Archived Transcript for 20 December 2001: Pages 1 to 50

1



1 Thursday, 20th December 2001

2 (10.00 am)

3 THE CHAIRMAN: Morning ladies and gentlemen, Mr Garnham.

4 MR GARNHAM: Morning sir. Ms Gibson will take the first

5 witness.

6 MS GIBSON: Thank you. Good morning sir. The first witness

7 is Ernell Watson.

8 MS ERNELL WATSON (affirmed)

9 MS GIBSON: Thank you. Good morning Ms Watson.

10 MS WATSON: Good morning.

11 MS GIBSON: Would you give your full name.

12 MS WATSON: Ernell Diana Watson.

13 MS GIBSON: You have made one statement and that appears at

14 volume 3, page 150.501 in the witness bundle. A copy of

15 that will be provided to you now. Do you have a copy of

16 the statements that you have made to the Inquiry?

17 MS WATSON: Yes.

18 MS GIBSON: Are there any amendments that you wish to make

19 to those statements?

20 MS WATSON: There is one amendment that needs to be made.

21 In my statement I said that a meeting did not take

22 place, a managers' meeting did not take place on

23 6th August. A managers' meeting did take place.

24 MS GIBSON: We now know for your reference that minutes of

25 that meeting appear in the bundle at volume 26B

2



1 page 087.501 sir.

2 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you.

3 MS GIBSON: Can you explain why those minutes have only

4 recently surfaced?

5 MS WATSON: Having read some of the bundles I was able to

6 more or less go back to some of the records that I have

7 had and I realised that we did have minutes of that

8 meeting.

9 MS GIBSON: Aside from that are there any other amendments

10 that you wish to make to your statement?

11 MS WATSON: No.

12 MS GIBSON: Can you therefore confirm that the contents

13 aside from the amendment you have just made are true?

14 MS WATSON: Yes, the contents are true to my knowledge.

15 MS GIBSON: By way of background, it is the position that

16 from 1994 you were a frontline social worker based at

17 the former Tottenham Child and Family Support Team?

18 MS WATSON: Yes.

19 MS GIBSON: And then that team merged with the centre, or

20 the new centre at Lansdowne Road was merged with the

21 Moira Close Centre?

22 MS WATSON: Yes.

23 MS GIBSON: And therefore from that time until the closure

24 of the centre in 2000 you were employed working at the

25 Lansdowne Road site. Is that correct?

3



1 MS WATSON: Yes.

2 MS GIBSON: And you were managed by Catriona Scott?

3 MS WATSON: Yes.

4 MS GIBSON: And your position was that of Practice Manager

5 within the team?

6 MS WATSON: That is correct.

7 MS GIBSON: Can you outline in brief what your

8 responsibilities were as the Practice Manager?

9 MS WATSON: My responsibilities were to manage the practice

10 at Lansdowne Road Health Centre. I was given

11 supervisory and managerial responsibilities for

12 initially 1.5 health visitors and three family support

13 officers and 1.5 administrator.

14 MS GIBSON: And there came a time when that increased and

15 you were supervising six instead of four officers?

16 MS WATSON: Yes.

17 MS GIBSON: And that was because the Health Visitor Practice

18 Manager left?

19 MS WATSON: That is correct, yes.

20 MS GIBSON: I think you say in your statement that that was

21 in 1998 but Catriona Scott mentions March 1999. Can you

22 assist with when?

23 MS WATSON: It is possible March 1999.

24 MS GIBSON: I will ask you a little more about that in

25 a minute but can you confirm now that the centre was run

4



1 as a joint arrangement between Haringey Council, the

2 NSPCC and the Health Service?

3 MS WATSON: Yes, that is correct.

4 MS GIBSON: Is it or was it your understanding at the time

5 that the NSPCC were responsible for management of the

6 centre?

7 MS WATSON: Yes, that is correct.

8 MS GIBSON: And you were quite clear about that?

9 MS WATSON: I was, yes.

10 MS GIBSON: Was there any difference in the type of work

11 that the centre at Lansdowne Road did and the centre at

12 Moira Close, or did they deal with similar?

13 MS WATSON: We did the same tasks.

14 MS GIBSON: An overview of the services that the centre

15 provided is set out in the evaluation report that was

16 done in April 1999 at the centre.

17 MS WATSON: That is correct.

18 MS GIBSON: Aside from your work with individual families

19 you also offered a playgroup service and a drop in

20 service.

21 MS WATSON: We did.

22 MS GIBSON: It is correct, is it not, that individual family

23 support constituted the majority of your work at the

24 centre?

25 MS WATSON: Yes, that is correct.

5



1 MS GIBSON: Were you clear about the aims that you were

2 working towards within the centre?

3 MS WATSON: Yes, I was.

4 MS GIBSON: Can I ask you now about the position with cases

5 with a child protection element within them. What was

6 your understanding of the centre's ability to handle

7 such cases?

8 MS WATSON: Cases with a child protection element came to us

9 via Family Support Panel and these were cases that were

10 more or less with specific tasks for us to undertake.

11 We would work in partnership with allocated child

12 protection social workers. We would also ensure that

13 when referrals came to us from the panel we would have

14 a network meeting and that meeting would involve the

15 allocated social worker, a health visitor, if there is

16 a health visitor, a school nurse or a school teacher and

17 from there we would develop a care plan which was more

18 or less made clear of the different tasks, the roles and

19 the responsibilities of individual workers assigned to

20 that family's case.

21 MS GIBSON: How well did that system of allocation from the

22 panel work in your opinion?

23 MS WATSON: It worked quite well when we were clear, when

24 there was clear planning, where we could look at

25 objectives and outcomes for families. Again, it became

6



1 clear when we follow through our network meetings with

2 reviews on the particular case.

3 MS GIBSON: Did there come a time though when that system

4 began to break down?

5 MS WATSON: There was a time, yes, because we were inundated

6 with an awful lot of referrals from the panel and again

7 in hindsight that system did not work as effectively as

8 we would have wanted it to work.

9 MS GIBSON: Were you aware of the Service Agreement which

10 set up the family centres?

11 MS WATSON: I was quite aware of that Service Level

12 Agreement.

13 MS GIBSON: Are you aware that within that Service Agreement

14 there was an agreement or an understanding that your

15 centre would take on a third of cases with a child

16 protection element?

17 MS WATSON: I would say statutory because we also took

18 referrals where children were looked after and there

19 were requests for supervised contact as requested by the

20 court.

21 MS GIBSON: Perhaps it would assist to look at the Service

22 Agreement. It appears in volume 25, page 1 onwards.

23 Can you confirm that is the agreement that you are

24 discussing?

25 MS WATSON: Yes, it is the agreement I am discussing this

7



1 morning.

2 MS GIBSON: If you could turn to page 9 within the bundle at

3 the bottom of that page, if you go to 7.5 at the bottom

4 of the page, do you have that?

