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Joshua
The problem starts much earlier in the process than care proceedings and is affecting ever larger proportions of children. In my recent study 1 in every 16 children had been the subject of a child protection investigation before their fifth birthday in 2017, a 35% increase in the rate of involvement compared to children born just 5 years earlier (see http://bilson.org.uk/home/adoption-and-child-protection-trends-for-children-aged-under-five/ ). The increasing level of investigations included a rapidly growing rate of children investigated without leading to a child protection plan. This rate rose by 60% to 2.6% (1 in 38) of children in the 71 local authorities reporting on this. This represents a huge level of collateral damage. As Judge Anthony Thornton in his judgement said of an unfounded s47 investigation it is "reportable by the parents concerned, can blight their lives irrespective of the nature and extent of the significant harm or of their involvement in it or of the reasonableness of the suspicion".

There is no evidence that this cycle of increasing investigations which has been the case for 15 years has any affect on the amount of harm done to children or even on the serious crimes which we all abhor. If all this investigative action was effective in protecting children or preventing future harm we would expect to see a reduction in investigations and findings of abuse over time, but there has been an increasing rate of both for the last fifteen years in England. It is sad to note that despite the continued rise in investigations, the number of child deaths recorded by the Child Death Overview Panels as being due to deliberately inflicted injury, abuse or neglect have changed little since their instigation in 2010 fluctuating between a low of 30 in 2010 and a high of 62 in 2014 (DfE, 2017).

This issue is now a major scandal and a government that increases the pressure on families through policies that lead to greater poverty and inequality, instigates cuts that remove support for families facing difficulties and then vilifies parents and promotes a culture of rescue by issuing guidance saying “A desire to think the best of adults and to hope they can overcome their difficulties should not trump the need to rescue children from chaotic, neglectful and abusive homes.” cannot be absolved from considerable blame for these trends which damage children, families and communities.

In New York a movement of parents working with a range of allies led to improvements in legal representation through the employment of trained parent advocates in law firms; took political action to challenge state policies; and led to a reduction in the number of children in state care from 50,ooo to under 9,000. There are growing numbers of parents', particularly mothers' groups in England challenging these injustices and we need to find ways to help them to become a countervailing force. In legal circles perhaps there is a way to help by parents to challenge the legality of the decisions being made to investigate which is mainly on the basis of concerns about future serious harm?