How can parents do this?

social services cannot film or out in camera without a Dols so I imagine it is off a device that the 'parents' themselves installed

I can't get the image of that poor little boy out of my head either. He was crying for his grandma at one point. How were these people able to carry on treating him like this for so long.

AGA44. I can well believe that and I was going to say earlier that it’s better to go to the police if there’s real concerns as it’s a crime and they will treat it as such whereas sw’s see it as a case and are trained to work with the parents’ needs not the children’s.

It is not possible to understand how anyone can hurt a child.

Parents who do this should suffer the way the child did.

Usually I wouldn't ever say that but abusive parents just are the lowest form of life.

So many options, don't have children, send him to a family member who does love him, have him fostered, adopted.... Anything

Yet, they don't because they enjoy abusing the child and they never think they will lose control and seriously hurt or kill the child until it happens and they are caught.

Too many children with abusive/neglectful parents. Just too many.

Exactly VioletSky. Take him somewhere, say you don't want him, can't cope or whatever. Reading the details, they seemed to enjoy hurting him. Monsters. Many years ago, after reading about some particularly harrowing case, I set up a direct debit to the NSPCC. I still pay it. I can't bear this sort of horror.

So many options, don't have children, send him to a family member who does love him, have him fostered, adopted.... Anything
Yet, they don't because they enjoy abusing the child

Yes, that exactly.

We may wonder why, when so many would love to have a child but can't, that they do not give up the child for adoption to people who would love them.
But it is because they are sadists.
Sometimes it is just one child in a family, others are not abused.

From what I gather this stepmother’s own children were cared for. I think the little chap was disturbed and played up. His mother was in prison and he was sent to live with his father. He had already gone through a lot and was probably resentful of the stepmother. Children can’t express themselves like adults. He obviously had a grandmother that loved him but she wasn’t listened to. I think one of the reasons they don’t give them up is because don’t want to lose any money received for the child.

I remember other cases, Daniel Pelka being one, where the other children are cared for and try to help the abused sibling. I don’t believe they ever found out why he was so sadistically abused.

It’s been said repeatedly things have to change regarding child welfare but they never do. Parents are believed, children aren’t seen on their own. It’s heartbreaking.

My heart breaks for this poor innocent child. I remember years ago a case where a social worker visited an at risk child. Mother and social worker sat chatting on chairs, the child was supposedly playing behind the sofa. The social worker did not go over to the child to look at her, and left, quite satisfied all was ok. The child was behind the sofa because she had a broken leg and couldn't move, was terrified of her mother, so didn't make a sound. I find it hard that other people who come into contact with these children, such as neighbours or extended relatives, school staff etc, do not intervene more, or at least probe into things more actively. I hope this couple get what they deserve when they are locked up.

That dear little boy. . I can’t write in polite language what I’d like to do to the perpetrators of this crime.

I’ve heard via other channels that this occurred during lockdown so he wasn’t at school therefore not monitored closely. Also that the reason the hairdresser didn’t report it was because she was breaking lockdown rules by being in their house.

There’s another case of a 19mth little girl ongoing and a report last week about a weeks-old baby dying. I too remember Maria Colwell and yet nothing seems to have changed.

So the hairdresser chose to turn a blind eye SueDonim that's unbelievable. Hope she doesn't sleep at night either.

It’s about time it was made a criminal offence to turn a blind eye to child abuse. Much in the same way there’s international law making it mandatory to save people in peril in the sea. I, personally, wouldn’t be able to rest without doing something if I was witness to such behaviour.

I’d also be interested to know how the police knew about the hairdresser. I might be wrong but I believe that once little Arthur died the hairdresser probably contacted the police with her input. Pity she didn’t contact them before.

I know it is cowardly but I just couldn't watch that video clip - that poor child what a terrible sad life he lived. I truly hope the "adults" who thought it OK to treat him that way get very long prison sentences.

This is a horrific incident and my heart goes out to that poor child. As a social worker of over 40 years I still can’t bring myself to watch the video. It doesn’t matter what I have seen previously it’s never possible to become hardened to child abuse and children’s suffering.

Please don’t fall into the age old trap of believing everything you read in the media. There is good social work going on every day by brave social workers. Of course one child dying is always unacceptable, but it’s an unpleasant truth that social workers and other professionals are human beings and sometimes mistakes will be made. But it’s also true that they have to work within the law and it can be very difficult to reach a legal threshold to take action to remove a child from their carers. Social workers do not have right of entry even with police presence. The police have emergency powers but it is up to them whether to exercise those. In ideal circumstances social workers and the police work well together, but both services are impossibly stretched. These problems and questions are agonised over every single day in Children’s Services Departments. So talk of social workers being ‘hoodwinked’ and ‘not fit fit the job’ are usually pretty wide of the mark.