5 MS WATSON: Yes.

6 MS GIBSON: That says:

7 "The number of families on the Child Protection

8 Register or receiving services in relation to contact

9 will not exceed 40 families or one third of the

10 capacity."

11 MS WATSON: Yes.

12 MS GIBSON: Can you confirm whether that was your

13 understanding?

14 MS WATSON: Yes, this was my understanding of the Service

15 Level Agreement that was done at that time.

16 MS GIBSON: Did the capacity ever go over that one third

17 level?

18 MS WATSON: Yes, it did.

19 MS GIBSON: To what extent?

20 MS WATSON: I am not sure to what extent but we were more or

21 less receiving an awful lot more court directed contacts

22 than we were able to deal with at the time.

23 MS GIBSON: That was in relation to supervised contact?

24 MS WATSON: Supervised contacts.

25 MS GIBSON: What about cases where families had children on

8



1 the Child Protection Register?

2 MS WATSON: Again we were more or less exceeding what we

3 were -- what was said for us in the contract, in the

4 Service Level Agreement.

5 MS GIBSON: Can you assist with how you were aware that the

6 one third limit was being exceeded? Were figures

7 collected?

8 MS WATSON: Figures were collected on a monthly basis and

9 that gave us more or less overall an idea of the fact

10 that we had more or less exhausted our capacity as

11 identified in our Service Level Agreement.

12 MS GIBSON: Can you help with when that started to occur?

13 Was it from the inception of the centre or at a later

14 stage?

15 MS WATSON: I believe at a later stage.

16 MS GIBSON: It also says looking at 7.4 above that it is

17 estimated that the capacity of the service will be 120

18 families at any one time. Again, was that capacity ever

19 exceeded to your knowledge?

20 MS WATSON: I cannot remember. I cannot remember.

21 MS GIBSON: You say that there came a time when the number

22 of supervised contact cases and cases involving children

23 on the Child Protection Register became more than one

24 third. Can you be more precise about when that

25 happened?

9



1 MS WATSON: Again, I cannot remember.

2 MS GIBSON: Was it before or after you returned from,

3 I think you had a period of extended sick leave

4 from April to July of 19199.

5 MS WATSON: I believe more or less just before I went off on

6 my extended sick period.

7 MS GIBSON: Can I ask you now about the effect that that had

8 on the service that you were providing, the fact that

9 you felt that there were more cases of that intensive

10 nature coming in? Did that lead to any tension between

11 your service and Social Services?

12 MS WATSON: It did to an extent because we were not in

13 a position to provide a quality service to the families

14 that we had referred to us in terms of the current

15 staffing. Staffing became an issue because we were more

16 or less placed in a position where we were expecting an

17 awful lot more work from our workers in terms of case

18 management, making sure that the guidelines and

19 procedures are adhered to within our Family Centre.

20 MS GIBSON: Do you know what was done to resolve that

21 tension and the fact that your centre had become

22 overburdened?

23 MS WATSON: We did have meetings with Social Services

24 managers and I believe that Catriona Scott, my manager,

25 did have meetings with the referral panel because again

10



1 the referral panel was in the process of re-evaluation.

2 MS GIBSON: Did you participate in any of those meetings

3 yourself?

4 MS WATSON: No, I did not.

5 MS GIBSON: Did you see anything happening to resolve the

6 problem?

7 MS WATSON: Again, because of my extended sick leave an

8 awful lot of the time that I would have spent there was

9 away on sick leave actually.

10 MS GIBSON: But during the time that you were involved in

11 the centre you say this problem was becoming more acute,

12 just as you left around Easter time 1999, and from that

13 time to the closure of the centre in 2000 did you see

14 any improvement in this problem?

15 MS WATSON: Could you repeat that please?

16 MS GIBSON: You said that the problem was becoming more

17 acute just before you went off on sick leave which

18 I think was about March 1999. Is that correct?

19 MS WATSON: Yes.

20 MS GIBSON: You returned in July 1999. That is correct, is

21 it?

22 MS WATSON: Yes.

23 MS GIBSON: Were you then on sick leave again subsequently?

24 MS WATSON: No. Could I refer to my witness statement

25 because I believe that when I returned from sick leave

11



1 there was an awful lot of changes that had happened in

2 that short space of time. For example we more or less

3 had to cope with the new client index that was

4 introduced by Haringey Social Services to look at

5 statistics of the numbers of families coming to the

6 service in relation to age, gender, ethnicity, and again

7 we were more or less being expected to cope with the new

8 IT system that was introduced by Haringey Social

9 Services.

10 MS GIBSON: Is that the system called CIDS, client index?

11 MS WATSON: Yes, Client Index System, yes.

12 MS GIBSON: Do you remember whether when you returned, you

13 mentioned all these changes in IT but was there still

14 a problem in relation to referrals and the fact that the

15 centre was swamped with referrals, too many child

16 protection cases?

17 MS WATSON: Could you repeat the last bit?

18 MS GIBSON: You said that there was too much of an element

19 of child protection work and supervised contact, more

20 exceeding the one third specification in the agreement.

21 Was that problem being addressed when you got back from

22 sick leave or did it get worse until the centre closed?

23 MS WATSON: I believe that there was some efforts made to

24 address the problem again re-evaluating the Family

25 Support Panel.

12



1 MS GIBSON: Did you see any positive improvement come from

2 that re-evaluation?

3 MS WATSON: It was more or less impossible because soon

4 after we were told that our centres will be closed the

5 following March so therefore I could not foresee any

6 changes because of the fact that we were told that our

7 centres would be closed, so we more or less had to deal

8 with the volume of work that came to us during that

9 time.

10 MS GIBSON: Was it your view that the volume of work

11 continued to be excessive?

12 MS WATSON: Having been told that our centres were earmarked

13 for closure we were unable to more or less accept any

14 further referrals. We had to deal with the volume of

15 work that we had there and then.

16 MS GIBSON: How long did you have notification that the

17 centre was to be closed in March 2000, do you remember

18 when you were told about that?

19 MS WATSON: I cannot remember.

20 MS GIBSON: Looking at the systems for referral, you had

21 three routes into the centre: self referrals, referrals

22 by individual social workers and referrals that came

23 through the panel. How effectively did the panel system

24 work in making sure that you got appropriate type of

25 cases to deal with?

13



1 MS WATSON: The panel system of referral came from the

2 district and we were more or less told that we would be

3 having copies of the referrals before we attend a panel

4 meeting. On some occasions we were able to have access

5 to those files. On other occasions we were not, so we

6 were not clear of the volume of cases that were coming

7 to us until we actually attended that panel meeting.

8 Some of the cases were appropriate, other cases were not

9 appropriate. On occasions the inappropriate cases were

10 returned to the district.

11 MS GIBSON: What about cases coming through individual

12 social workers? Would those be appropriate referrals or

13 sometimes referrals outside the scope of the work that

14 you would do?

