There are many – so many – questions about the death of Baby P rattling about in my mind. About how on earth any fellow human being could inflict those cruelties on him. About how safety net after safety net could fail to protect him.

Increasingly there is one question looking to me as key to understanding what went wrong – it’s around the four plus months gap between a decision that Baby P needed to be seen be a paediatrician and that actually happening.

Haringey’s report own report tells us:

“From March, a main element of the child protection plan was to obtain a developmental paediatric assessment” [Paragraph 2.1.6]

But he wasn’t seen by a paediatrician until 1st August [Paragraph 2.1.15]. There are serious questions about how that inspection was carried out and why Baby P was returned to his mother after it. But it only took place four plus months after it was decided that this inspection was a “main element” of the plans to ensure Baby P’s well being. How can you leave such a key inspection for so long?

There’s a hint in Haringey’s own report that something went very wrong, for one conclusion – even in this report, for all its whitewash features – is that Great Ormond Street Hospital (who provided the paediatric care services) should develop, “a waiting list priority system that acknowledges the needs of the child, including the implications of a child subject of a child protection plan” [Paragraph 4.3.7]. You don’t say that unless you think the opposite is the case at the moment, do you?

Other Baby P news: Haringey Council kept information back from police and prosecutors – Telegraph – and whistleblower warned ministers about problems in Haringey several months before Baby P died – The Independent.