Worcester Borough Council says lessons have been learned from the murder of Alfie Steel

Council bosses said lessons had been learned from the murder of Alfie Steele.

The nine-year-old died at his home in Droitwich in February 2021 after suffering months of cruelty and abuse from his mother Carla Scott and her partner Dirk Howell.

couple They were jailed in June last yearand a review highlighted a number of missed opportunities by professionals to protect Alfie.

At a Worcestershire County Council cabinet meeting on Thursday, chief executive Paul Robinson said hundreds of staff had attended webinars in response to the review.

“Alfie Steele this was a terrible moment for the authority, the region and the community,” he said.

“But on the positive side, if anything, our people have learned from this.

“They’ve experienced it, they know what it is, we have examples and learnings from the report, and those have been communicated to our staff.”

Councilors heard from Steve Eccleston, independent chairman of the Worcestershire Safeguarding Children Partnership.

He said: “We have to be realistic here. We’re often asking our youngest, most inexperienced practitioners, whether from social services, health, police, to come in and deal with some of our most challenging adults in our communities – challenging, difficult, frightening, open and able to avoid that kind of scrutiny.”

“A Probation Service representative told me that as a result of these webinars there had been difficulties between professionals in a small number of cases, leading to people who posed a risk to children being recalled to prison.

“These are small numbers and anecdotal, but to me this is a demonstrable result.”

Marc Bayliss, councilor for Bowbrook, which covers the area where Alfie lives, said he was “pleased to hear there was a focus on real change rather than forwarding the details because so many of these serious case reviews follow the same path”.

He asked the head of conservation what the key differences to emerge from the review were.

Mr Eccleston said: “The most significant changes are not structural or procedural.

“These empower practitioners to have the confidence to challenge their own initial thoughts and perceptions, as well as challenge what they are told and be more robust with individuals.

“I’ll give a simple example from the review. Alfie was reportedly at home when his mother said ‘no he’s not here.’

“Be confident enough to say, ‘Actually, we don’t believe you and we want to take this further.'”