15 MS WATSON: I cannot remember accepting a referral from an

16 individual social worker because again it was part of

17 our policy and procedure that all referrals should come

18 from the panel. Having said that, there was an

19 investigation team that dealt with family support type

20 work where the focus would be on establishing

21 relationships with a child or parent or practical family

22 support work. That is my memory or my recollection of

23 accepting referrals from the district social worker.

24 MS GIBSON: Can we now have a look at the evaluation report

25 that was done on the centre in April 1999 and that

14



1 appears in volume 15 page 427. 427 is the first page.

2 Can you firstly say whether or not you have seen that

3 document before?

4 MS WATSON: I have, yes.

5 MS GIBSON: Did you read it at the time?

6 MS WATSON: I did, yes.

7 MS GIBSON: Can you go to page 431 in the bundle. If you go

8 to the heading "Overall Conclusion" and then go to the

9 third list of items under that heading, it speaks there

10 of tension and resistance around working with some of

11 the more difficult families referred through Social

12 Services, and then if we could go to 438, just looking

13 at the bottom paragraph there, that sets out that there

14 was some variation in opinion between the centres and

15 Social Services Department about whether the centres

16 also needed to provide a service for some of the what

17 are described as heavy end cases, so the more serious

18 cases, cases with a child protection element in them.

19 Does that accord with your view of what was going on at

20 the time?

21 MS WATSON: Is it the last paragraph on page 438 you are

22 talking about?

23 MS GIBSON: Yes, just take a little time to have a look

24 through that.

25 MS WATSON: Yes, I do believe that there has been some

15



1 variation. Again, I believe that our centres were quite

2 clear of our roles and expectations in relation to early

3 intervention and prevention and as I mentioned

4 previously we were more or less inundated with some very

5 heavy ended child protection work.

6 MS GIBSON: Is it in any way the position that your centre

7 felt that they should not be dealing with child

8 protection type cases at all and that you should simply

9 be dealing with family support work despite the

10 agreement that we have referred to earlier?

11 MS WATSON: We were a centre that was initially set up to

12 work with families in the local community to prevent

13 children suffering from significant harm, to prevent

14 family breakdown and to work towards reuniting families

15 rather than separation.

16 MS GIBSON: So is it the position that there was quite

17 a fundamental difference in your ethos and that of the

18 people who were using your service, the Social Services

19 Department, who were sending you the type of cases where

20 things were becoming or perhaps beyond the stage where

21 you could actually do anything to help?

22 MS WATSON: Could I refer back to our Service Level

23 Agreement and to my knowledge the ethos or the

24 principles to which we were working were not changed, so

25 we continued to work towards the Service Level

16



1 Agreement, where we were expected to manage one third of

2 statutory type childcare work.

3 MS GIBSON: You said earlier in your evidence your view was

4 that that one third limit was being exceeded.

5 MS WATSON: Yes.

6 MS GIBSON: Were you involved at all in doing assessments of

7 risk in cases where there were child protection issues?

8 MS WATSON: There were occasions when cases from the panel

9 came to us for set or focused piece of work which would

10 normally be under the term "family support" or

11 "parenting skills" and there were times when we have

12 conducted an initial assessment and we developed a care

13 plan and it became clear that cases needed much more

14 than the centre could have coped with. For example, you

15 know, we would have wanted the social worker concerned

16 to carry out an initial proper assessment of the

17 family's needs and when we have our network meeting we

18 would have been clear that this is a specific task for

19 us.

20 MS GIBSON: Looking at the system for referrals you said

21 that you were not aware of referrals coming through

22 individual social workers but in fact that is what

23 happened in this particular case.

24 MS WATSON: Yes.

25 MS GIBSON: Is it your contention that that was in some way

17



1 unusual?

2 MS WATSON: I cannot remember quite honestly. As I said

3 earlier, there were cases that came to us from

4 individual social workers but again these were for

5 specific pieces of family support work but not

6 underlying child protection heavy ended work. We would

7 more or less work with a social worker where they have

8 identified that a family might be in need of a parenting

9 programme and that was quite acceptable.

10 MS GIBSON: What was the quality of information like that

11 you would receive from Social Services within the

12 initial referrals?

13 MS WATSON: In some cases, in some individual cases the

14 quality of the information was quite clear but there

15 were occasions where the quality of information was

16 essentially lacking.

17 MS GIBSON: How regular an occurrence would that be?

18 MS WATSON: I cannot remember. More or less --

19 MS GIBSON: Was it something that happened frequently,

20 infrequently, just a general view?

21 MS WATSON: I would say infrequently.

22 MS GIBSON: What would the position be when you received

23 such a referral where you were not content that you had

24 sufficient information?

25 MS WATSON: Again, we would have a network meeting with the

18



1 referring social worker.

2 MS GIBSON: And how soon would that happen after receiving

3 the initial referral?

4 MS WATSON: Again, we would look at the content or the

5 information that came to us from that particular

6 referral. If there were worrying concerns we would more

7 or lessen ensure that a network meeting would take place

8 say within two or three days of us receiving the

9 referral or on some occasions five days. Again, it

10 depended on the information that came to us, whether or

11 not the case was of a serious nature or whether or not

12 we wanted more information to form a professional

13 opinion about the task that we should be undertaking

14 with this particular family.

15 MS GIBSON: Can you go to volume 27 page 217. That is your

16 referral process and time scales for that referral

17 process which sets out that there should be a standard

18 letter sent out to the family within five working days

19 of referral and a letter to referral including certain

20 information and then within six weeks of referral

21 a letter sent giving an appointment for an initial

22 assessment visit and so on. Were those time scales met

23 in all cases or did that start to deteriorate as the

24 volume of work that your centre was taking on increased?

25 MS WATSON: I would say that this timescale did not work,

19



1 did not function for us.

2 MS GIBSON: Again, from about what stage did that slippage

3 start to occur?

4 MS WATSON: I believe in early 1999 or just around the time

5 that I mentioned earlier when I went on my extended sick

6 leave.

7 MS GIBSON: Can you help with how long referrals were taking

8 to process from that point, what sort of delays were

9 occurring before a family was actually seen by the

10 centre from the point of initial referral?

11 MS WATSON: I believe that we would try to see a family

12 within five working days initially and when I say five

13 working days that would be by a letter to the referrer

14 and also to the family. Following on from that we would

15 make sure that an initial home visit assessment would be

16 booked.

17 MS GIBSON: Here on the time scales it was to be six weeks

18 for your initial assessment which I think would take

19 place often at the family home, but from the time you

20 are speaking about in early 1999 onwards did that

21 timescale start to become longer?

22 MS WATSON: I believe so.

23 MS GIBSON: Can you help with how much longer than the six

24 weeks?

