I was totally shaken to see how 
gorgeous Baby P looked before he became a punch bag. Don’t you just want to squeeze those chubby cheeks and bounce him on your lap, sing a nursery rhyme, clap hands and laugh together.
That’s what most mums would have done with this bonny boy. But not Baby P’s mum. Instead of enjoying this kind of happy childhood, the blond haired, blue-eyed toddler was brutally battered to death at his home – a place which should have been his place of safety.
It doesn’t matter to me who gets sacked for this – and I’m sure it won’t be long before Sharon Shoesmith, Haringey’s Director of 
Children and Young People’s services, is deservedly given the boot.
Baby P, who was 17 months old, suffered more than 50 injuries while living with his mother, 27, her boyfriend,32, and their lodger Jason Owen, 36, despite being on the "at risk" register and receiving 60 visits from health and social workers. They will be jailed next month for allowing or causing the child’s death, and have been told they face a "significant term in prison".
The mother cannot presently be named for legal reasons, but I am hoping that she will be named and shamed by the judge when she is jailed.
To me, there is ONE person responsible for Baby P’s death. And that is Baby P’s mother who brought him into the world and then denied him her love and protection while in her care, knowing he was helpless to speak out against the horrific atrocities inflicted on him.
This is the kind of woman she is: on August 3 2007 when an ambulance was called to her house, its crew found Baby P already stiff and blue in his blood-spattered cot. As they tried to rush him to hospital, the mother demanded they wait while she collected her cigarettes.
When toddlers fall and hurt themselves accidentally, their mum will gently kiss better their injured area. Not Baby P’s mum. She covered his deliberately inflicted wounds with chocolate to conceal the bruising.
As a Sun columnist said, "The RSPCA wouldn’t have visited this flat 60 times and done sod all."
A court bans people from keeping animals if they have caused them unnecessary suffering; like this woman banned for life by Margate magistrates last week for the pain and suffering she caused to 13 Bedlington terriers
Isn’t a child entitled to the same kind of protection as a dog?
Ellee, you have articulated what so many people are thinking and is not being said loudly enough in the media. Hackney clearly were at fault – in fact negligent. But as you say there ONE person who is wholly to blame is the mother – if one call her that. You are so right that an animal would not have been allowed to be treated in that way. It is also frightening to think that the ‘mother’ could go on to have further children – although one hopes that the jail sentence may just be long enough to go some way in preventing that.
Out of respect for Baby P I do hope that the one and only positive outcome of this tragic story is that systems can be put in place to make sure that this kind of thing is picked up sooner and that it is acknowledged that there are far too many people out there who have no experience of ‘good’parenting so become inadequate parents.
You would hope so. But obviously not.
Its tragic.
Caroline, my view is that children are a special gift. Ask anyone who can’t have them. To let scum and low-life do this to your kid means you must be the most dreadful of mothers. It’s a privilege to be a mother. And this woman doesn’t deserve it.
“The RSPCA wouldn’t have visited this flat 60 times and done sod all”
Well I think that says it all. Best comment I’ve seen on this issue, Ellee.
PS: Having read Caroline’s comments I think there is a danger of a backlash and Lilith’s comments come to mind – that it’s a tick-box system. Many children are happy and well cared for but have been taken away from parents for the most bizarre reasons. Yet Baby P was not. One of the criteria for the SS is the contents of your fridge and the fact that children were not dressed at 10am was cited in one case where the children were placed in care. Like the case of Victoria Climbie, nothing changes it just gives others generally an excuse to be jobsworth and tick their boxes with the easiest of targets – those who did nothing wrong.
A comment I heard this morning on the radio goes some way to explaining this situation, I think. When dealing with this ‘underclass with no conscience’ social workers often feel they are in a vulnerable position and retreat, whereas, had this happened to a law-abiding, middle-class family, the child would have been whisked away in no time. That was the gist of it anyway, and the argument was that social workers in the ‘front line’ are often quite inexperienced and lack the back-up they need at the crucial time. Mind you, I am very tempted to say the mother should be compulsorily sterilised. There are many people at fault here – not least Patricia Hewitt and other government ministers. (See http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1085786/Baby-P-The-merry-round-sent-warnings-social-workers.html)
And something I didn’t realise before, Baby P has a sister who was also on the “at risk” register.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article5162711.ece
[…] Ellee Seymour – MCIPR, PRESS CONSULTANT, JOURNALIST, POLITICAL AND … […]
I could weep when I see photos of that poor baby. Give me a pair of pliers and I will sterilise her for free. Do I sound harsh? No more than that low life scum deserves.
Haringey, not Hackney.
I wonder who gave her custody of the child rather its natural father?
What an ugly, ugly story. That such a beautiful young child should end up this way is heartbreaking. It is simply unbelievable that a mother could do this to her child,
Elle,
The mother has got her wish, she had another baby in prison whilst waiting for the court case ( Baby P died over 15 months ago).
She like so many other women in her position see children as a meal ticket for life. I was astounded when a social worker friend of mine explained what a child is worth. They get extra money for every problem the child has. Breathing difficulties that will be £100 per week. Attention deficit disorder have another £50. One of her friend’s was even paid to help her look after the child. They just split the money between them.
Geoff, I guess he didn’t feel able to.
