It was that terrible rag The Sun which led a witch hunt.
“BLOOD ON THEIR HANDS”, ran the front page headline of The Sun following the death of 17-month-old Peter Connelly, known as Baby P.
The paper was not only referring to Peter’s mother, Tracey Connelly, her boyfriend Steven Barker, and his brother, Jason Owen, all of whom had just been convicted of “causing or allowing” Peter’s death. It had decided the social workers at Haringey Council, who had been involved in the case, and their boss, Sharon Shoesmith, were also to blame.
Of course the social workers and Ms Shoesmith weren't to 'blame' and the campaign against them was an utter disgrace, typifying the worse kind of journalism. This said Ms Shoesmith did herself no favours by trying to repress the finding of an internal enquiry.
Much of the criticism of her then and since has been about the notion that she did not apologise, or was not apologetic enough; and that she, as the accountable director, should have taken responsibility. She says she apologised many times for the failure of safeguarding staff to prevent the death, but she will never apologise in a way that suggests she was responsible for his death. The judge in her court case, she says, in her book published just 2 months ago, pointed out that “public accountability does not mean that heads should roll”. If every children’s director resigned after a child homicide, there would be no one in post, she says. Accountability has to be realistic: “You cannot expect that social workers can prevent every death of every child. You have to remember that this is happening every week, not all of them known to social care.”