25 MS WATSON: I cannot remember.

20



1 MS GIBSON: Were there any eligibility criteria that your

2 centre set out for the type of cases that they would

3 take on?

4 MS WATSON: Again, I would refer back to our Service Level

5 Agreement where we would have expected cases to be a --

6 one third of the cases would be statutory work. The

7 other aspect of our work which came from families

8 themselves, from other professionals such as health

9 visitors, schools, school nurses, those cases were much

10 more focused because again we would have been in

11 a position to complete our own assessment of these -- of

12 this family's needs, but in cases that came from the

13 district they were much more difficult and needed an

14 awful lot of planning and reviews and network meetings.

15 MS GIBSON: Did you consider that some of the cases that you

16 were sent from the district were beyond the capabilities

17 of the staff at your centre, they were too hardened

18 child protection type cases for you to be dealing with

19 appropriately?

20 MS WATSON: Yes, I would say so, yes.

21 MS GIBSON: Did you raise those concerns with your manager

22 Catriona Scott?

23 MS WATSON: Yes, we would have discussions about setting an

24 agenda so that we do not take on cases that came to us,

25 cases that were unacceptable, and again we would use the

21



1 panel referrals to refer cases back to the district.

2 MS GIBSON: Did you actually or your manager attend those

3 panel meetings when cases were allocated?

4 MS WATSON: We did, yes.

5 MS GIBSON: Who would attend, Catriona Scott, yourself, the

6 other practice managers?

7 MS WATSON: Yes, we had a rota.

8 MS GIBSON: So it would be one representative?

9 MS WATSON: One representative for each fortnightly session.

10 MS GIBSON: Was there a lot of debate at those meetings

11 about which cases should and should not be taken on?

12 MS WATSON: Yes.

13 MS GIBSON: Was the centre in any way under pressure to take

14 on inappropriate cases in your view?

15 MS WATSON: In some situations, yes.

16 MS GIBSON: You said that you would sometimes refer cases

17 back to Social Services.

18 MS WATSON: Yes.

19 MS GIBSON: So is it the position that you were clear that

20 that could be done if it was inappropriate?

21 MS WATSON: Yes, and it was done.

22 MS GIBSON: So it is right then that there was no sense of

23 compulsion on the centre to take on cases?

24 MS WATSON: In some situations we were more or less asked to

25 work with a specific case.

22



1 MS GIBSON: You say you were more or less asked to work with

2 a specific case but if Social Services were saying to

3 you "Okay, we have got this case and we want you to deal

4 with it", if you felt it was outside your expertise,

5 beyond the remit of your agreement, surely you could as

6 you have said use the process for sending it back to

7 Social Services and say, "This is not an appropriate

8 case for us to deal with"?

9 MS WATSON: Yes, and that is what we did.

10 MS GIBSON: But you are suggesting that sometimes you felt

11 that you had to take on cases. Can you explain why that

12 was?

13 MS WATSON: When the information given was not quite clear

14 we would work with that particular case with the

15 expectation that yes it would fit our eligibility

16 criteria but in situations once we started to do

17 a specific piece of work we became aware that that case

18 did not belong, did not fit the criteria for the Family

19 Centre.

20 MS GIBSON: Was that simply as a result of what you

21 discovered through your work?

22 MS WATSON: Through our work.

23 MS GIBSON: Or it was the case that you were not getting the

24 full picture from Social Services?

25 MS WATSON: It was a case where we were not getting the full

23



1 picture from Social Services but these issues came up as

2 soon as we started to work with the family and we

3 developed a care plan, the issue came to us that it was

4 clear that that case did not belong, did not fit the

5 criteria for our family support work.

6 MS GIBSON: Can you summarise what type of cases those would

7 tend to be?

8 MS WATSON: Cases that have been worked with for a number of

9 years and they were clear that families perhaps needed

10 a more therapeutic setting rather than a structured

11 programme of parenting skills or direct work with

12 a child or one to one work with a parent.

13 MS GIBSON: So once you had started work on this type of

14 case and met with the family and perhaps had a few

15 sessions with them and you then found out that they were

16 not an appropriate referral for your centre, would you

17 simply continue to work with them for the duration of

18 the course that you planned for them or would you send

19 the case back?

20 MS WATSON: Again in consultation with my manager we would

21 have another meeting and the case would be handed back

22 to the district for them to complete their specific

23 tasks that we had identified and then once that piece of

24 work is completed perhaps it would return to us to

25 complete that specific task.

24



1 MS GIBSON: I do not understand how the case would be

2 referred back to you if you had taken the decision it

3 was not a case that you could deal with.

4 MS WATSON: There were occasions when a case wanted

5 therapeutic support for a parent or a child. Once that

6 programme was completed we would have had another review

7 and we would take on the case once that specific piece

8 of work was completed. It has happened not on many

9 occasions but there was perhaps one occasion when that

10 did happen.

11 MS GIBSON: Looking at what would happen at panel meetings,

12 you have described how you could end up with cases which

13 you felt were inappropriate for you. What system was in

14 place to check that you had all the relevant information

15 from Social Services to enable you to determine before

16 taking on the case whether it was appropriate or not?

17 MS WATSON: There was a system whereby the referrals from

18 the panel would come to our centre before a panel

19 meeting. When that system worked we were in a position

20 to go through those files or those cases, look through

21 the ones that were appropriate for our centre. The ones

22 that were inappropriate would have been returned to the

23 district. There were occasions when we did not receive

24 those referrals on time, so therefore we would go to the

25 panel without that relevant information. However, the

25



1 meetings that I attended I made sure that I can only

2 accommodate or accept the referrals that were

3 appropriate to our centre.

4 MS GIBSON: You say that you would receive files on the

5 cases?

6 MS WATSON: In the post, yes.

7 MS GIBSON: So that would be the social services file on the

8 case you would have to look through?

9 MS WATSON: Yes.

10 MS GIBSON: Would those files be read routinely from cover

11 to cover before deciding whether to take the case on?

12 MS WATSON: It was a basic panel referral form outlining the

13 family's name, address, number of siblings in the family

14 and a care plan from Social Services with a specific

15 task for us.

16 MS GIBSON: So you did not receive the whole --

17 MS WATSON: No, just the family support referral form.

18 MS GIBSON: When you met at the panel, would the social

19 worker, if it was a child protection case, who was

20 allocated to the child deal with or give you a briefing

21 on what the case was about?

22 MS WATSON: Yes, but we would have already made a decision

23 in our management group that this case was not

24 appropriate for us.

25 MS GIBSON: From looking just at the referral?

26



1 MS WATSON: From going through the referral and the

2 information. If there was any other information that

3 was needed from the panel, from the referral panel, then

4 again we could look at that referral but if we were

5 quite clear that the information given, if it was not

6 appropriate for our service, it would have been

7 returned.

