking for a way out.

SO what am I saying - things have changed for the worse and I honestly don't know why anyone these days would want to go into cp work. I hate to be pessimistic but what hope is there when both the 2 major political parties have signalled their intention to cut public services to the bone if they are re-elected.

Birmingham City Council childrens services has been in dire straits for years and was recently deemed "unfit for purpose" and there are hundreds of jobs being axed in CS and other departmennts.

I think the government (of whichever hue) needs to decide on their priorities in relation to public services, and ensure that they are properly resourced, but there is no chance of this happening because they are too interested in profits and public services don't produce anything and don't make profits. Oh sorry my old Marxism coming out.

Sorry for the long post - just spilling out my thoughts really. And yes maybe I have been a bit too defensive of social services on these threads because I was thinking of my own experiences. However I still believe it is not the fault of individual social workers but of the capitalist system in which we live.

Thank you for your reply dilemma and sorry to hear of your experiences and of course I respect your right to privacy. However I can't agree with I am in agreement with JH! Never, not ever...........I know he commented that he was "happy" with your comments but FWIW I think this was just another of his soundbites. I don't think he is in a position to critically evaluate the points you made to be honest. I don't believe he possesses the knowledge and awareness of how SSD operate or has any knowledge about children and child protection. He has one agenda only.

Dilemma - you might be interested in my post to Eldritch

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WELL Dilemma - of course I disagree with you but rationally of course! I agree JH has invested time and money into his campaign but I know that it is all because of his own personal experiences with SSD and the details of this are in the public domain. I have met people like this before and some mount positive campaigns and others who never lose the anger and irrationality caused by their own personal experience and I think JH fits into the latter category.

Most of the social workers and a few lawyers on here have argued with JH re his stance about cp in this country. Not sure how many of his posts you have seen, but he has made it quite clear in the past that he belives that the entire cp system is evil and social workers snatch babies from decent parents in order to get them adopted. I know I am repeating myself but feel I need to in response to your comments. He then makes it clear that he believes there is a conspiracy by all professionals involved in care proceedings (including the lawyers acting for the birth parents, who he says "roll over" and agree with the local authority in order to pay their mortgages) and that the judge merely rubber stamps the recommendations and hey presto there is another miscarriage of justice.

It is very evident from what he posts that he has no understanding about children, child development, abuse of children or the causes of child abuse. Indeed he is telling us now that behaviour problems in children are not linked to the parents...........but are caused by being in the care system. He cites some research by Alan Rushton that supposedly supports this view. Of course the care system and its limitations often exacerbate the problems of children in care but that is not the cause of their problems. As I said recently this is tantamount to saying that a child's leukemia is caused by the hospital.

Are you aware of some of the irrational stuff that he posts i.e. child taken into care because granny called the social worker fat, parents fail parenting assessment because mother wanted to breast feed on demand. There are many many more of these kind of nonsensical comments and social workers on here have all tried to argue with him, but he is impervious to any kind of criticism and is incapable of rational debate. He can never evidence anything that he says.

Sorry Dilemma I am not as convinced as you are that JH wants the things that you say he does. I think he wants revenge on a system that he considers treated him unfairly. Do you know of another MP who would serve a Writ on the local authority concerned for £300,000 and insist that the social workers paid from their own pocket. DOES this seem like the action of a rational person.

OK rant over - nothing person Dilemma, but I have to disassociate myself from this man and his desire to discredit the entire cp and court system in this country.

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Dilemma, my child was also subject to a Section 47 investigation due to one incident towards the end of my realtionship when I stupidly called the police because I felt frightened about my partner getting aggressive.

My son, who was 11 months old at the time, did not witness anything.The police were obliged to inform social services. Due to local policy around domestic violence in families with children under the age of 1 social services automatically undertook a S47 investigation. The social worker was apologetic for having to carry out the assessment at that level.

I am still incandescent about the situation and at the time complained to social services who acknowledged that they had no discretion to deal with the situation differently due to local policy.

I am also a social worker and I don't beleive the system is inherently evil as jh does. I also think he spouts dangerous rubbish. Whether this is driven by his personal experience I have no idea. I just know that he is highly irresponsible by making sensational statements with absolutely no evidence to back them up.Its a shame because I think he has something valuable to contribute and in my opinion just succeeds in losing credibility

nananina as ever has resorted to yet another Straw Man as she misrepresents my argument to disagree with the misrepresentation.

