I was speaking to an elderly lady the other day, who was a social worker amongst a multitude of other socially active roles during her life, both paid and unpaid. And the Baby P case came up. I asked her if in her opinion anything had changed since her years in social work. Was it simply a case that more child abuse cases are publicly discussed now than during her day, or are there more incidents?

She didn't exactly answer my question, but said that in her opinion, modern problems in social work stemmed from a break-down of communication between different departments, she said inter-departmental communication had deteriorated over the years since she was working. And it was this which made the job of efficient action and intervention, which in her day was much easier, increasingly difficult for modern social workers.

I think it's of course a terribly sad case. My Mother knew a teenage girl at school, who was universally hated for her violent bullying of other girls, this girl used to wear whip scars on her back from her religious Mother regularly beating her with electric flex. All the girls knew of it. And apparantly plenty of the parents and teachers too. No thoughts of any action were ever taken. How many people in there own lives can look back and recall times they could or should have noticed or said or done something, but missed the 'obvious'?

For whatever it's worth, I speak as someone who was seriously abused myself. Public awareness has changed greatly, the system has to cope with more cases. There needs to be greater support of those who work in these areas, not greater condemnation.