8 MS GIBSON: How did it come about that on occasions you

9 would end up with cases that were inappropriate if you

10 had referrals forms from Social Services setting out the

11 background and you had panel meetings where you would

12 speak with the allocated social worker about what the

13 case was about?

14 MS WATSON: Could you repeat the question?

15 MS GIBSON: How would it come about that you would end up

16 with inappropriate cases if you had that system in

17 place? Is it the position that the information you

18 received was not accurate?

19 MS WATSON: Was not accurate, yes.

20 MS GIBSON: What was done to address that?

21 MS WATSON: Again, the panel, the Family Support Panel

22 I believe perhaps, I am not quite sure of the time but

23 it was in the process of re-evaluation to look at what

24 was working and what was not working.

25 MS GIBSON: And the system from then was that you as

27



1 a Practice Manager would take the cases from the panel

2 meeting and allocate those to the family officers who

3 worked under your management, is that right?

4 MS WATSON: All cases that came from the panel were

5 discussed at our managers' meeting and we would look at

6 what the issues were and delegate specific pieces of

7 work to the practice managers present and it was up to

8 the practice managers to take those cases back to

9 individual caseworkers.

10 MS GIBSON: What supervision would there be of those

11 individual workers by yourself, the six workers who were

12 under your control?

13 MS WATSON: We would have supervision fortnightly and the

14 reason for that was it was part of our policy that all

15 family support officers received regular supervision.

16 MS GIBSON: And what would that supervision consist of?

17 MS WATSON: Looking at the case load management, any issues

18 to do with difficult cases, for the professional

19 development of the worker, any issues to do with the

20 actual process of us managing our centre.

21 MS GIBSON: Is it the position that the person that you were

22 supervising would select the cases that they brought to

23 you?

24 MS WATSON: Yes.

25 MS GIBSON: So they would take cases they felt to be

28



1 difficult?

2 MS WATSON: All cases were met with in supervision. My

3 policy was that if a family support officer had six or

4 12 cases I would more or less make sure that she brings

5 six cases to me in one supervision and the following six

6 cases in the next supervision so that each case would be

7 seen or be supervised once per month.

8 MS GIBSON: I see and what records would you keep to track

9 the progress of cases from referral through to the

10 initial assessment of the case through to the case

11 actually coming into the centre for work?

12 MS WATSON: All supervision on cases were recorded. I used

13 to keep a copy in my supervision folder and a copy of

14 the case discussed would be placed on the family's file.

15 MS GIBSON: Can you have a look now at what happened in

16 relation to Victoria's case. Volume 7, we see the

17 referral that you received from Social Services, page 1.

18 Do you have a copy of the referral there?

19 MS WATSON: Yes, I have.

20 MS GIBSON: That is the standard referral form that you were

21 speaking of earlier, I think.

22 MS WATSON: Yes.

23 MS GIBSON: Can you confirm who has filled in this initial

24 referral form?

25 MS WATSON: From the recording it was taken by A, who at the

29



1 time was a Family Duty Support Officer.

2 MS GIBSON: Can you confirm what the name of that person is,

3 A?

4 MS WATSON: Anna Ieronnimou.

5 MS GIBSON: That sets out the reason for the referral and

6 then at "Source of Request" on page 1, the initials LAW

7 appear. What do you understand by that?

8 MS WATSON: I believe that the referrer's name was

9 Barry Almedia Almedia, Practice Manager from North

10 Tottenham District in the Advice and Assessment Team.

11 MS GIBSON: Yes, but that does not look to be a reference to

12 him.

13 MS WATSON: No.

14 MS GIBSON: Do you understand that to be a reference to

15 Lisa Arthurworrey, was that a common shorthand you were

16 using?

17 MS WATSON: I am not sure quite honestly.

18 MS GIBSON: You do not understand what that means?

19 MS WATSON: No.

20 MS GIBSON: Just looking through the reason for referral,

21 you said that this is a type of referral where you would

22 want to seek further information. Why would that be?

23 MS WATSON: Because there was not enough evidence to suggest

24 whether or not this case was for our Family Centre.

25 Secondly we have here a number of indicators suggesting

30



1 that an awful lot more information was required before

2 we actually start to do any kind of planning with this

3 case.

4 MS GIBSON: Can you assist with what those indicators were

5 and what further information you would have wanted to

6 receive from Social Services?

7 MS WATSON: Could I just start with the first recording.

8 "Family came to England a couple of months ago."

9 MS GIBSON: Yes.

10 MS WATSON: Again, I would want information about whether or

11 not the family is aware of the system -- of the welfare

12 system to support children in Britain. The referral

13 goes on to say that she is not registered with a school.

14 Again, that is worrying, in relation to her age. The

15 family was referred to North Middlesex. NMT means North

16 Middlesex Hospital and the hospital had referred the

17 family to Social Services.

18 MS GIBSON: What did that indicate to you and what further

19 information would you have wanted in that regard?

20 MS WATSON: We would have wanted more information of why she

21 was referred to the hospital, what the issues were for

22 the hospital and also for social services. There is

23 also mention of treated for scabies. Again, from

24 a family support, Family Centre perspective we would

25 have wanted more information about her natural

31



1 surroundings because if she is being discharged from

2 hospital we would want a fair picture of what the

3 prognosis was for her, why she was in hospital, and to

4 get a general feel of what is happening to this child in

5 her physical environment.

6 Certainly there were issues around not washing and

7 dressing appropriately and again for someone coming to

8 Britain and not having a knowledge of the appropriate

9 dress code, that was worrying. Sometimes she had no

10 underwear. Again, those are indicators of a child that

11 was desperately in need. Displaying behaviour problems

12 and they refer to that no home visit was made.

13 I believe that we would have wanted an awful lot more

14 information to form our professional judgment before we

15 actually meet with this family because then we would

16 have as much evidence as possible from which to base our

17 assessment to work with this family.

18 MS GIBSON: Yes. It says that Anna is said to seem anxious

19 when mother is around. Again is that something that

20 would have caused you concern?

21 MS WATSON: That would, yes.

22 MS GIBSON: And the request from social services is then

23 specified with help, advice on health and hygiene and

24 managing Anna's developmental needs and dealing with the

25 interaction between mother and child. Is that the kind

32



1 of work that your centre would deal with, would that be

2 appropriate work for you to do, health, hygiene

3 assistance?

4 MS WATSON: Yes.

5 MS GIBSON: Helping with the mother perhaps to play better

6 with the child?

7 MS WATSON: Yes.

8 MS GIBSON: Engage with the child?

9 MS WATSON: Yes.

10 MS GIBSON: In that sense is it correct that the referral is

11 appropriate?

12 MS WATSON: It is appropriate in the sense that we were not

13 given enough information. But we have taken on cases in

14 the past where we have dealt with developmental problems

15 with a child and a parent, poor hygiene.

16 MS GIBSON: So these are issues that you could deal with.

17 Your difficulty is that this referral raises a lot of

18 questions.

