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

It's not just underfunding though, that's a cop out, it's mismanaged, corrupt services (grooming gangs etc). Everyone passing the buck of responsibility, which the system allows them to do. Lack of accountability. People playing the system. Tick boxes to avoid liability whilst doing nothing meaningful.

Services tied up in knots pissing money and time away on stuff that really doesn't matter and ignoring what does. It's NOT just underfunding. At all.

Good point - that is all very true!

While I mentioned paying for it, thats not the whole of it and not what I mean when I say the public wont like the answers for this and dont want to face the reality of it

The reality is that we are too focused on rights and too focused on the indvidual, the answer to this anathema to much of society which is that we would need to move back to systems that we had in place years ago, far far more segretation for children with challenging behaviour no matter what the cause or diagnosis, less reluctance to use custody for children. A cultural shift is needed about what we expect from each other.

But, research seems to indicate that is not better for kids, but is it better for society?

This !! Sadly in seems that people in certain public facing roles are inept of taking responsibility. Is this down to lack of experience in their roles or the fact that 'shit rolls down", and they are not supported by their superiors when the proverbial hits the fan?. Im not making excuses here, but I've seen first hand where experienced and caring professionals are frightened of making decisions, because those above that are being paid a shit load of money will not back them up in the long term.
As a result ,we have lunatics like this walking the streets and our poor children are sitting ducks so to speak. God bless these girls. Yet I fear nothing will change if no one is held accountable and punished accordingly.

Hard agree. Parents must be held responsible for the behaviour of their children. The Law should enforce this.

But he could have stopped giving AR money, taken away his phone and computer, refused to allow deliveries for AR, and not lied to the police or been obstructive when agencies raised AR's behaviour. I don't believe that a grown man could not provide any kind of discipline towards his own son. Pathetic cowardice and lack of any kind of moral fibre. He should be in jail too.

By all accounts his brother was popular, clever and leading a normal life at university before this atrocity happened.

Would probably have been beaten black and blue by his son for some of this. He had experienced years of trauma and violence and dealing with agencies who slate everything you do and was probably completely broken by that point. He thought he was going to be killed by his own child - you have no idea what that is like. Who knows? It's much more complex than you think it is.

I don't know.about others but speaking personally I would be happy to face the reality of this.

We need a safer society, that much is clear.

Perhaps the law should also be that parents must also be protected from extreme violence from their children.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr411lzn1qwo

Looks like they are pushing for some tangible change here and who can blame them.

"The families, quite frankly, are aghast."

I can't imagine. My heart broke all over again reading this.

Would probably have been beaten black and blue by his son. A black belt judo instructor?

He had experienced years of trauma and violence and dealing with agencies who slate everything you do and was probably completely broken by that point. The parents failed to act out of a misguided and irresponsible desire to avoid him being taken into care.

You have no idea what that is like. None of us do

It's much more complex than you think it is. Not too complex to urgently work out better systems of dealing with such hopelessly dysfunctional families.

BBC
There was stark criticism particularly for his father Alphonse Rudakubana, who Sir Adrian said had deliberately withheld information about his son amassing a stash of deadly weapons including the biological toxin ricin.

Sir Adrian said if the parents had reported their true level of knowledge to the authorities before the attack, the killer would "undoubtedly have been taken into care or held in custody".

"The love I had for him overrode [my] good judgement," he said.
Sir Adrian said the killer's parents had failed to act out of a "misguided and irresponsible" desire to avoid him being taken into care.

The dad loved and protected his murderous son. We all know what that led to.

Ok

So I DO know what it's like. I have been there in extreme situations. For years. It is horrific and traumatising and the gaslighting from services is also traumatic. There is no money. There are no resources. Society is all too happy to believe the Daily Mail whereby all you need to do is discipline your child. There is no protection.

Services cannot help you. What is reported on paper is one thing, the reality of the situation is very difficult. A lack of distrust forms between the majority of families and professionals develops.

You can't use self defence on your own child. It really is not allowed. Can you imagine the consequences of this?

You have no idea until you've been in this boat of what families face. Of course I don't condone what happened. Absolute not. But it's much more complex than you think.

I would also like to add that it's tough on professionals too. They would have loved to have been able to help AR's family. They genuinely would not have believed the issue was discipline, of course they didn't. There are too many families in this situation, they do not have the resources and protect their own pots. Of course AR's parents should have contacted the police, that goes without saying. But don't forget that they had been put in a quite frankly terrifying position for years. Where was their protection? Why is it somehow deemed acceptable that they too were exposed to violence for years and lived in constant fear that anything they did could lead to escalation.

