Ofsted 'covered up Baby P scandal'

Neil Millard12 April 2012

A whistleblower has accused Ofsted of destroying documents which could have proved its officials tried to cover up the Baby P scandal.

The agency has been criticised for deleting draft inspection reports which gave Haringey council highly complimentary ratings.

If news of the case had not been made public, the drafts would have been approved.

But following the controversy surrounding the death of Baby Peter, they were scrapped and rewritten to condemn the council's protection of children as "inconsistent" and "inadequate overall". They were published last December.

Sharon Shoesmith, the former director of Haringey's children's services, was sacked on the orders of Children's Secretary Ed Balls.

Her lawyers have requested the documents as she pursues a wrongful dismissal case.

She claims the Ofsted report was made much more critical after pressure from Mr Balls and Ofsted chief inspector Christine Gilbert.

Tory children's spokesman Tim Loughton said there was clear evidence of a cover-up.

He said: "This calls into question the integrity of the way Ofsted has been operating. Ed Balls needs to explain exactly what discussions he had with Ofsted behind the scenes."

Ofsted said it was right to scrap the initial draft of Haringey's annual performance assessment (APA) report.

A spokesman for the watchdog said there were two reasons why the earlier draft was scrapped. "Firstly some of the data provided by Haringey was clearly false."

Secondly, Ofsted's emergency inspection of Haringey, ordered by Mr Balls after the Baby P trial concluded, uncovered child protection issues which were "so significant that there was no question that they would impact on the final APA judgement".

"It is our firm belief that this material has no relevance in the action currently before the court, to suggest otherwise is nothing more than a red herring."

Peter Connelly died on 3 August 2007 aged 17 months after horrific abuse at home resulting in at least 50 injuries.

He was allowed to die despite being seen 60 times by council and NHS staff.

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