Shoesmith should have done the decent thing and resigned before she was booted out. Whilst not personally responsible for the death of Baby Peter, she presided over a social service department which was a shambles, and the buck always stops at the top! For her to bellyache because procedurally her sacking should have been done better, does her no credit. Baby Peter suffered all his 17 months of life, so her pain is nothing compared with that.

Whilst I completely agree that the buck stops with Shoesmith with regards responsibility over that particular Social Work Dept and she SHOULD have been sacked, I also agree with Boudi that the ultimate responsibilty for this poor wee soul's hellish time on this earth was his "parents"......I use "" because they didn't fulfill that role at ALL!!

But I don't have any faith in ANY Social Work Dept full stop....granted there will be decent Social Workers out there somewhere.....just never come across any! Any of the ones I know are either bampots or extremely dangerous!! The ones in charge of Baby P's case certainly seem to fall under the latter category!! And will lessons ultimately be learned? Sadly, probably not(!)