Lady Finchley,I think lots of others feel as strongly as you. Can she reform? I doubt it. That can only happen if you have a supportive home environment to return to.
Kentish Northerner, I didn’t know about the baby being born in prison. But you are right about the way babies are regarded as some as a meal ticket. My mother has lettings and she is often told about 16-year-olds who deliberately get pregnant so they can leave home and be given a council flat.
Pip, that check list needs throwing away.
Caroline and Jennyta, what you say rings true. A child doesn’t ask to be born. It’s pot luck whether he ends up in a caring and loving environment or in a vile place of abuse where even professionals fail to save you.
As much as I am appalled by little Peter Connolly’s death,have posted on the subject and sent an email to Ms Shoesmith to resign, enshrining enforced sterilisation into law is a step I would not like to see, as we have seen that this Parliament has passed one Law, and it has been abused by a host of petty, power crazed bureaucrats. Say I live in a Labour/Con/LiBDem authority, I am violently opposed to their policies. Am I seen as a ‘mental defective’ worthy of being sterilized ?
This young woman had no sense of responsibility, because the ‘State’ will provide ‘all’ it will make all the decisions from cradle to grave. She lived in an area that had no sense of community, most of the tenants were transitory. The ‘Social’ promises to salve our consciences by taking ‘resposibility’ for all our children- We have created a society sick with greed and inverted priorities.
Where were Peter’s grandparents, father- nowhere because it was not their problem, morally they had dumped the whole problem on the doorstep of Haringay Social Services.
I still cannot get my head round the fact that we need a license to have a pet but we don’t need one to have a child.
Makes you think, doesn’t it!
http://www.lettersfromatory.com
As someone who has lived in Haringey for over 20 years, this latest case does not surprise me. The complacency and arrogance of the political establishment here is so bad that that there just isn’t the political will to deal with the many systemic problems in our services for children and young people. (Education in Haringey is appalling too, with the exception of one secondary school and a small handful of primaries that draw their intake from the rich western fringe of the borough, where parents are highly motivated and can afford supplementary lessons). Bear in mind that old left-wing prejudices are still strong here–they see adoption as a class issue: the middle-class colonising the children of the poor working class. That is why their mindset is to do everything possible to avoid taking children away from such families–they’d rather they stayed in care or went to a slightly less bad version of the same chaotic dysfunctional family, than actually ended up in a ‘bourgeois’ home. That same mindset is also evident in the approach taken to adoption by the lefty North London screenwriters who relentlessly pump out an anti-adoption message in every TV soap, where every natural mother of an adopted child is shown to bitterly regret their decision, they are reviled by others for giving away their baby, the adopted child is always shown as feeling rejected and hostile. If anyone follows Hollyoaks, they will have seen an absurdly extreme example recently, where the sdopted son attempts to murder his natural mother and all her family.
I have strayed far from the original point here, but the case of Baby P is symptomatic of a far deper malaise, of the malign influence of the cultural leftists Nick Cohen wrote about in his excellent book ‘What’s left?’.
Why not bring back the death penalty?
I find such tales horrifying and deeply distressing. Not only must she be prohibited from having future punching bags, she must be summarily sterilized. That to me is not excessively harsh in such a case.
It seems there were so many red flags warning of the dangers before.
can someone tell me how the boyfriend who tortured this baby so horrifically and killed him in a slow painful death could be cleared of murder?? he will be out in no time to torture more children.
Annette, I agree, I don’t understand either. The law is so cautious is our country. These monsters were collectively responsible and I hope they get a rough time in prison when their crime becomes common knowledge.
If you look at The Daily Squib web site Uncovered The vile mother of Baby P you will see that according to his mothers Friends Reunited profile update she was ” no longer with her ex husband , waiting for him to sign the papers ” and had met “someone lovely” .
She states that at that time had 3 girls and one boy .
Since then she has seemingly given birth to another baby whilst in prison .
Its just amazing how normal these types can look .
Allegedly the social workers were going to leave that baby in her tender care as well but the police intervened .
As for the director of social services ,she will no doubt only go when forced and not before a payment package has been agreed to then turn up a while later in some other role within the system .
http://www.dailysquib.co.uk/?c=117&a=1551
The link above gives further details, which will only reinforce the views of those quoted above.
Perhaps Social Services needs to be run in the same way as the RSPCA. I cannot imagine that a dog would have been left with its owner with all that eveidence to see. As to having another baby. No No No.
How sad but it happens all over the world. It seems people are punished more severely for inflicting pain and suffering on cats and dogs or other animals than they do for harming their children. It must stop!
Tragic story… just tragic.
Sounds like he’s better off than being raised by such an asshole.
i know i am late to posting on this…but wanted to say that the press never reports the entire story…please don’t think i am standing up for any of the social services workers involved but i know first hand how these things get reported…everyone wants to blame someone…and it’s easier to blame someone else…where were the people who saw the child regularly? the neighbors…the people on the street…someone had to have heard the cries, where were they? I guess what i am trying to say here, is we all, as a community have a responsibility and when that responsibility is ignored because it isn’t pretty, tragedy happens…
thanx for ur blog.. i was shocked when heard this story .. it’s really awful and terrible… and this woman is so irresponsible. how can you give a birth to a baby and then don’t care for him??
of course this happens all over the world. and anything can’t be done so far..