This is a truly dreadful course of events isn't it. Cruel and manipulative parents, and a very vulnerable child, and his sibling, just almost too awful to think about. The only positive thing is that so many people are talking about it and desperately trying to look at how things could have been different for these children. I share the comments by Nelliemoser and Nightowl - I only wish there were simple solutions to complex problems. I'm sure that the young teacher, TA, HT, nurse, doctors, police who had professional involvement with Daniel will live with the horrors he was subjected to for ever. So will his sibling. I agree that a child who is failing to thrive, scrabbling for food and with parents known to fight,take drugs and drink heavily - every alarm bell in everyones head should have been ringing loud and clear. The process for getting a proper social work investigation has simply failed and we all want to understand how. Like others, I don't want to simply have every other child death review re-hashed, references to poor communication, parents who manipulated and intimidated professionals. I am not saying that more resources would magically improve practice, but it needs to happen. More effective, and career long, multi disciplinary training should be mandatory for all involved. I've been involved in social work training and I'm sure that using excellent workers, who do the job for the greater part of their working life, is the way to go. Theory is essential to underpin this difficult work, but individual courage in situations like this could have possibly, maybe had a better outcome for the child. It is a brave individual who whistle blows, or simply makes a referral to the police and social work teams, without going through whatever system is in place where they work. Teachers can only be effective in expressing concerns, if they have proper support from the designated child protection staff member.