"It is an internationaly accepted wrong to separate a child from a close kinship group like Indians or Roma, or Pavees and place that child with a group which discriminates against that child."

A few questions:-

- Where is this "internationally accepted"?
- How do you know the foster-care family with which she was placed discriminates against her?
- In many historical cases of child abuse, the child has been moved from the abuser to someone closely connected with the abuser or with a vested interest in stopping the investigation. The child has then been pressured into retracting claims of abuse, and often the abuse has continued. Social services have learnt from this, and no longer allow this to happen. You state that the Travellers are a close-knit community, which means that all the community would know Mrs. Toogood. By these very rules, then, none of these Traveller families are eligible to care for her daughter. In addition, this group of Travellers are known to have hidden Mrs. Toogood from the police until she decided to give herself up. Given that these Travellers are all close friends of Mrs. Toogood, have a vested interest in preventing their friend being convicted, and have already demonstrated a willingness to obstruct the police, why should they be permitted to look after the child? - How many Traveller families in the area are approved for foster-care, and therefore would be eligible to care for her temporarily? If they're not approved for foster-care, the police wouldn't be allowed to place the child with them.

None of us are claiming there is no prejudice any more. What we're all trying to pound into your granite-hard prejudice against the police is that what's happened here is no different to what would have happened to anyone of any other ethnic origin who was caught beating their child around the head.

Graham.