In no way am I making excuses for what has happened to this little boy, it is heartbreaking. But knee jerk blame will not help to avoid the next tragedy, which will surely come.

I have worked along side many Social workers and i was astounded at what situations they were willing to leave a child. They thought it was acceptable to leave a child who had been brave enough to tell about being sexually abused by her Mothers boyfriend in the house with him as they said if they removed her (or him) the child would feel guilty about breaking up a family and making her mum sad. According to one social work team a child being neglected was just a matter of different standards, the poor child was hungry had awful nappy rash and was never bathed or in clean clothes. Those are just 2 cases that i have dealt with. I have no time for Social services.

I do know how hard most people in social services work, nightowl and apologise if I offended you but cases like this one do slip through the net.
Young, inexperienced social workers, pressurised and working under strain may well make mistakes. Sometimes parents can be very plausible but surely warning bells should ring if teachers and others, who see a child daily, are alarmed.

I posted above that I don't think that Daniel's Law ever came near the H of C all those years ago, which would have given more powers when a child was thought to be in danger. Complacent politicians who could have taken action.

As for the police, who allegedly told the grandmother she would be arrested for breaking Covid rules if she went near the family, if true then not fit for the job is still my opinion.

I've seen horrendous photos, read lots of reports of child abuse and it never ceases to outrage and upset me, especially where authorities were alerted and no action was taken.

When I worked in local government I worked with child social workers. I had no reason to respect them. All talk, numerous case conferences and very little action despite some very harrowing situations. That was 40 years ago. Maybe things have changed. Somehow I doubt it.

I didn’t realise the ‘mother’ was in fact the ‘stepmother’, I didn’t read the article as too harrowing. Not that would remotely justify it. Was the father there? Was he taking part in the abuse? As I said deal with them as they treated that poor innocent child. No punishment is fit for this kind of crime.

Callistemmon don’t worry, I’m not offended, I just feel a need to stand up for social workers. Thank goodness I’m at the end of my career, no longer in frontline child protection but in a job I love. I still have nightmares about my job and I remember all too well the fear of getting it wrong and being the one whose name is on the front page of the tabloids (remember ‘the most hated woman in Britain’ -not the person who murdered the child but the social worker). But most of all I remember the cases where I did get it wrong, and I remember the faces of the children I failed, and sometimes, the others where I think I helped. No one else can make us feel as bad as we feel about ourselves when things go wrong and children suffer.

We know a friend of a friend, who got his first girlfriend pregnant in late teens, the lad stood by her& they had baby, were bringing it up ok, the dad taking most responsibility, but was a good dad, then his girlfriend cheated on him with a down& out psycho- who badly treated the toddler and she let him, apparently- poor little child died aged 16mths yet the poor childs dad had offered to take his child to live with him & his family full time, so if they couldn't be bothered with the poor mite she could have just let him have the toddler and he loved that baby so much and was a very good young dad.Its such a tragedy.They lived near us so we knew them too..Id see them on the bus sometimes, when the parents were still a couple and they were a happy little family.Such a shock, and a shame.The toddlers dad was heartbroken.The mother & her new psycho boyfriend were jailed for 10 years.But it won't bring back the poor child will it.

BlueSky The father was abusing the child too.

A lot of parents /people who abuse children were abused themselves - not all, but quite a few I’d imagine.
They never got help so the cycle is never broken. I’m not making excuses for them but just answering the question as to ‘why do people do this’ ?

My dd works for local govt and during the lockdowns was responsible for managing things like free school meals, key worker/at risk school places and support for vulnerable people. She worked closely with the SW dept and they managed to have almost all their at risk children in school, where they could be seen and any problems hopefully spotted.

They were later criticised by Holyrood for having ‘too many’ of the at risk children in school. You really couldn’t make it up.

I don’t think she was abusing her own children according to reports, just this little boy. Where was the dad ?

Kate1949

BlueSky The father was abusing the child too.

Forsythia, see Kate1949's post above

Sadly this little boy didn't stand a chance.
His only saviours would have been his grandmother and other family who were not allowed to see him.

I have spent 30 years working with vulnerable families alongside social workers, doing an almost impossible job. There is absolutely no way I would advise my children for example to go into social work partly because of the utter contempt with which they are treated by the public.