Who is responsible (child protection scenario)

[TheLimeQuail]

Parent has 3 children removed from their care. Changes identity and moves away. Has another child under their new name that they then assault and hospitalise. Could this have been prevented

People do move and change their names in such circumstances. It’s not that uncommon for children’s services in a new area to get a referral for a person who has moved there and is pregnant, after having previously been unable to care for their dc. I’m most cases this is picked up because when the person goes to their midwife in a new area they have records that show the person has previously had children and have been known to children’s social care. Even with name changes they should keep the same medical records. If this doesn’t happen then in most cases a midwife would be able to tell if a woman has given birth in the past and would question why they had not told them about this. This would then be raised with the local children’s social care who would look into the reasons the person did not tell the midwife they had children and this would be discovered. This all works in the vast majority of cases. I can only assume the person you speak about slipped through the net when getting pregnancy care.
However, it is possible you do not know the situation fully. This person could have been assessed as having changed and been supported to keep her baby. Then sadly she didn’t maintain these changes. Or the court could have overruled the decision. The sw may have got it wrong. The person may have not given birth to this child and it belongs to a partner. Lots and lots of variables

Also.. was the assaulter the mother or father?

Yes I agree this is the point.

i think being allowed a new identity is fine (we allow it for ex murderers) but social services and probation etc should be aware of this person under their new identity and keeping a watch.

Changing identity isn’t the problem - for those who change and are rehabilitated it means they can lead a different life. But being allowed/able to do it without any trace is a real issue.

They may have been caught after the fact but it’s another victim before that point that shouldn’t have gone unprotected.

There is it's called CPIS

Is this a woman or a man?

It's easier, but not 100% to keep track of a woman who moves and changes name to have more children.

It's not as easy with a man.

Especially if there was no probation restrictions on them moving.

I do think anyone with a conviction for a violent crime should be banned from changing their name unless it's done through official channels (as in probation services and the likes, not just deed poll).

They’re a woman

Were they convicted of anything surrounding the removal of their children or was it all family court related?

That's often where things slip - if there's no probation restrictions then it can be considerably easier to slip the net.

They went to prison for what they did

Why do they not make sure that parents can’t just change their names move away and have more children when their first ones were removed

How would they know? This is a matter of law not SS not doing their job. As a PP has said, people with safeguarding history should not be able to change their name. But even then, someone motivated will find a way to duck under the radar.

Each state in the US has a centralized system which holds information, so if you move to a different county, your history goes with you. Never understood why there is not something like this.

How do you propose that people are stopped from changing their name?

Sadly dc are failed often. A neighbour of mine lost her 2 ds's into care.. .. Years later she was in a popular magazine raising money for ivf with a new dp. Apparently she had no previous dc.....
New area....

They went to prison for what they did

If they went to prison for what happened with their elder children then there has been a failure in the system - were they still being monitored by the probation services?

Has the review happened and also the court case for the younger child's injuries? If not we should likely be careful with details so there's nothing identifying

How could anything 'flag'?

they waited over 10 years to have their new child

Nope - this is a flaw in the system I’m afraid.

It should be addressed and probably would be if you took the case to the media

The parent is responsible for their actions.

We live in a society that doesn’t choose to sterilise criminals, so they have the option available to them to have further children.

Maternity services and Health Visitors do a certain amount of risk screening, but only on information available to them. As a society we don’t currently require people to pass a background check in order to be able to have a child.

So. The parent is the one responsible. Second order - society that choose not to restrict people’s right to procreate. Most will accept thats a balance of risk trade off thats in the right place. Some don’t.

How could anything 'flag'?

her medical record should have flagged previous children.

How do you propose that people are stopped from changing their name?

People don't need to be stopped from changing their name, there just needs to be a process that keeps track of name changes of those with criminal convictions.

There’s someone around here who lost two kids due to her druggie , mentally unstable and abusive partner. She had another baby that she managed to keep. Guess who the father is and is around on and off? Yup, same waste of space.

they waited over 10 years to have their new child

That level of determination is incredibly difficult to manage.

Previous social work involvement in pregnancy should have flagged in their health record, but that can be got round with determination unfortunately

Possibly in England but I don’t think anywhere else in the UK has a joined up database.

Possibly in England but I don’t think anywhere else in the UK has a joined up database.

One of the big problems is also the loss of information that can happen easily if someone moves to another part of the UK.

A two year period of my medical history was lost when I moved from England to Scotland and then back again. Despite the fact it was all electronic.

I have really vague memories there was one set up maybe around 2009 where you could see if social care had been involved with child protection but you had to have justifiable reason to be able to check it. Then the government changed and it was shut down and hadn't even been going a year. The issue is that unless health link it as there is something on the parent's record or have concerns and refer nobody will know. Social services don't have access to other county/boroughs records. They can phone to make enquiries if the threshold is met but if a parent isn't flagged as a concern or truthful about where they have lived it could get missed.

But it is also why they switched to mash having all services (health education police and social care) together to have joined up information.

Well thry keep on having children can't see who can be responsible for that other than themselves