But much is being made of the fact that it happened in the same London borough of Haringey as a previous front page case, that of little Victoria Climbie, 8 years ago.
Already the knives are out for the social services staff in Haringey, and not least for Sharon Shoesmith, the Director of Childrens Services in the borough. It is being said that for two such horror stories to happen in the same borough must imply major failings in the social services set-up there.
Well it may be true. Certainly the case is more shocking even than the Climbie case because the little boy was on the 'on watch' register and had been seen by countless officials and a paediatrician, all of whom, it appears, were misled to an amazing degree considering the extent of the little boy's injuries.
But we have to look at the complete picture. Haringey is demographically a very mixed borough, reasonably prosperous in the west, and pretty deprived in the eastern part. How many successful interventions have social workers made in the last eight years? I would imagine that there are parts of that borough where they are constantly on their toes.
Ms Shoesmith as Director of Children's Services has come under savage attack from the media and there is some pressure for her to resign her post. If that were to happen, it might satisfy the knife wielding critics, but would the children of Haringey be any safer. As soon as the knives came out for Ms Shoesmith, an amazing show of support came from nearly every head teacher in the borough.
"She has done an amazing job in turning this borough round ..there are no schools in special measures in Haringey" were a couple of the remarks in support.
There are, indeed, serious questions to be answered over social worker Nevres Kemal who claims that her concerns for some children in Haringey were ignored by her bosses and that she 'blew the whistle' on the Baby P case 6 months before the child died...and there does indeed seem to have been intense efforts by Haringey Council to legally have her silenced and the plot thickened this week when it transpired that a letter sent by Ms Kemal to Patricia Hewitt, the then secretary of state who passed it on at a time when two government departments were changing roles and the letter appears to have fallen down a bureaucratic hole in the middle. The classic cock-up theory - 'if the worst thing can manifest itself out of confusion, it will'
So there are serious questions to answer. But before social workers or their Director are roasted on a spit to pacify some media inspired sense of outrage, there should be a full and comprehensive public enquiry to ascertain if, as Ms Shoesmith said this week 'Sadly if parents are intent on killing their children it is very difficult to prevent them' or whether there are still fundamental flaws in the way the department of social services in Haringey operates. If there are, then at that point changes should be made - possibly of personnel as well as procedure. But until then, I believe hard working people with terrible decisions to make daily should not be scapegoated on the altar of some misplaced sense of righteous justification.
2 comments:
There are a number of issues here.
One is that there is no democratic means by which Ms Shoesmith can be removed: indeed any of those involved in this matter, so people have no choiice but to resort to outrage.
But perhaps more importantly is the question of what the actual purpose of her department and how it performs it's duties.
The Ofsted report commnended the department for lowering the number of children on the at risk register.
But the question is how this was done, and more importantly how that appears to have directly impinged on the death of Baby Peter.
At the trial the social worker, Maria Ward, stated that the mother was cooperating with social services to have her child removed form that register, and this appears to have been the primary concern for the professionals involved in the case. Indeed so primary that they appear to have been perfectly willing to turn a blind eye to the injuries and weight loss that the child was suffering: not to mention the actual state of the child: bloody clothes, unwashed, nappy rash, lice etc.
Which is really the issue.
You mention that lack of schools in special measures - which is a good thing - but what is not addressed in this statistic is the means by which this has been achieved. Since I notice there appeasr to be record numbers of exclusions and expulsions.
Personally I would rather have social workers actually protecting children, and not statistically protecting them.
The latter would seem to be proved by Ms Shoesmith attending a press conference on the lack of care provided to Baby Peter, and using it as an opportunity to quote meaningless statistics on the GCSE results of children in care, and then making crass statements about the impossibility of stopping parents killing their children.
As for Ms Kemal, it is not dissimilar to the Dr Kelly business. A whistleblower makes an allegation, a government inspection team declares he is wrong, and then makes reccomnedations that in essence proves he was right.
And since Ms Kemal has a gagging order on her, we cannot know if what she was saying is right or wrong.
But from what I understand, she alleged that for reasons of costs and targets, children were being placed in situations of danger.
But I agree with you that Maria Ward is being unfairly targetted, because if this is the system she was required to work in then she was only doing her job: and she certainly wasn't in a position to change the system. And had she attempted to do so, she would probably have recieved more than a written warning from her managers.
Hi transfattyacid
I don't get many comments on the blog and to get one as thoughtful as this is a bonus, and thank you.
Yes you are right and this is one of the issues that should be investigated...and hence the necessity of an independent public enquiry. If ,as you suggest, the reason for apparent success is the manipulation of statistics then that needs to be brought out without interference and pressure from government ministers.
I share your concern at what seems to be the overwhelming inclination of social services to have a family 'normalised' as soon as possible sometimes, it seems, ignoring evidence which suggests that all may not be well.
Of course they are damned if they do and damned if they don't - recall the outrage over children taken into care in the Orkney and Cleveland cases - but I share your worry that the pressure to show an improving situation may be blinding them to what is really going on.
Thanks for your views
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