Vulnerable children put at risk due to social worker shortage

Megs wrote:

I have to disagree with you Jacqueline. If a child is placed by a local authority in London then it is their responsibility to fund that placement. The only time it becomes Kent's problem is if additional needs are required such as disabilities team involvement. Which it should be because the child now resides in Kent so Kent are responsible. Social Services are a joke they are under resourced, under funded and over staffed with too many admin staff abd fat cats skimming the cream, and not enough social workers doing what they should be doing protecting the most vulnerable people in our society. Some of these children are living in appalling conditions with drug addicts as parents who are constantly witnessing domestic violence, they are neglected and abused. Social Services won't remove the children because then it costs them money in fostering payments unless they can of course dump the kids with grandparents or other relative carers and then walk away saying it was a private arrangement therefore it is not our responsibility. I can assure Kent are the worse LA in this country for not paying family and friends carer allowances when these people are bringing up children that are not there own it is a disgrace. There caviat being "well if you don't take the child then it will go up for adoption" there is not a grandparent/relative carer alive who would wish that on there grand child and then they don't give proper advice about where those grandparents/relative carers should get additional benefits, how to obtain PR for a child. A child placed with a grandparent/relative carer does not come with PR wrapped up in a little box, some of these grandparents/relative carers are not aware that they cannot make even a decision about a doctor for a child without PR Social Services neglect to tell them this basic bit of information. Social Services are to blame for their own inadequacies nobody else, instead of funding big employer pensions and huge salaries and bonus' to lazy fat cats put the money where it should go protecting kids.

05 Dec 2010 1:23 PM

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sophie watts wrote:

It would not matter if social services had infinite amounts of money they have no itellegence and will never get things right. It is also well known that social workers usually come from council estates themselves and usually went to failing state schools so how can they manage.

02 Dec 2010 1:45 PM

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Jacqueline wrote:

You will note ...perhaps I used the word insidiously because though the money for fostering comes from the placing county ,the money for nhs care,schooling and the extra burden on social services does not ,only the actual fostering is a allowable.

13 Sep 2010 5:09 PM

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Kevin Reynolds wrote:

I am not aware that private fostering has any effect whatsoever on Kent Social Services. In actual fact it is a huge cottage industry within Kent that brings many millions of pounds into the county. To my knowledge there is no responsibility whatsoever placed upon KCC for the welfare of these children and this point is factually incorrect. The money for the fostering is paid by the council who places the child in Kent. Kent do not pay to foster children from other areas and fostering is a highly lucrative and profitable profession. Payments are up to £600 (per child) a week tax free sometimes considerably more in complex/difficult cases.

I have had personal dealing with Kent Children’s Services and I can tell you a huge issue is the lack of any proper protocols and procedures. There is also appalling/non-existent record keeping, virtually no written records. Supervision does not exist, they don’t carry out risk assessments they are absolutely useless! My son was on a supervision order with KCC and the social worker concerned visited my son and often wrote one line for home visits. For example one visit said “smiling baby, does not come to me automatically like other children”. This is a gross breach of the duty of the social worker to keep proper notes of home visits. There are also alarming gaps in between visits despite the placement in this case being extremely risky. In my case the person concerned has had five other children removed for significant emotional harm and neglect. My child has also been taken to the GP in excess of 100 times for NOS “no obvious symptoms“ and there is a pattern of this behaviour with the existing children. I was later told this was due to the mother “anxieties” but what about the impact of this behaviour on my son who is being medicalised? No expert involved just some social worker making a conclusion based on what: your non existent supervision?

I refer you to her news story done with the BBC. In this KCC defends a man who smashed his baby’s skull. “The problem is there was no conviction” : http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/kent/8572027.stm

WRONG!

The problem is you did not have proper protocols are procedures in place to deal with a referral concerning a social work client. Ironically the man was convicted in any case for assault on a family member plus additional cautions for child neglect. What kind of person would go out on a limb to defend a person who smashed their child’s skull I ask you? Not only defend them but come out with a pack of lies to justify the departments inaction when they were informed twice by the family and at least once by a heath care professional(s) of significant concerns and risk.

12 Sep 2010 11:03 PM

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Jacqueline wrote:

One of the most costly issues facing Kent social services as far as children are concerned is the "dumping" in kent foster care of children from London,they become insidiously the responsibility of KCC and take up resources meant for Kent children .

12 Sep 2010 6:27 PM

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