There are some parents' solicitor who act against the interests of their client. It was a Social Worker from Birmingham who told me how this was done.

It does not, of course, apply to all such solicitors.

There are some very good solicitors such as those working for William Bache & Co.

staggerlee reports a problem with a policy. The policy is one that effectively punishes mothers for reporting DV.

It is a dreadful and in my view evil policy because it forces mothers to suffer in silence because if they ask for help they suffer more.

There are lots of aspects like this. I did today talk to the family in the case of the OP. Mum should be in a mother and baby unit tomorrow with baby.

Thanks for coming back to reply, NaNi.

I think the thrust of what you had to say chimes with Dilemma's points 7 and 8, though you express it more broadly. And we do have to ask who on earth would want to do this job, in current circumstances and faced with the kind of trenchant criticism there is on this threat, x100?

Dilemma made another interesting point when she said:

"...in retrospect though I believe there was an element of the SWs involved being nasty, manipulative and power crazed on a personal level, I also think they were working within a system that made doing their job properly almost impossible if they'd had rather more pleasant personalities..."

So the system and its pressure, and public disapprobation, are probably combining to drive out the empathetic people we need and leave a disproportionate number of the ones who do it the wrong way and for the wrong reasons.

I had a friend who worked in youth justice. He only survived the hardships of the job and the poisonous office politics by being aggressive and intransigent. His heart was in the right place but it doesn't say much for the system when that's what it takes.

It is interesting though that the really articulate and insightful critiques on this thread do not come from the campaigner (jh) but from others. Still waiting for your 10 soundbites points jh.

I am happy with those from dilemma. I have a lot more as well.

Dilemma - I do not "profoundly dislike JH" - I profoundly dislike the way he attempts to discredit and at times make insulting comments which are completely inaccurate about the child protection system in this country. As for him not rolling over for me to "tickly his tummy" hypothetically or not is a rather sickening thought. As Staggerlee says he "spouts dangerous nonsense" and what a lovely cop out when he is asked by Eldrich to give his 10 bullet points of what improvements he would like to see, to simply say he agrees with the points that you made. If you believe this, you'll believe anything. SO he "has a lot more as well" - so come on JH lets hear what they are.

I am not trying to lecture you about JH nor do I think you are not capable of drawing your own conclusions, but if you are going to tell me that I want the same things as him, then I am going to defend my position and disassociate myself from this notion of ageeing with him. You of course have the right to believe what you will, but I also have that right, so we will have to agree to differ.

I had thought that you were maybe more rational than I had previously given you credit for, but I am not so sure now. You are clearly very anti SSD and there is nothing I can say to change that. I think in my post I have acknowledged that things have changed so much over the past 30 years, but anyone who tries to totally discredit the entire system loses credability as far as I'm concerned.

Leonie - I know I won't change your mindset and would not attempt to try - you are clearly still very angry and this is understandable, but why do you have to "tar allsocial workers with the same brush." A GP misdiagnosed my sister's lung cancer despite numerous visits to him, and she died at quite a young age. Yes I was/am still angry about this but I don't try to discredit all GPs because of this.

And I would like to make the point that the fact Birmingham City Council was deemed "unfit for purpose" was nothing to do with the practice of social workers. It was to do with very high vacancy rates, high sickness rates because of stress, over reliance on agency staff and concern about the management structure. There are huge problems in BCC and god knows why anyone would want to be a sw there. They are struggling with huge caseloads and the service is totally overloaded and on top of all this they are about to axe hundreds of posts, which willonly make things worse.

Back to the OP
www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1246590/The-woman-told-stupid-baby-boy.html

Nananina is back to the Straw Man. I happily accept that there are good practitioners. The Birmingham report only identified around 50% of practise as "poor". Around a tenth was thought to be good.

Where the problems really lie is in the failure of the checks and balances (the courts).

If you look at staggerlee's issue. That was one of a system perspective. In her case none of the practitioners were in themselves using their discretion to do anything nasty. It was the system itself that was nasty.

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I am glad that it seems she is going into a mother and baby unit. The DM article presents a very one sided anti-SW argument with a lack of evidence though.