Social Services.....children at risk

[newcastle]

You have to have some sympathy for departments and workers involved with the care of children. Well..... a smidgen perhaps.

A few weeks ago there was a furore on social media concerning the case of a white 'christian' child placed in temporary foster care with a racially mixed muslim family. The London authority thought they were acting in the child's best interests, having taken all factors into account. A considerable number of people, probably with little, if any, knowledge of the facts, thought otherwise.

I gather the child has now been placed with relatives.

Of course there have been many reports of children being subject to terrible abuse, even killed, because social services ignored warning signs or didn't act resolutely.

Recently on BBC Newsnight, a short report concerned a woman (not sure about ethnicity) who asked her midwife a question about FGM...which resulted in her children being regarded as potentially at risk and placed on a child protection plan. The mother had not undergone FGM herself and, apparently, had no intentions of inflicting this on her children. Nevertheless, she, and her children, went through several months of hell until the situation was resolved.

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The BBC programme asks whether we're tackling FGM in the right way.

Who knows? But it seems at times the authorities charged with looking after children are damned if they act...and damned if they don't.

[Dusak]

From hard lessons learned in the UK, do not get me started on social services, but especially social workers. Guaranteed to get me blocked or locked.