'Reckless' minister has put children at risk – Shoesmith

[Albus]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/feb/06/haringey-social-services-ed-balls

Sharon Shoesmith, the children's services chief sacked in the wake of the Baby P tragedy accused the children's secretary, Ed Balls, last night of "breathtaking recklessness" in his handling of the affair, claiming his actions had fuelled a blame culture that had left social workers demoralised and put child safety procedures at risk.

Speaking for the first time since her removal by Balls on live television in December, she claimed political opportunism and press hysteria had created "a local tragedy and a national catastrophe".

In a wide-ranging interview, the former Haringey children's services director said she felt an inquiry ordered by Balls into child protection in the borough had been an attempt to "discredit" her. She said the report, carried out by Ofsted inspectors and used by Balls in support of his ­decision to remove her, was misleading and lacked balance.

She accused Balls directly of making the task of protecting children in Haringey more difficult. The consequences of his "reckless" attack on Haringey, said Shoesmith, would be to make it "more of an uphill struggle" to achieve his aim of raising the standing and status of the social work profession.

But she also admits that she and the council were unprepared for the scale of public anger when details of the Baby P case emerged. "We were out of touch with public opinion," she said.

Baby P was 17 months old when he died after suffering more than 50 injuries at the hands of his abusive mother, 27, her boyfriend, 32, and their lodger, Jason Owen, 36, despite 60 contacts with the authorities over eight months. They are due to be sentenced next month.

In the interview, Shoesmith reveals:

• She and her team of social workers had been deeply shocked by Baby P's death. She regrets that the "disastrous" press conference called in November to present details of the case following the conviction of Baby P's killers wrongly created the perception that she was not prepared to apologise.

• Some errors were made in what was an exceptionally complex and difficult case, but she stands by her decision to discipline rather than sack three employees involved in the case.

• At times during the crisis she contemplated suicide in despair at the way she was hounded by tabloid newspapers. She received death threats and hundreds of abusive texts from members of the public, and was forced to take special police protection.

• She understood why people were appalled by the circumstances of Baby P's death, but there was a desperate need for a more mature debate about the difficulty of child protection work, and more realistic expectations from the government and the media about the ability of safeguarding agencies to prevent all child deaths.

Shoesmith, 55, who is considering legal action for unfair dismissal after being formally sacked by Haringey on 8 December without notice or compensation, says she had the support of her employers but she accepts that the strength of media pressure on the council in the end made her position intolerable. "I was squashed between politics and the press."

She says one of her biggest regrets was the damage caused to Haringey over the affair. She is angry Ofsted told Balls on 1 December that the failings it identified in Haringey were "exceptional" when it knew that a number of councils around the country were struggling.

Haringey children's services had received a "good" annual assessment by Ofsted three months after Baby P died. Shoesmith rejects suggestions, made by Ofsted chief Christine Gilbert in a Guardian interview in December, that Haringey had given inspectors false data to achieve a "good" annual assessment in November 2007. "I deeply objected to being called deceitful in the press ... I was completely unable to defend myself."

Shoesmith says the Ofsted inquiry was misleading because it suggested she faced a conflict of interests because she was chair of the local safeguarding children board investigating the Baby P case when it was accepted at the time that 70% of all such boards in England at the time were chaired by the children's directors.

She also believes it was wrong to allow her a chance to respond before publication or to imply Haringey had a particular problem with heavy child protection caseloads and high reliance on agency staff when these difficulties were common in most deprived inner-city boroughs.

Haringey's performance and reputation had been improving in recent years following reforms and a renewed focus on child protection following a national outcry over the death of Victoria Climbié in the borough in 2000, she says. But this had been put at risk because the press condemnation of social workers was destroying morale and fuelling a recruitment crisis , she said.

The Guardian revealed last month that the new children's director in Haringey, Peter Lewis, had to appeal to neighbouring boroughs to lend staff because of shortages of personnel skilled in carrying out child protection investigations. There is also anecdotal evidence that councils have seen a rise in the number of care proceedings which could result in youngsters being taken from their family.

Shoesmith reveals that friends had advised her to find another job after the death of Baby P in August 2007 because it was likely to be a difficult case to handle. But she turned down job offers to see the job through: "That was the weakest thing I could do. That betrayal – that I could walk away from the council and leave them to handle this."

Ed Balls said last night: "I make no apology for the actions I took in Haringey last December, which I judged absolutely necessary to make sure children in that borough are properly protected. I believe that every community, every parent and every social worker would expect me to put the safety of children first. That is what I did - and faced with the same situation again I would have no hesitation in taking exactly the same decisions."