19 MS WATSON: Yes.

20 MS GIBSON: Is that in summary what you are saying?

21 MS WATSON: Yes.

22 MS GIBSON: Is it the position that some of those questions

23 that you have just gone through, I think you said

24 before, raised some quite serious concerns about what

25 this case was about?

33



1 MS WATSON: Yes.

2 MS GIBSON: Is it the position that some of those matters

3 may be possible indicators of abuse that you would need

4 to clarify with social services?

5 MS WATSON: Most possibly, yes.

6 MS GIBSON: So all in all would you agree quite a worrying

7 referral and something that needed to be checked out

8 promptly?

9 MS WATSON: Yes, I would say.

10 MS GIBSON: You allocated that referral to Sylvia Henry to

11 deal with at the managers' meeting on 13th August, is

12 that correct?

13 MS WATSON: Yes. I would say that it was a discussion and

14 it was not allocated because Sylvia and I are both

15 practice managers.

16 MS GIBSON: So you are the same rank?

17 MS WATSON: Yes, so it is not matter of I am allocating it

18 to her, it was more -- I cannot remember how it was

19 passed to Sylvia but I would not be in a position to

20 allocate a case to Sylvia.

21 MS GIBSON: Do you actually recall from memory dealing with

22 this case or are you now dealing in your evidence with

23 it looking back at the records and making assumptions

24 about what must have happened?

25 MS WATSON: I do not recall dealing with this case.

34



1 MS GIBSON: Just dealing with when the case was actually

2 actioned or when Sylvia Henry agreed to take it on, you

3 have now mentioned that we have minutes of a managers'

4 meeting which took place on 6th August which was the day

5 that you held a party in the centre, so in fact we know

6 that despite the party there was a meeting. Can you

7 explain why this referral which came in on 5th August

8 was not allocated at that 6th August managers' meeting?

9 MS WATSON: I do not remember. I do not remember.

10 MS GIBSON: Would there be reference in the minutes to

11 whether or not allocation of cases had gone on? Perhaps

12 it would help if we looked at the minutes at

13 26B/087.501. Do you have those minutes there? Would

14 you just look through the minutes. You see there that

15 Helena was present, Catriona Scott and yourself.

16 MS WATSON: Yes.

17 MS GIBSON: And various items are mentioned but there is no

18 mention of any actual case allocations going on. Would

19 that have appeared in the minutes if that had taken

20 place?

21 MS WATSON: It would have.

22 MS GIBSON: So is it the position that this was a shorter

23 meeting than normal, it was not a usual managers'

24 meeting perhaps because of the party later that day?

25 MS WATSON: I cannot remember, that is the honest truth.

35



1 MS GIBSON: Can we go back now to volume 7, I do not know

2 whether you still have that with you. Perhaps we could

3 take away the file with the minutes and return to

4 volume 7. If you could go to page 3 now in volume 7, do

5 you have that?

6 MS WATSON: I have.

7 MS GIBSON: You see there the initial assessment has been

8 identified, health and safety issues which need checking

9 out. "Case needs to be actioned ASAP." Whose writing

10 is this?

11 MS WATSON: I confirm it is my writing.

12 MS GIBSON: So although Sylvia Henry is dealing with the

13 case, you have written this part in. Can you explain

14 why that is?

15 MS WATSON: You know, managers' meeting we took turns in

16 discussing the cases that came to us so I believe I was

17 the manager responsible for going through all the cases

18 that were in our referral process. We discussed cases

19 together and we would record accordingly.

20 MS GIBSON: By ASAP what would you mean, how swift would

21 that action be?

22 MS WATSON: Going back to the information given by the

23 referrer, I would have expected the case to be dealt

24 with within five working days or perhaps on a day or two

25 after our -- after we had our managers' meeting.

36



1 MS GIBSON: Five days would be the normal timescale if you

2 were working to your set times, which we have already

3 gone through, but given that you have put that this

4 particular case needs to be dealt with ASAP, that

5 suggests a greater degree of urgency.

6 MS WATSON: Yes, and ASAP is the term used or has been used

7 by the Family Centre to make sure that difficult cases

8 are worked on within an agreed timescale.

9 MS GIBSON: So it is right in this situation that as you

10 have already said, going through the referral form, this

11 is a case about which there were indicators of concern

12 to you that needed clarification, and would you agree

13 this was just on the basis of what you had in the

14 referral form looking like a fairly serious sort of case

15 that needed to be sorted out quickly?

16 MS WATSON: Quickly, yes.

17 MS GIBSON: Then just looking below that: "Telephone call,

18 family now moved out of the borough and case closed."

19 Is that in your handwriting again?

20 MS WATSON: No, it is not.

21 MS GIBSON: Can we now look at the document that appears at

22 page 11 in that bundle, a list of families referred to

23 the centre, is that correct?

24 MS WATSON: Yes, it is correct.

25 MS GIBSON: Is that any sort of system for tracking cases or

37



1 is that simply a record of referrals?

2 MS WATSON: It is a system for tracking cases and a system

3 for recording referrals that come to the centre.

4 MS GIBSON: How did that system work?

5 MS WATSON: It worked quite well and again it make us focus

6 on the volume of the cases that were coming to us.

7 MS GIBSON: Just looking at that, what would you do to

8 review cases and to check progress on cases?

9 MS WATSON: Could you repeat that please?

10 MS GIBSON: I want to understand how that system worked for

11 making sure that referrals that you had taken on were

12 processed appropriately.

13 MS WATSON: We would more or less record all referrals when

14 we met as a management group. Cases that were allocated

15 to myself or to Sylvia were dealt with. I had developed

16 a system whereby cases that I took on I made sure that

17 the date that the case came from my records was taken on

18 by myself, whether or not it required an initial

19 assessment, which is a home visit, whether or not it

20 required a network meeting with the social worker who

21 made the referral, and from there we were able to more

22 or less record the length of time cases were referred to

23 us so that we were more or less working towards our

24 performance indicators in making sure that cases are not

25 left over a long period of time, but that cases are

38



1 dealt with accordingly.

2 MS GIBSON: Would there be any system for highlighting cases

3 within that, particularly a case like this where action

4 had to be taken as soon as possible?

5 MS WATSON: Yes, I believe that we had a system to more or

6 less identify whether or not a case is a high priority

7 or whether or not it needs -- but we did have a system

8 to more or less highlight cases that needed to be dealt

9 with urgently or whether or not that case is of a low

10 priority.

11 MS GIBSON: It seems though, does it not, that this system

12 did not work in this particular case?

13 MS WATSON: No, it did not.

14 MS GIBSON: Do you accept that that is a serious defect in

15 the centre's handling of Victoria's case?

16 MS WATSON: Yes, I would.

17 MS GIBSON: I think as you have just outlined from the

18 referral you had serious concerns about this case.

