Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

[charitynjw]

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/uk...1466-28778313/


Sharon Shoesmith could be in line for a massive compensation payout following a Court of Appeal ruling that she was unfairly sacked following the Baby P tragedy.
A leading employment lawyer said the former director of children's services at Haringey Council in north London could receive as much as £1 million, if the court's decision is not overturned...................

[Amy]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

Another [Ed] balls up.

[leclerc]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

The Government are appealing. Does anyone really know how many deaths occur when Social Services are aware of a child that maybe at risk? Not every head of the SS is sacked as a result.

Unfortunately, witch hunts usually mean that innocent people are involved and that may result in payouts for their witch hunt.

[Amy]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

The "witch hunt" to which you refer is the direct result of the utter revulsion felt by the public when attempting to comprehend how Mrs Shoesmith is able to sleep at night let alone how she feels comfortable claiming vast amounts in compensation, when ultimately it was the incompetence of her department of which she was Director, that led to that 17 month old little boy being let down so appallingly.

Baby Peter had been seen by members of her staff on at least 60 occasions and that was only in the last 8 months of his short life. Yet she maintains indefatigably that this baby's death is not her fault or the fault of her department because "all procedures were followed." She and her ilk truly believe that as long as all the boxes were ticked and they could all be seen to have done their jobs, then there is no case to answer.

Despite the fact that the end result of all the form filling and box ticking was a dead baby.

Gross incompetence means the sack in the normal workplace, but not if you are employed by the government. Instead it means that no blame is apportioned since nobody fails at anything.

If she had one shred of decency in her, she would have fallen on her sword rather than reach for her lawyers and claim her blood money.

She even has the effrontery to claim she has experienced suicidal thoughts. The woman is clearly incapable of feeling even a semblance of empathy. If I had my way, I would like her to experience just one day of Baby Peter's life, such as it was.

She feels she was unfairly dismissed. Baby Peter was murdered. So who is the victim?

[leclerc]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

The judgement on the case is here. At the end of the day, she is appointed under powers given under the Children's Act 2004 and was removed as well. You can't simply walk roughshod over employment law simply because of the cause celebre.

Judgement is here btw:

http://www.bailii.org/cgi-bin/markup...method=boolean

[Amy]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

God no, heaven forbid someone's job comes before the loss of life.

Whatever was I thinking.

[leclerc]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

Amy, I repeat the main point I stated which is: How many children die in the care of social services within the UK?
How many children have been visited dozens of times and yet still died?

As I said, this was a horrific case of cruelty but there will be more loss of life, there will be more horrific cases but ultimately, if you want to sack an individual and make them responsible for that death then you have got to follow the law unless you simply think it should be summary firing every time a child dies under the care of social services?

As it is, there are serious case reviews under that scenario(in case anyone wonders what happens to other non cause celebre child deaths who have social care).

[CleverClogs]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

Amy, I repeat the main point I stated which is: How many children die in the care of social services within the UK?
How many children have been visited dozens of times and yet still died?

Don't you mean poor, innocent children who are being murdered every day by evil people who get away with it?

As I said, this was a horrific case of cruelty but there will be more loss of life, there will be more horrific cases but ultimately, if you want to sack an individual and make them responsible for that death then you have got to follow the law unless you simply think it should be summary firing every time a child dies under the care of social services

It certainly was not a very good witch-hunt; apart from Ms Shoe***** never having been intimately examined for The Devil's Mark or another nipple wherefrom Satan might suckle, she was not even subjected to the famous Flotation Test to determine if she was a witch.

Moreover, as she knew that she lacked experience in social work, she had delegated the management of social work to her deputy, Ms Cecilia Hitchen; see paragraph 3 of the judgement - link. If anyone should have been held responsible for the alleged failures, ought it not to have been the person actually running that side of the department?

[Amy]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

One death is one too many and I refer you to my fifth paragraph.

[CleverClogs]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

One death is one too many

After all, as Tovarisch Ioseb dze Jughashvili declared, "One death is a tragedy". But when does the number of deaths become a mere statistic?

and I refer you to my fifth paragraph.

The one where you opined that she should (metaphorically?) commit seppuku even though she was neither directly nor indirectly to blame for the death of that innocent chavling?

[Amy]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

First, I was not talking to you and second what a despicable term to use for a child who had not been given the chance to become anything.

[CleverClogs]

Re: Up to £1m payout' for Shoesmith

First, I was not talking to you

Ooh, get you!

I've not read such a retort for nearly twenty years, when someone on FidoNet had the mistaken idea that their posting on a public discussion area (specifically, the COMMON_ROOM [sic] echo) was a private conversation.

and second what a despicable term to use for a child who had not been given the chance to become anything.

How else might one describe the offspring of low-life? :tinysmile_grin_t:

You're quite right, though. Little Baby P never had the chance to get his own ASBOs.