Let off, staff who failed baby Poppi
Inquiry won’t even name them – or dead child
NOT one of the health or social workers who failed to prevent the death of tragic Poppi Worthington has been disciplined or sacked, a report revealed yesterday.
An inquiry into the death of the 13-month-old found a catalogue of failures but named none of the officials who might have saved her.
And despite criticism over previous attempts to suppress information, the review also neglected to identify the tot – simply naming her ‘Child N’.
Poppi – said by a judge to have been a victim of sexual assault by her paedophile father in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria – had been at risk from birth, the report revealed.
Yet county authorities did nothing to help and failed to show ‘professional curiosity and scepticism’ over the role of supermarket worker Paul Worthing- ton. Evidence of injuries to other children in the troubled family also raised no alarms, it added. However, not one social worker, health visitor or medical professional who failed to prevent Poppi’s death has faced any sanction since she died in 2012. Some have since ‘ moved on’, meaning they are now likely to be responsible for the welfare of vulnerable children elsewhere in the country.
The ‘serious case review’ published yesterday, also failed to name 48-year-old Mr Worthington, instead referring to him as ‘FCN’. Poppi’s name has been known to the public since 2014.
The 24-page report was published while the Crown Prosecution Service continues to consider whether criminal charges may yet be brought over the tragedy, which was hushed up for nearly three years.
In a devastating ‘fact-finding’ ruling November last year, High Court judge Mr Justice Peter
Jacksonworkersseries meantPoppiIn January,diedof key and accusedmajorwas evidence medicalthe lost. blunderspolice, judge’sabout staff socialthat howof keya finding monthspolice and afterwas Cumbriait madewas first public councilgiven– 21 to – and around claimedthe time’ Poppi as died the‘ at sex or attack. In the furore that followed, the CPS restarted its probe and Cumbria MPs called for an outside police force to be called in to take over the inquiry into the death. Yesterday’s report for the Cumbria Local Safeguarding Children Board was drawn up by independent reviewer Clare Hyde. It said all six of the chil- dren under the care of Poppi’s mother, now 32, were at risk. Yet social workers had no contact with the family from 2007 and medics failed to act when the mother reported injuries to ‘immobile infants’ in her care.
Poppi’s grandparents, the report said, had been brought up in state care, and her grandfather called himself a ‘jailbird’. The baby’s mother grew up in an abusive family, was taken into care after being sexually exploited aged 15 and her first child was taken from her and given to adoptive parents.
Health visitors accepted the ‘superficial’ idea that her ‘noisy and chaotic’ family was happy, even though they noted that Poppi’s twin was ‘ withdrawn and looked sad’. The review said no social or medical worker ‘reflected’ that the mother’s history might mean risk to the children despite ‘clear indicators’. It added that there should have been ‘comprehensive and ongoing multi-agency assessment’.
The arrival of Paul Worthington was a further risk to the children, the report said. He had fathered a child with a woman suspected of grooming Poppi’s mother as a teenager, it found.
Cumbria’s safeguarding board, which includes social workers, NHS staff and police, claimed the report showed Poppi could not have been helped. Its chairman, Gill Rigg, said: ‘There is nothing to suggest that her death could have been predicted
From the Mail, October 28, 2014 or prevented.’ But John Woodcock, Labour MP for Barrow-in-Furness, said: ‘It is alarming to hear such a key figure apparently still clinging to the idea that nothing could have been done to prevent Poppi’s death despite this damning report.’
Former MP John Hemming, who campaigns for open justice, said of officials: ‘They habitually use the maximum amount of secrecy to avoid any scrutiny of their decision-making.’
In 2014 Cumbria Council fought for a High Court order banning any publication of Poppi’s name, home town or the involvement of officials for 15 years on the grounds that it would be ‘unfair’ to authorities.
After opposition by the Daily Mail, most of the facts were released in January this year. Yet parts remain shrouded in secrecy. The anonymised report yesterday noted that ‘confidentiality’ was important in a serious case review.
‘Habitually used maximum secrecy’