Southport report lays bare the failures of authorities - and the attacker's parents

[IwantToRetire]

The words "failure", "failing" and "failed" appear more than 200 times in Monday's Southport Report

Its findings leave almost no agency, organisation or individual involved in Axel Rudakubana’s life unscathed.

The police, council, mental health services, Prevent programme – none of them took ownership of the risks that he posed.

Only The Acorn School, which the attacker attended after being expelled from Range High School, is noted as having repeatedly intervened.

But the Chair of the inquiry, Sir Adrian Fulford, also clearly believes in parental responsibility.

The attacker's father, in particular, is described as "obstructive" and "manipulative" in relation to the authorities.

It is rare to see a killer’s parents singled-out for not doing more to prevent their child’s crimes.

Together, the Southport attack was a failure of both parenting and policy – nobody, says the Chair, agreed who was responsible for the troubled teenager.

There was a "merry-go-round of referrals, assessments, case-closures and 'hand-offs'", he says.

There is even a specific moment when Sir Adrian believes the murders could have been prevented, after the attacker was caught with a knife on a bus in 2022.

But no arrest or search of his home took place, leaving the poison in his bedroom and the warped search history on his computer undetected.

The report’s recommendations include setting up an agency with overall responsibility for monitoring risk, to avoid repeat failings.
But there are searching questions too about access to online materials for children, the availability of weapons and the complexities of the attacker’s autism (the Chair is keen not to stigmatise others with condition).

Ultimately, only the attacker can account for his crimes. But for the families of the victims and survivors, today’s report contains the painful conclusion that he could – and should – have been stopped.

https://www.itv.com/news/2026-04-13/southport-report-finds-failures-by-authorities-and-at-home

The Southport Inquiry: Phase 1 report
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-southport-inquiry-phase-1-report

The problem really is that it looks like AR MH really declined at school (not unusual with autistic children). Looking at the evidence parents did a lot to get support, even funded private therapy. Many many meetings. Begged for help rather a lot, really loved their child and did everything. Were clearly very distressed and it's natural to feel frustrated with services etc when you aren't getting the help you need.

Parents clearly very stressed, AR dysregulated clearly, they did anything they could to not face domestic violence at home. For some reason does seem to be somewhat glossed over. IMHO vast majority of parents would over accommodate in order to avoid not having violence in their house, calling police, child even more dysregulated afterwards. More safeguarding concerns reported, nothing changes. It's important to protect yourselves.

The situation just carried on deteriorating. AR had control over the house. It's pretty much reduce anxiety etc first, then reduce the control. Condoning any form of violence from anyone is unacceptable and that applies towards the family too.

I think perhaps this would have gone to child protection as everyone at risk, more coordination needed, resources etc but there were obviously reasons why it didn't.

So lots of very complicating factors in this case as - not straightforward 'weak parenting' - the parents had tried a lot for a long period of time tbh and had engaged well. They will have experienced a lot of trauma, that goes without saying.

I'm sure that this applies for the services too - lots of mitigating factors and as people have said thresholds. It looks like CAMHS offered a reasonable amount, police will say but we obviously can't do x,y,z.

@Thekidsarefightingagain Services are there to provide services! They have to prioritise work. Recognise what is most dangerous! If we have a police force who just wring their hands and do nothing, what use are they? They cost £billions! Ditto social services. They need to work together much more effectively and not pour out excuse after excuse. It’s not good enough.

I think you’re extrapolating too much on his case and not looking at the level of extreme violence he used.

“Did everything’

Sure. Except stop him getting knives and weapons delivered and did bugger all when he left the house with a knife. They knew what the likelihood of what he was planning to do as he only ever left the house unaccompanied when he was planning violence. The week before dad stopped him, this time they did bugger all even though they knew he had a knife as empty packaging was found. So no, they did not do everything

I'm not, believe me the first thing I would have done if I found out my child was ordering knives would have been a call to the police. And I absolutely would have begged for residential etc. I'm just saying that a lot happened that built up to it.

I'm referring to the early days. Obviously not at that stage, absolutely not. There was a build up of things though which is what the inquiry addresses.

The Inquiry points out severe failings in the police, Prevent, Social Services, Mental Health Services and the merrygoround of services which failed people in Lancashire. The Vera Baird piece in the Guardian very much lays bare how multi agency approach is only as good as the people running it and thst they won’t accept responsibility. Even if you give them powers, they don’t do anything. Look at Prevent! Too narrow brief and AR didn’t fit so they passed the buck after 3 referrals! Instead of recognising potential danger, they wash their hands of it! They all did and it’s not acceptable.

You’re attributing a lot to autism and dysregulation. You can’t know what underpins his extreme violence.

They absolutely do really need to work together better. But this is a national issue, not just local. The whole system needs to change.

Wasnt this part of the issue though, lets say for sake of argument that his whole behaviour, every action and decision was led by his ND

So everyone working with him agrees that he is like that because of his ND

Ok, then what?

It seems to stop there for some reason.

