‘Too many’ babies taken into care

TOO many children are being taken into care unnecessarily by social workers who should take a ‘kinder’ approach to families, according to the country’s chief social worker.

Isabelle Trowler, 53, said it was ‘an injustice’ that some authorities were removing babies who could be safely supported at home.

And, as fears of a rise in child neglect cases had not come to pass after the first lockdown, the pandemic would offer an opportunity to ‘reset’ the way social work is done.

Mrs Trowler told The Sunday Times: ‘Someone used the example of a social worker going to the family home, and instead of looking in the fridge and saying, “Oh my goodness, how terrible you haven’t got any food,” saying, “Oh, my goodness, how terrible. How can I help you get some food?”’

She added that the number of child protection probes ending in no further action – which have tripled in the past decade – showed social workers were ‘intervening when we didn’t need to’.