19 MS WATSON: Yes.

20 MS GIBSON: You needed more information but that information

21 was not sought, and it is the position, is it not, that

22 it is possible that if the centre had taken on this

23 referral and actioned it promptly and done some work

24 with the family, that some of the problems that were

25 going on with Kouao and Manning's care of Victoria could

39



1 have been identified?

2 MS WATSON: Yes, I do believe, yes.

3 MS GIBSON: And do you agree that there is also a problem

4 that if Social Services think that the Family Centre has

5 taken on the case, that perhaps that will allow them to

6 have a false sense of security that there is something

7 happening on the case and therefore they can perhaps sit

8 back a little bit?

9 MS WATSON: I would say that once a case fitting Victoria's

10 situation had come to us we would not -- we would make

11 sure that Social Services showed a responsibility in

12 working through the process, because clearly this case

13 was a heavy ended child protection case and as a Family

14 Centre we would not be working within the remit of heavy

15 ended child protection cases.

16 MS GIBSON: Yes, but at the time on the referral you had

17 I mean that is what we know subsequently about the case.

18 On the referral you just had the information about

19 health and hygiene issues, albeit reference to

20 a hospital admission that as you have said needed

21 further clarification.

22 MS WATSON: Yes.

23 MS GIBSON: Can you help at all with when the telephone call

24 was received from Social Services at page 3 of that

25 bundle? Perhaps it is a question that is more

40



1 appropriate for Sylvia Henry because she dealt with

2 that. But I just wondered if you can assist in any way.

3 There is no dating of that.

4 MS WATSON: Did you say page 3 of this bundle?

5 MS GIBSON: Yes, volume 7 page 3. We have looked at that

6 before, where there was a reference to a telephone call

7 from Social Services saying that the family moved out of

8 the area. Were you aware of that telephone call or in

9 any way involved with it?

10 MS WATSON: No, I was not aware of it.

11 MS GIBSON: So you cannot help in any respect about the

12 timing of that entry?

13 MS WATSON: No.

14 MS GIBSON: Did you have any further discussions about this

15 case with anyone?

16 MS WATSON: No.

17 MS GIBSON: Was there any sense in which Social Services, or

18 was the perception of the centre that Social Services

19 would use your service to deal with their backlog of

20 work and cases?

21 MS WATSON: Could you more or less --

22 MS GIBSON: There is reference in the evaluation report to

23 the fact that there were tensions around the type of

24 cases that were taken on and there is mention, perhaps

25 we do not need to go to it but volume 15 page 439, of

41



1 one Social Services Department team leader describing

2 the benefit of referrals to your centre in terms of

3 breathing space on a case. Did you feel at times that

4 Social Services used your centre to give them breathing

5 space to deal with the massive volume of work that they

6 had?

7 MS WATSON: Yes, I would say so, yes.

8 MS GIBSON: Thank you very much.

9 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you Ms Gibson. Mr Downey please.

10 Ms Watson, Mr Downey will ask you some questions now.

11 Mr Downey, you have not been before us before. Perhaps

12 I should help by saying that you have up to 30 minutes

13 if you want to take 30 minutes.

14 MR DOWNEY: I can probably deal with the witness much

15 quicker than 30 minutes.

16 THE CHAIRMAN: That is fine.

17 MR DOWNEY: I have a couple of questions for the witness and

18 then perhaps I can provide some clarification of the

19 documentation to the Panel, the points which I am aware

20 of on the documentation which Counsel to the Inquiry may

21 not be.

22 Ms Watson, could I please take you to paragraphs 5

23 and 6 of your supplementary witness statement, that is

24 page 156.502 of bundle 3. Do you have that document?

25 MS WATSON: Yes.

42



1 MR DOWNEY: Would you please read paragraphs 5 and 6 of your

2 witness statement?

3 MS WATSON: "Often referrals were not properly dealt with by

4 the referring agency. Often assessments had not been

5 carried out when cases were referred to the Family

6 Centres. This was inconsistent with the aim of the

7 Family Centres which were designed to facilitate

8 specific aspects of cases which had an allocated social

9 worker in Haringey Social Services Department.

10 "6. The Family Centres had become used for

11 inappropriate referrals many of which were outside the

12 scope of family support."

13 MR DOWNEY: Perhaps I can stop you there. When you gave

14 evidence to the Inquiry earlier this morning you said

15 that it was infrequently that insufficient information

16 had been provided. Do you want to revisit that evidence

17 in the light of paragraphs 5 and 6 of your witness

18 statement?

19 MS WATSON: Yes, I would more or less confirm the statement

20 that I have written here, that cases were -- cases

21 referred to the Family Centres were not properly

22 assessed before we became involved with that particular

23 case or family.

24 MR DOWNEY: So contrary to the evidence that you gave to the

25 Inquiry this morning you actually feel that it was often

43



1 that inadequate information was given in referrals to

2 the Family Centres?

3 MS WATSON: Yes, I would say often.

4 MR DOWNEY: Just one further question Ms Watson. Could

5 I take you to volume 7, page 3. Do you have that

6 document?

7 MS WATSON: Yes.

8 MR DOWNEY: I just have one question about your entry dated

9 13th August 1999. The final section of your entry reads

10 that the case needs to be "actioned ASAP". When you

11 gave evidence to the Inquiry this morning you used the

12 words "dealt with ASAP." Could you clarify for the

13 purposes of the Panel exactly what you mean by

14 "actioned" or "dealt with"?

15 MS WATSON: In front of me in my records it is stated or

16 states: "Initial assessment identified. Some health and

17 safety issues identified and need checking out with the

18 social worker and North Middlesex Hospital." What

19 I meant is that these are specific tasks that were

20 needed, that needed to be dealt with.

21 MR DOWNEY: You are not answering the question. What

22 I actually mean is what do you mean by "actioned", what

23 do you mean by "dealt with"? Do you mean that a visit

24 to the family should have taken place ASAP, which

25 I think you said would be within five working days, or

44



1 do you mean that further information should be obtained

2 ASAP in order that whoever has the file at the Family

3 Centre is in a position to make a judgment as to exactly

4 what needs to be done with this referral?

5 MS WATSON: What I meant here was that the health and safety

6 issues raised in the referral needed to be -- further

7 information was needed from the social worker and also

8 from North Middlesex Hospital.

9 MR DOWNEY: Thank you, if you remain there for a moment.

10 Sir, there are perhaps a couple of points which

11 I should raise which may assist the Panel when

12 considering the evidence that has been given this

13 morning. If I could just refer you to page 1 of

14 bundle 7, that is the referral form to the Family

15 Centres, in Ms Watson's evidence there was a question as

16 to where it says perhaps two-thirds of the way down the

17 page: "Source of request, name and role of referrer" who

18 is R and who is LAW.

