Sunday, November 16, 2008

It’s a distorted cruel world that we live in

Two weeks ago a terminally ill girl won the right to refuse treatment after a hospital ended its bid to force her to have a heart transplant. Hannah has a hole in her heart and copes with various symptoms from previous childhood illnesses.

Hannah is aged 13 and had decided she wanted to die with dignity and fought for her right to do so, tooth and nail.

Hereford County Hospital child protection team contacted authorities and threatened to remove Hannah from her parents care if they failed to bring her to the hospital for the live saving operation.

Her parents were swamped by the might of the social services and hospital protection team, but the parents stood by their daughter’s decision and the case has been dropped. Hannah is now at home and preparing to die in her own time.

Meanwhile in the rather down market poor area of Haringey London, the social services, the child protection team and a paediatrician failed to recognise the systematic abuse of a 17 month old boy who was found dead in a blood splattered cot last year.

The wee boy named Baby P attended the hospital where a prominent paediatrician failed to notice his broken back and several broken ribs; he was allowed home to die at the hands of his mother and her abusive boyfriend. The doctor said the baby was ‘miserable and cranky’ two days before he died. I suspect his broken spine, ripped ear and numerous injuries might have made him rather upset.

Baby P had been the subject of many social services enquiries and was on the child protection register, and despite that, the social work team were at pains to keep the family together.

Haringey social services seem to have learnt no lessons from the Victoria Climbie case in 2000 when Victoria managed to slip through the social care net and died at the hands of her carers.

The court case surrounding Baby P has led Lord Laming to start an investigation into the issues surrounding his horrific death.

He said “It would be awful wherever it happened, but it seems particularly sad that is has happened in the same area where Victoria Climbie experienced this same awful cruelty and a terrible death and involved the very same services”

Social services do a sterling job when they get it right. Yet there are too many social protection workers who are determined to ‘keep families together’ and in the process manage to let real evil bastards slip through the net. Adults who are determined to torture kids will manage to dupe the authorities into believing everything is fine with their kid. Like the mother of Baby P, she smeared chocolate over his bruised face, yet the care worker couldn’t tell the difference between the dirt and the cuts. That’s appalling and worrisome.

I am sure Baby P would have said different if only he could have had a voice, he wasn’t allowed to speak, he couldn’t speak, he was battered and cowed like a small tortured animal.

The social services in Haringey need to account for what went wrong, yet again another ‘investigation’ will occur to please the government and the do-gooders will bleat their excuses. Someone somewhere let that wee boy down and that needs to be addressed.

Things won’t change unless you go live in Hereford, where it seems the social services are determined to get involved in the care and protection of your child.

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