Back to the Oxfordshire County Council report this evening. I was struck by things I hadn’t noticed or noted in the list of factual inaccuracies I was forced to produce the other weekend.  

Reading the Methodology section alone makes me feel like a nest (nest?) of spiders eggs are about to hatch and burst through my skin. Interviews were apparently conducted with the;

Area Service Manager

Operations Manager

Team Manager

Senior Practitioner

Care Manager

Clinical Specialist Occupational Therapist

Service Manager, Children with Disabilities

Team Manager, Children with Disabilities

LB’s teacher

LB’s teacher obviously knew him well. The Care Manager met LB and me a handful of times (3?) across ten months or so.  I met the Operations Manager once after LB was admitted to STATT. The rest? I dunno. Just job titles. That give certain people the power to produce words/claims about what happened. Some personally named, some not.

I wonder how long these ‘interviews’ were. What was asked? How much careful probing was done? Were they recorded or were notes jotted down? Were they face to face or over the phone/email? What could so many of these people contribute to any understanding of what happened to LB? Why weren’t we involved at any point?

As if this flimsy engagement wasn’t enough for someone (anyone) with any sense at OCC to recognise that this ‘independent review’ was clearly, seriously flawed, there’s also a handy list of ‘Other staff noted in this report but not interviewed‘. This includes the psychiatrist who was apparently contacted by the Team Manager (who?) on behalf of the Independent Consultant. And various other staff members who had either left OCC or were not available for interview (in the eight months the review took to produce).

What a dogs dinner of a report.

And how often are sneaky little investigations like this conducted and circulated within and beyond local authorities/NHS Foundation Trusts without families’ knowledge?

Just chilling.