Here's the story, it is truly disgusting.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6343693.stm

How can people do this to their own kids, or kids full stop? It's made worse by the fact that the girl had cerebral palsy, condition that would give her phsyical and possibly learning difficulties. The poor kid would be even more delicate than most 4 yr olds and this must surely scar her for life. i have no idea what her level is mental capacity is, but havign worked with people with learning difficulties I know that many of them are even more vulnerable and frightened than average children :(

Taking another angle, we hear a lot of stories of child abuse that seem to go undetected by Social Services, even though they are involved. This child was taken away form her parents then returned to them later. What can be done? Who is to blame?

That's awful! Like a defenceless 4 year old girl! :(

Well i am 10 years older, if my parents even tried to do that, i would kik their a**es and possibly stab them!

They should be locked up forever!

ARGH! it just makes me so angry! What would make them do that! :yikes: :yikes:

The last questions you pose there are so very difficult to answer aren't they?

For part of the tennis course I did a fortnight back I had to attend a midweek child protection workshop, which was basically a big discussion about what you can and can't do as a coach (for instance you can't give a kid a lift back home, can't pull their arm back to show them a swing unless they ask etc.).

Social services or not, it's very difficult to tell what can be done. There are warning signs you can detect in young children which might suggest things aren't what they should be at home, but even if you suspect something, you can't just suddeenly question the parent(s) on a whim!

The thing is, and was raised in the workshop, is that there are just as many cases of child abuse now as there were 20, 30, 40 years ago, it's just that there is a lot more media coverage now and it seems that it is on the increase, when really the elvels are about the same, despite the many ideas and measures to prevent it.

Unfortunetly there are always going to be sick people in the world who take advantage of children, as we have seen in the media with some teachers, coaches etc., whose only aim was to get at vulnerable children. It's sick, and it makes my blood boil :angry:

I spent quite a few years working with children in the Care System and unfortunately have seen the product of situations just like this at first hand. The blame has to be 75% on the perpetrators themselves, 20% on Social services who never seem to actually learn from previous tragedies/errors/etc and sedly 5% on neighbours, family, friends who sometimes do see and choose to ignore. I personally grassed on my friend's sister for something similar and her 3 kids have now been fostered away for a year. Her family are cool with me (as in ok). My friend herself is grateful I did it as she struggled to deal with the situation. I've had numerous drunken threats from the cow and her succession of knobhead partners but hey ho - my consience is clear.

well done you - grassing up is a big part of it sometimes.

One of the sample scenarios we were shown was with your best mate being a coach, coaching kids of 13-15 years old. One day you see a glance of him kissing one of the girls in a quiet corner. What do you do?

Obviously you should 'grass' them, but how difficult can that be sometimes in real life situations?

Well done - the "don't dob on a mate" 'code of honour' is used more often than not to hide unmentionables as loyalty that is merited does not usually have to be asked for.

Yeah I can see that often people don't say anything when they should. Thing is though, there are cases where they have and social services have still screwed up. My personal impression of Social Services, havign had many dealings with them through work, is that there are some very bad managers making some very bad decisions, nto to mention staff who are naive to say the least. Social work is a tough job and a very responsible one. I think we need to have a stricter criteria and selection process fo rthose who work in it, and pay them more money to do a better job. Some of the SWs I've met, I just cannto beleive the imcompetenc eof. I'm not slagging them all off, I sympathise with their plight and from the ones I've spoken to there is not always the resource or the support from management to do a thorough job. A lot of the young recruits get the enthusiasm bashed out of them after a while, and in badly managed councils, staff morale is low. There is no incentive to stay and many of them go into related jobs with private agencies as they are better paid.

There is also a lack of continuity in areas where they find it hard to recruit and retain staff, which means many cases being passed around and often left on the back burner when a higher priority case comes along. One thing I've noticed in my London Borough is nto only this, but staffing problems lead to an awful lot of SWs beign drafted in from abraod temporarliy, a lot of whom seem to be here more for the travel opportunity than to mak ean impact work wise. They were paying Australians much higher rates of pay than their native staff and this led to resentment. One problem with this is nto onyl the extra cost, but the fact that foreign workers dont; have a full knowledge of our society and also the statutory services structure. I had to work alongside a German lady for a year and lovely as she was, she just had no clue about how to deal with people and how to help them as things are very different in Germany.

Anyway, of course we cant; blame everythign on Social Services BUT they are the main agency responsible for spotting and dealing with child cruelty and recent cases have shown that they are not performing up to scratch so this needs to be adressed.

Pretty fair comments. Have had similar experiences with SS too.

I once saw a really scruffy looking man in about his 60's trying to give an ice cream to a little kid by the open door of a beaten up old car. I watched them and the man looked awkward with the child and vice-versa - the child was not making a very good show of enjoying being given the ice cream. They did not look as though they knew one another too well, if at all. My suspicions were fuelled by the fact that the old man was white and the little child was black, or at least mixed-race.

I went round the corner and told a policeman that I had my concerns based on no more than what I had seen - I made it clear that I had not seen him do anything wrong (as I hadn't).

About 40mins later I was out again and saw a van with some pc's in it - I went over and asked them if they had heard whether anything had come about because of what I had done. They told me that the old man had in fact been the child's grandfather.

