The number of proceedings issued by Haringey council to take children into care fell significantly in the months before Baby P’s death. At the time, the authority was facing an overspend in its budget for children’s services and had extra paperwork from trials of reforms to the care system.

Haringey had 480 children in care in September 2006. By August last year — the month Baby P died — the figure had fallen to 412. In the following months, as the authority’s internal investigation into the toddler’s death began, the number of children in care rose.

In the autumn of last year, two months after Baby P’s death, a new protocol was introduced, requiring social workers to complete extra paperwork before care proceedings could start.

Haringey took part in a pilot scheme that meant the extra paperwork started earlier for social workers proposing to put a child into care. To avoid this, it is said that they tried to place children with family friends, rather than initiate what was to become time-consuming and expensive legal action. A spokesman for Haringey said that they could not supply the figures for the months before the death of Baby P.

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