According to the Daily Telegraph, remarks made by Andrew
Webb, president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services, during
a BBC radio interview on the Daniel Pelka tragedy, have drawn criticism from Peter
Saunders, head of the National Association for People Abused in Childhood.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10216127/Head-of-childrens-services-chiefs-accused-of-defeatism-after-he-says-we-will-never-prevent-all-child-deaths.html
Webb is reported as saying that the number of child abuse
deaths was “… remarkably consistent, which tends to suggest that there’s a
problem here we will never, ever manage to crack.” In reply Saunders accused
Webb of defeatism saying: “We are very interested in people who are supposed to
be leading the way but who are almost throwing their hands up and admitting
defeat.”
Most sensible people will be inclined to side in this debate
with Peter Saunders. It is foolish to believe that nothing more can be done.
But this does not imply, in the wider debate, that something
can be done quickly and dramatically. The great fallacy of the Every Child Matters agenda was precisely
that – ‘a significant step’ I think Tony Blair
called it, when it was nothing of the kind. Throwing policies at child
abuse and neglect, and introducing untried and poorly designed systems that are
supposed to mark the beginning of a new era, is the territory of the fantasist.
In contrast, what is required is small, incremental,
continuous improvement. That means daily learning with the aim of having
services that are just a little bit better today than they were yesterday.
Modest, achievable and sustainable changes should be initiated by those who
actually do the job or be based on an evolving understanding of the needs and
wants of children and young people who receive the services.
This kind of continuous improvement can have impressive cumulative results. Services which are made just a little bit better every day will often be substantially better at the end of the year and significantly improved at the end of the decade. But what we do not want are grand policies devised by political and
managerial elites, which take years to implement only to be shown to be hollow vessels.