I subjected him to, no doubt, a nasty moment, and I felt bad in a way. The police didn't really give the impression they had a view about what I had done one way or other. However, I think I would do it again. I just had a picture in my head of that little kid's face on the front page of a sunday paper and having to call the police to say I had seen it looking awkward being given an ice cream by an old man etc.

Was I right?

on the whole yes I would have done the same.

It is however a sad indictment on society that there is so much suspicion when one sees a man interacting with a child, that the first thing that springs to mind is 'pervert' rather than 'grandparent'

I do know of one instance where a guy was beaten up for the heinous crime of passing a comment on how sweet a child looked!

I believe there is a bit of a witchhunt mentality in the UK with the media driving sensationalist stories to sell newspapers and that is driving suspicion which in turn drives even more sensationalist stories.

You were right Barry. We never know this little kid could have bitten the fingers off this poor old man...

Just kidding. I would say I have a vivid imagination, so like you it seems, I pay attention to a lot of details around me and cannot put behind me anything I find a little odd especially when children are involved.

Very good point actually, lex. This is the drawback of our societIES' excessive caring as we tend to make rules for the exceptional/accidental case.

As it snowed yesterday in London, our children were not allowed to play in the playground at school and enjoy a bit of snow throwing because a few got injured somewhen and somewhere in the world. We never had this problem when I was a child. Yes we got a cold as a consequence maybe but that's it. Now it is taking ridiculous proportion as we are being ruled by the exceptional incident.

Worse, my daughter goes to a religious school but has no right to wear her little religious necklace -even invisible under her shirt- because....she could strangle herself!!!

What's going on.

I agree completely on this.

I'm not a big fan of Michael Moore --- not because I don't agree with a lot of what he says, but rather because I don't think he gives the full picture; i.e., he simplifies things in a way which may be funny and poignant, but also somewhat unfair. Nonetheless, this is a point I really agree with in his 'Bowling for Columbine': that there seems to be a climate of fear which is being propagated about many things, blowing them well out of proportion.

I find this very much so in the UK. For example, it seems most parents won't let their children (or at least their younger children, say around 10) walk to school, even if it is nearby; they feel they need to take them in the car. However, I do wonder what the chance is of a car getting injured in an accident involving their parents' car, as compared to the chance that they are snatched off the street by a pedophile ...

Don't get me wrong, I am has horrified as anyone when I hear these terrible stories. But I do ask myself --- would I rather make my child be afraid of going on the streets on their own? I personally feel that I would have been deprived of a significant part of my childhood that way.

There is indeed. I think people overeact a lot. And also as a side thing they use suspicions of indecent behaviour against people they dont; like for spite. In my neighbourhood, there is an old man who's bene pestered by kids for 7 yrs. He's got a heart condition and lives alone. He's had fires started in his hall, superglue in his locks, stones thrown at him, it's terrible. The police never catch the culprits and told him to photograph any kids he catches trespassing. he does so and the parents scream paedophillia. :angry: I saw an old man try to talk to kids last month and hey calle dhim a paedophile and threw stuff at him. I intervened to get rid of them, the poor guy could hardly stand up.

The final straw for me in this was when our neighbours insinuated that my partner was stalking their kids. The reality was that they are up for an ASBO and we were told to photograph any dodgy behaviour. We photographed them setting light to a sofa in their garden, burning my fence and trees in the process. There wer eno minors present. They didn't like the consequnces when we reported them so they called the police and made up stupid allegations. I todl the police what was what and they apologised for botherign me but warned us not to take any photos. Yet the onyl way to prove ASB is through such means. Anyway we went to mediation with them and they even accused us of stalking them in the Summer - that was me with my flash camera photographing hedgehogs - i'm a huge fan of wildlife photgraphy - stupid, stupid people. :rolleyes:

And unfortunately these are the sort of people who create the image of suspicion on someone who is totally innocent of any insinuation of paedophilia etc. Hard luck having tossers like that for neighbours SB. Don't envy you that :(

I agree. When we were kids we went everywhere in groups together, and we would indeed have been deprived of muc fun and many days out had we had the overprotective and molly coddling parents of today. They do their kids no favours - the kids do not learn independence, I mean they cant; even go anywhere without a lift! We used to use bikes and the bus. They lack imagination and the abiltity to create their own entertainment. If you gave one of them a bike, their partents would not let them out on it. When I was a kid, our parents gav us a packed lunch and told us to bugger up the park or something on our bikes and not come back until tea time. I'm glad they did. :D We'd have picnics and stuff and play adventure games. We also became expert in woodland flowers and stuff very quickly and used to watch for wildlife. Soem parents say their kids can't go out even with a mobile. Our parents didnt; even have a phone back then.

I suppose the real problem is society is less caring, cos years back we knew if we needed help, people would help us out. There are not more paedophiles and harmful people out there than before if you ask me, just less community orientated people to help others out. It's such a shame. Keeping kids indoors though doesnt; help - they dont; learn how to look after themselves and spot danger as they are never expeosed to any risks. It's a difficult balancing act for partens I know, but makign kids paranoid is not the answer.