Wasn’t there a report at the trial covering this more, I can’t recall it entirely.

He had autism, it doesn’t mean it was due to dysregulation or that other dc with AS would tend to this extreme violence. It was a premeditated action to get in a taxi.

Yes, this obviously did go above just ASD. Maybe if he'd been diagnosed early on and given intervention he might not have deteriorated. COVID didn't help either. It's multifactorial, that's a problem with this case. It's extremely complex across the board.

There also isn't anything for child to parent violence -adult social care say doesn't meet thresholds - and I suspect that because in this case it was towards Dad and not mum this led to extra feelings of embarrassment. Child to parent violence absolutely has to be addressed if we are going to look at the bigger picture too. It's very much hidden and because it's child to parent it can be viewed as 'poor discipline/boundary setting' etc. No one should be expected to have to tolerate any kind of violence towards them.

The parents absolutely should have alerted the police - that goes without saying. Without any doubt at all.

Absolutely. If everything is attributed to his ND then no CAHMS support, no PREVENT just advice to reduce demands on him. No ‘punishments’ because he won’t understand them.
When he was found on the bus with a knife he was just returned home it would seem.

Yes, effectively they 'reduced demands' to the level of also not actually having a demand not to do criminal things. And then seem to be shocked when he violently murdered 3 girls, which he said he wanted to do.

The demand to behave lawfully should apply no matter what.

There have to be protections for other people and this is what seems to be lacking in society today and people are getting VERY angry about that.

They weren't told to reduce demands at all, quite the opposite. They were told they were over accommodating which they were. They explained that they didn't want to get beaten up and why should they be allowed to get hurt?

It's true that with a diagnosis of ASD everything does seem to get put down to that.

You're right, you have to be right, its obvious

My point is more, that IF you argue and IF everyone agrees that a person like this is soley and wholly like they are due to their ND.... ok, so whats next, how do you 'fix' it, how do you change it, how do you work with it, how do you stop people like this

So people, professionals, who said, well its due to his autism or some such description, ok, so what then, how do you stop him behaving like this.

What are the resources to do that? Apart from locking him up which is not going to happen under current thresholds and legislation, remember children are not going to be criminalised there is a lot of work going into preventing that, and children with ND are seen to be harmed by hospitalisation so no one is going to argue for detainment (and he wouldnt have met any threshold for that anyway)

Sorry I was responding to PP who talked about reducing demands - I've seen this myself my question was really to what point can you reduce demands? It's not something you can keep doing endlessly. There have to be boundaries in society for it to function or you get to the point of allowing criminality. Arguably we're already there - if you read sentencing often men doing awful things like having vast quantities of child torture material get reduced sentences because of this or that reason they're vulnerable. With seemingly no thought to the impact of what they're doing on risks to children.

I also think it's extremely unfair for the non-violent people with ASD when violence gets attributed in this way. It's a cop out, especially when acts of violence are planned / deliberate. It's one thing for someone who's dysregulated to lash out. It's another to deliberately target someone and it's not impossible to tell the difference.

Yes and someone might know more I’m sure but part of the trial process will include a report that covers whether the accused is mentally culpable.

There’s various defences for this. But that was not deemed relevant,

I understand some might have experienced dysregulation which can be lashing out but I do think AR is a separate case and autism shouldn’t be used to the extent it is.

Yes this is a harder question. Not sure atm but worth asking

You do frequently have to reduce demands with highly anxious autistic people. Whether their dysregulation is due to demands or the environment etc. Implementing certain behavioural approaches could be absolutely disastrous and this is well recognised and you need to be taught how to safely do this without triggering escalation. In this case as people are saying is that this should not have all been pinned on autism, it went above and beyond this.

Violence from a child to family members cannot be viewed as acceptable in any way, shape or form though and they need protection too. This needs to be part of the national picture.

Does anyone remember the Rackhams attack in Bham where the guy went on a rampage in House of Fraser attacking women. They all survived luckily but it does remind me of this. Nothing changed after as far as I’m aware. He had a history of mental illness and was a few years later (despite receiving 10 life sentences) allowed out shopping in Stafford from a low security unit. We don’t learn do we.

And more often than not the women have allowed their sons to own deadly weapons, such as in Plymouth where the son owned a shotgun, killed his mother and four other people.

There was an incident in London decades ago (not Hainualt two years ago) of someone with paranoid schizophrenia, for some reason his parents allowed him to keep a Samurai sword in his bedroom, and then he tried to go on a rampage with it.

There is this constant blind spot of people thinking that it's not their fault that their children can own and keep deadly weapons.

He lacked capacity to volunteer for MH care so surely that could have been tested in court?

I remember that very well. So essentially despite having schizophrenia they decided at trial that it wasn't a MH issue, he went to prison, they decided he was severely unwell after all.

Same old same old

Yes, I think the trauma aspect of this is likely pertinent.

I also feel some surprise that the parents did not act in any way to protect themselves given that it sounds like they were frightened of him.

Additionally that is a whole talking point unto itself really.