I write as someone who has specialised in family law (especially legally aided child care work) for 20 years, and have been a children panel solicitor for 12 years. I am angry and dismayed at the way specialist practitioners are being driven out of this vital field of work, when the funding 'reforms' are so ill-thought out and ineptly managed.


In terms of child protection, I fear that we face a rerun of the scandalous cases of child deaths (from Maria Colwell in 1975, onwards) that led to the creation of the current system - the system that is now being dismantled so recklessly.



Maud Davis, Blacklaws Davis, London