The tragic news of the death of that poor little baby P has been all over the news. I suspect, and would hope that you were upset, and quite frankly shocked by the circumstances surrounding the case.
The actions (or rather lack of), by Social Services, are disgraceful. Yet I find myself unsurprised. I feel that the training is inadequate. Some social workers are practicing after a mere 2 years training.
A friend of mine has a teenage son who has ADHD, conduct disorder and moderate learning disability. Since the age of 5 SS have consistently let this little boy down. At one point they put him in the care of his violent father. His mother begged SS not to do this. She told SS he was a bully, thief, drug addled ex-con. But they refused to believe her.
This story doesn't have a good ending. One year after being placed in his fathers care, it transpired that this man was not only on crystal meth, but also sexually abusing his teenage daughter. The daughter was told that if she told anyone he would kill himself. And he did!
My friend is still locked in a permanent battle with social workers, who never seem to see the wood for the trees.
I don't think the problem is that social workers aren't trained for long enough. I think the problem is that so much emphasis is put on keeping families together that even in cases where it really needs to happen kids aren't put in to care. Social workers need to have a huge amount of evidence before they can take a child into care - its not enough to just know that a child is being abused, you have to prove that they are at significant risk of harm. So if a child is too young or too frightened to explain what is happening its really hard for social workers to do anything about it. Also people have this idea that social workers and foster carers are trying to take children off of good parents and to tear up families. This is nonsence - thenumber o fchildren who need care so far ouweighs the number of foster carers/care homes that social workers really struggle to find anywhere to put children, and don't place them in care unless there is no other choice.
In Britain every thing has gone PC crazy. It is now at the stage where British people are frightened to say anything in case it is not pollitically correct. I think this has gone too far as now the tables are being turned on british people and they are the ones having racist remarks and rejudices thrown at them. this is supposed to be a country of freedom and speech. Have people forgotton what our granfathers/fathers and other family members fought for.
I agree. In many situations, we are the ethnic minority. I think it is good to celebrate your your ethnicity, like black history week. But what about white history week? Or Asian history week?