But AR did get services. Loads of them! No
underfunding for him.

He and parents refused to engage. Daddy threatened the psychiatrist so much she wouldn’t go back and was replayed. Mummy refused to let social workers in.

Was there respite? PAs? Did they know what they needed to do in the event of escalation? Are you taking the PTSD on board that they had in their dealings with services? Was the house safety proofed? Were the services offered actually helpful or did they just escalate the situation? Was there any useful coordination between services? Was what was reported on paper a reflection of the reality?

All I can say from my experience is that it is brutal. And never ending. And a lot of families on here report the same thing.

yes, a black belt

a sports fight is regulated and, importantly, time restricted.
is it very, very different to fight in competition to having a highly volatile individual who lives in your home. who doesn't respond to usual safety measures, who would attack without apparent rhyme or reason

Do you threaten professionals though, to the degree they withdraw services? Do you refuse to update them on behaviours in the home. Do you slam the door in the SWs face?

There isnt anyone who wants to provide respite for people like this anyway, who would want him in their home, even if he agreed to go by the way. Respite is either with individuals who would be at risk from him or a set of carers who are also caring for other children at the same time who he would pose risk to.

There’s no mention in the press of two factors that seem very relevant

1. why isn’t there a ban in selling knives online?
2. why isn’t there a call for restrictions on these dangerous websites he was accessing. As a parent if you turn iff the Wi-Fi as has been suggested it can be accessed instead on 4g or in a free WiFi connection in a public place. What do other people think?

Absolutely agree with this. At a low level you see it in schools. Children being 'evacuated' from a classroom because of the high needs of other children. Because the focus is on the individual and the options to the school are limited because there aren't alternative placements nor decent support (it'll just be a min wage TA doing her best) and in the end the child causing the disruption and the other children are all failed.

It's not in the child's best interests to be in a mainstream school where the child can't cope. It's certainly not in the interests or the safety of all the other children.

The focus needs to shift towards balancing everyone's rights not just the few individuals with agencies involved. Problem is lots of lawyers (like Kier Starmer) have got rich off the 'individual rights above all else' gravy train and we're seeing the results in society, including in these tragic deliberate planned murders of completely innocent children.

I could reel off a very very long list of women and girls irrevocably harmed or murdered because the 'rights', freedoms and desires of men and boys have been placed above the safety of women and girls. However the failures leading to the murder of Alice, Bebe and Elsie should and must be enough for change.

I am frequently shouted down on threads where I talk about the dangers of children accessing the internet on phones

Would you lock your child in a room with drug dealers, weapons dealings, hard core porn taking place, violence taking place around them in the room and conspiracy information being spoken. In that room. Because that is what is available every time a person has free access to the internet. And children who fixate on matters, children who have a distorted view of themselves and th eworld around them because of internal factors (ND, MH, trauma experiences etc) will be far more prone to seeking out and enjoying, engaging with, maintaining an interest in those areas.

Yes. And a very dysregulated child is also a very strong child. The reality is that you will be strangled, attacked with any object that is in reach, often in the head, punched, kicked - for hours and hours every single day. Every time you say no to anything. You spend your entire day trying to keep things as calm as possible. It's extremely painful and you just have to stand there and let it happen. Help doesn't materialise. You don't even know what you are meant to do as everyone tells you to do different things. You are terrified for your own child - what will happen to them? And all the time you are being told that you are the problem. You don't even know if you are allowed to restrain as that is seen as harmful for the child. If you do restrain you are criticised for causing harm. You are worried about the impact on your other children.

You ask for an action plan. It doesn't materialise. You ask for advice on how to keep everyone safe. It doesn't materialise. You ask for advice on how to safety proof your house. It doesn't materialise. Every day you wake up you face another day of this. If you complain you are yet again the problem.

This is the reality, it's pretty awful for everyone.

Most people I know won't let their children now have a smartphone until at least 16 - we're not going to for our youngest child. But yet again it's fallen on individuals - smartphones should be banned for under 16s (they can have brick phones) and any parent who breaches this faces a £2000 fine. That would solve a lot of problems.

"Most people I know won't let their children now have a smartphone until at least 16"

Clearly this is not representative of society as a whole, otherwise phone bans would not be needed in primary or secondary schools.

Completely agree on switching the focus to what’s safer for women and girls. With all the systems in place.

No one asks how to keep those three little girls safe at a holiday camp and all the things that should be different so they were. It should be top priority.