19 I understand that the original documentation is

20 lost. The documentation was anonymised for the purposes

21 of the NSPCC's Part 8 review. In the Part 8 review R,

22 the referrer, is Barry Almedia and obviously LAW is

23 Lisa Arthurworrey.

24 A second point which perhaps the NSPCC should raise

25 in order to assist the Panel is on page 3 of volume 7

45



1 Ms Watson was asked about the telephone call entry which

2 is underneath the entry that we have just been

3 discussing. Once again this document was anonymised for

4 the purposes of the Part 8 review and the original is

5 lost. In the Part 8 review again R, which you will see

6 in the left-hand column of that document, is the

7 referrer.

8 When Ms Gibson, Counsel to the Inquiry, was asking

9 the witness about this telephone call she suggested or

10 it was perhaps suggested that the call was made by

11 Barry Almedia to the Family Centres. I think we will

12 hear in evidence later that the person who made that

13 call, Sylvia Henry, actually feels that it was a call

14 made by her to Mr Almedia, although again this is

15 something that we will never know because the original

16 document is no longer in existence.

17 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much Mr Downey. Just before

18 you go --

19 MS GIBSON: I was just going to mention that this is

20 obviously concerning because we have not had any prior

21 notice of these matters and really it is not appropriate

22 for Mr Downey to give evidence on these points. Perhaps

23 one of the subsequent witnesses will clarify it but

24 obviously this comes as a surprise to us. We did not

25 know that the original document had been lost.

46



1 THE CHAIRMAN: No, indeed and perhaps that is something that

2 we can pick up later on because I do not know whether

3 you know Mr Downey that you will not be the first person

4 to have come before the Inquiry to refer to lost

5 documents and so it is quite an important issue but

6 perhaps we can pick it up later on.

7 Ms Watson just a few points to help me please, if

8 you will. You said at the beginning of your evidence

9 when Ms Gibson was asking you questions that you fully

10 understood the Service Level Agreement between the NSPCC

11 and the authorities that had reached an agreement with

12 the NSPCC, the Health Authority, Social Services and

13 that there was a clear purpose for the centre. Did

14 I understand that right?

15 MS WATSON: Yes.

16 THE CHAIRMAN: Could you look at paragraph 9 of your

17 statement because if I read paragraph 9 correctly what

18 you say is:

19 "As there was no real criteria for where and when

20 referrals came from there was a greater expectation for

21 the centres to offer and deliver services it could not

22 provide and were outside the experience of the work of

23 the Family Centres."

24 I cannot reconcile the fact that there was a clear

25 Service Agreement with your statement that says there

47



1 was no control overall of this, so could you help me

2 please?

3 MS WATSON: Could I just reflect on what I have written

4 here?

5 THE CHAIRMAN: Of course.

6 MS WATSON: I would more or less reiterate that initially we

7 were adhering to the Service Level Agreement but

8 somewhere along the line the process got lost.

9 THE CHAIRMAN: So the Service Level Agreement was irrelevant

10 in day by day practice?

11 MS WATSON: In practice, yes.

12 THE CHAIRMAN: You say in paragraph 13 that your supervisory

13 relationship had broken down. That is not a matter for

14 the Inquiry as such but it is a matter for the Inquiry

15 as to whether or not it affected the work with respect

16 to Victoria. Is there something you would like to say

17 about that?

18 MS WATSON: I believe this took place soon after I returned

19 to work from sick leave and there were times when I was

20 not meeting as frequently with my supervisor as we had

21 agreed in our supervisory contract. I would more or

22 less argue that because of the changes that had taken

23 place over -- so rapidly, I should say, that the

24 supervisory process was more or less not as forthcoming

25 as it was previously.

48



1 THE CHAIRMAN: Thank you. Ms Gibson asked you about the 120

2 families that was part of the agreement, the numbers,

3 and a third being child protection. Could you just give

4 me some rough idea whether or not, when Victoria was

5 referred to the centre, the centre would be working with

6 four families or substantially more families? I do not

7 expect you to be able to tell me exactly the number but

8 was in fact it running down or were the numbers going

9 up?

10 MS WATSON: I would say that the families, the numbers were

11 going up.

12 THE CHAIRMAN: So from your experience it is likely that the

13 number of families that you were working with at that

14 time was greater than the 120 or about the 120?

15 MS WATSON: I cannot remember. I cannot give an exact

16 figure.

17 THE CHAIRMAN: You have just heard that some papers are

18 lost. From your experience where were files kept in the

19 centre? How were they maintained?

20 MS WATSON: We had a system where all files were locked in

21 filing cabinets. All cases that were active were kept

22 in separate case -- in separate filing cabinets from the

23 cases that we worked on previously and were closed.

24 THE CHAIRMAN: So from your point of view this was a secure

25 system?

49



1 MS WATSON: I would say it was secure.

2 THE CHAIRMAN: You said that you had concerns about the

3 referral when Ms Gibson was asking you questions and

4 that you felt that a great deal more information was

5 needed, very important information was needed about

6 Victoria.

7 MS WATSON: Yes.

8 THE CHAIRMAN: Why could not you get that information by

9 arranging to meet with Victoria and Kouao? Why was it

10 not possible for the Family Centre then and there to

11 make arrangements to get that information?

12 MS WATSON: Could I refer back to -- I am not sure what

13 document it is but it is right here in front of me,

14 07/003.

15 THE CHAIRMAN: Yes.

16 MS WATSON: And again from my recording an initial

17 assessment means that a home visit to the family was

18 required.

19 THE CHAIRMAN: Yes. Sorry, I want to understand. Were you

20 saying in your evidence, I was not clear about this so

21 do help me if you can, that the centre was going to get

22 this information by means of a home visit or an office

23 visit or were you saying that Social Services had to get

24 this information?

25 MS WATSON: I am saying that it was part of our policy, when

50



1 we received inappropriate referrals, we would have

2 wanted an awful lot more information than what was given

3 in this particular case, and that would not deter us

4 from carrying out an initial -- an assessment in the

5 family's home.

6 THE CHAIRMAN: Right. So just so that I am absolutely

7 plain, the information that you rightly thought that you

8 needed, information that I fully understand was

9 necessary, it was your expectation that that would be

10 got from the centre arranging a home visit?

11 MS WATSON: Yes, or perhaps from -- let me be clear.

12 THE CHAIRMAN: Please.

13 MS WATSON: What I am saying is that we would have carried

14 out an initial assessment of this family's needs and

15 given the seriousness of the information given in this

16 referral form it would have been complementary to the

17 information that we would have wanted from the allocated

18 social worker and certainly from North Middlesex

19 Hospital.

20 THE CHAIRMAN: Yes, absolutely, so actually it would have

21 been a sort of three pronged attack if I can put it this

22 way, to put it mildly, or perhaps less than mildly, more

23 than mildly. What you would have done you would have

24 gone back to the Social Services to say, "Could you let

25 us have more information?" You would have gone to the