A CHILD who suffered a fractured skull was not given adequate protection by an ‘under-pressure’ Lancashire County Council social work team, a professional watchdog has ruled.

Diane Constance Cleasby, the manager of the integrated support and assessment team, has now been suspended for one year after a string of failings, some involving two colleagues, were identified before the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC).

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The injured child was placed back with his grandparents, who may have actually caused the skull fracture, and care proceedings were not started until months later, the HCPC hearing was told.

Cleasby and social worker Laura Yates were also censured over the case of a family where child pornography was said to have been found on a home computer after a tip-off, the HCPC’s conduct and competence committee.

Later it was found, during a court hearing, that two children in the family had been abused by their father. The county council was subsequently criticised for failing to protect the ‘vulnerable’ youngsters.

Yates was also found to have put a child who was said to have been sexually abused by a sibling at risk, the committee, sitting in Manchester, was told.

She asked a family support officer, not a qualified social worker, to investigate rather than her, for which the panel gave her a 12-month caution.

The watchdog heard that, at the time, between 2009 and 2011, the social work team was ‘over-stretched and under-resourced’ and often reliant on newly-qualified staff.

Another social worker, Nighat Rafiq, from the Blackburn area, was found guilty of misconduct for not taking adequate steps to probe a child with ‘fingertip’ bruising or identify potential serious risks of a child being born to a couple with a history of cannabis abuse.

The panel ruled that, as she had shown insight into her failings and undertaken safeguarding training, her fitness to practice was not impaired and no further action would be taken.

But Cleasby, from Burnley, who did not appear at the HCPC hearing, was heavily criticised by the three-strong panel, which heard evidence from Yates and Rafiq, and professional assessors, back in January.

Announcing her suspension, panel chairman Sarah Baalham said: “A number of children from different families were left without adequate safeguards. These are serious omissions which fell far short of what is expected of a registered social worker in the circumstances.”

Cleasby wrote to the panel to say she had not been a social worker since early 2013 and did not intend to continue in the career - but the panel decided the suspension was necessary to protect the public interest.

Other charges involving the trio and different children were found not proved.

Bob Stott, the county council’s director with responsibility for children’s social care, said: “The safeguarding of children and young people is of paramount importance to us and as soon as these issues came to light, we took appropriate disciplinary action. The staff in question no longer work for the county council.

“Although we were extremely disappointed and concerned to find examples of poor practice in these specific instances, we must set them against the wider context of our children’s social care service as a whole, in which hardworking and skilled staff protect and support children on a daily basis.”