As I understand it, David Cameron's point was that Haringey Council (which has 32 Labour and 25 Liberal Democrat councillors) should not be investigating itself after such a major failure.

Gordon Brown replied that this was cheap party politics. What really is cheap is a Labour Prime Minister trying to justify a Labour council investigating itself when Haringey social workers are 25 per cent below strength, nobody wants the jobs, and Labour-controlled Haringey Council is back in trouble.

To Gordon Brown, shifting the blame and ducking the issues is more important than the safety of children having seven bells knocked out of them. How long must we wait for a Government that gets its social services priorities right?

From: Terry Duncan, Greame Road, Bridlington.

I AGREE with the minority party Liberal spokesman from Haringey Council that only a small group, ie a clique of councillors, is privy to a lot of information and decisions in our present day councils' set ups, whereby local authorities are encouraged to appoint elite cabinets,
made up by a majority of the ruling party, but ignoring other members.

This system was instituted by our present Labour Government.

It means that hundreds of elected councillors have little say in local authority decisions, – because highly-paid council leaders and the chief executives (paid more than Prime Ministers) seem to now run the local authorities, instead of the democratically elected.

That means the people we put in to represent us are denied access to information such as cases like those of Baby P.

The practice should cease and local government should return to open government, when all committees are accessible to all elected members as well as to the general public, as they were in the good old days.

Even the Press could then get access to all debates so as to inform, while retaining anonymity in delicate cases.

Then another Baby P may still be alive this Christmas coming.


The ways we are destroying our world

From: Allan Ramsay, Radcliffe Moor Road, Radcliffe.

ACCORDING to Arnold Schwarzenegger, that part of California which has been destroyed by fire is "the most beautiful place on earth".

What about the Amazon rainforest? That is home to countless species of insect, animal and plant life; food and shelter to thousands
of indigenous people and also a vital support system for Planet Earth – the only one of its kind.

While millionaires' properties are being destroyed in California, isn't the most pristine place on earth being destroyed by logging and slash-burn? Logging to satisfy the so-called civilised world's insatiable appetite for hardwood, and slash-burn for cattle to satisfy its insatiable appetite for meat. And who has the biggest appetite?

The carbon footprint of all the indigenous people of the Amazon is probably less than that of just one millionaire in California.

Our global financial catastrophe was reportedly caused by greedy, irresponsible people, and the way the "civilised world" is heading, it will be much the same people who will cause a global environmental catastrophe.

What the Amazon and California suffers today, we will all suffer tomorrow.