The furore over the death of Baby P continues to grow. The campaign for those responsible in Haringey Council to resign has reached fever pitch. But this is one of a long line of scandals to hit the north London borough in recent months.

Here is a list of a few of those scandals:

Public finances. Haringey lost around £37million when they put some money in an Icelandic bank which later went bankrupt, despite repeated warnings made about their financial problems. The council argues this would not impact on services, but there have been fears that they are planning to cut spending and axe services for the next financial year.

A new civic centre. Haringey had earlier put in motion plans to move its headquarters to Woodside House, not far from the current Civic Centre, despite public protests. In order to do this, they controversially tried to evict both council staff and voluntary organisations currently based there. However,  the plans have at present been ‘put on hold’.

Planning. Haringey’s planning service has been repeatedly criticised by local residents. Major controversial planning projects, like the Hale Village in Tottenham Hale, were being forced through by the council, despite public opposition. Residents, shop keepers and stall holders in Seven Sisters are currently battling the council over plans to allow a property developer to knock down an old department store, which currently houses an indoor market, and replace it with shops and around 200 flats. The stall holders would  be evicted from the building and told to go elsewhere without compensation.

Regeneration. Haringey has received billions of pounds in government money aimed at ‘regenerating the area’. However, there have been allegations that there has been widespread fraud, and that vital funds have been misspent. One of the government’s earlier New Deal for Communities regeneration schemes was based in another deprived part of the area. The council has repeatedly refused requests to reveal its accounts to the public.

The environment. Haringey, according to a recent survey, had some of the most dirtiest streets in the country. The dumping of refuse, particularly in some poorer parts of the borough, has been a major problem. Complaints about rubbish have hit record highs, but little is done about it. The borough’s environmental services were featured in the BBC documentary series, “A Life Of Grime“.

Council management. The council has been repeatedly criticised for the way they manage public money and deliver local services. Despite receiving a larger government grant than most councils of similar social and demographic problems, they levy some of the  highest council tax levels in the country. Complaints against the council are often ignored, and are only usually addressed when they are threatened with legal action.

The people of Haringey must wonder why the council, almost unique in the country, seems to be very ill- managed. Hopefully the Baby P scandal will force the council to make efforts to chamge and improve all their services.

A former law lord has claimed legal advice given by then attorney general Lord Goldsmith to Tony Blair on the eve of the Iraq War in 2003 was ‘fundamentally flawed’ Lord Bingham says:

” It was not plain that Iraq had failed to comply in a manner justifying resort to force and there were no strong factual grounds or hard evidence to show that it had.

“Hans Blix and his team of weapons inspectors had found no weapons of mass destruction, were making progress and expected to complete their task in a couple of months.

“If I am right that the invasion of Iraq by US, the UK and some other states was unauthorised by the (United Nations) Security Council there was, of course, a serious violation of international law and the rule of law.”

This has been well known throughout the lead up to the invasion, but Bush and Blair wanted in advance to invade Iraq anyway. Nobody knows what would have happened if Saddam had still been the country’s president, but anything else could’ve been better than the Iraq of today.

The evidence against the invasion was overwhelming, so why are the real causers of the situation in Iraq getting away with it? One of them is currently the ‘Middle East peace envoy’.

There has been understandably a collective public outrage over the tragic death of Baby P, who was known to social workers in the same local council where there was a similar tragedy eight years earlier.

It was later revealed that concerns about the management of Haringey social services made by staff to both the council’s leadership and government ministers fell on deaf ears. Because of the council’s poor reputation, the department suffered regular staffing and funding shortages, and as a result, social workers, particularly less qualified ones, were having to deal with more complex cases than they should have done, and they had little or no support from local managers. A number of social workers who did try to speak out were either disciplined or dismissed. There also have been claims that complaints made against social services were repeatedly either ignored, or failed to be followed up.

There’s also the wider political fallout. The local leadership of Haringey Council has backed Sharon Shoesmith, the head of the department responsible for child protection in the borough, even though it was widely known that she was in part responsible for the practices which lead to the baby’s death. The council’s leader and the executive member responsible for childrens’ services have said they would not resign over the scandal.

It is bad enough that Haringey had to face scrutiny over one death… but two? That in many peoples’ eyes seems like carelessness. No doubt there will be the usual government inquiries with new recommendations made to make sure children are fully protected. But they will not deal with the fact that child protection services  across the country has suffered both from gross under-funding, and the government’s mania for persistent structural change. Staff working in these services are often having to deal with children in mainly either deprived neighbourhoods or ‘challenging’ households, are often poorly paid and work longer hours.

The real tragedy of Baby P is that children who are at serious risk or are currently being abused in Haringey will be denied help, because of the widespread distrust of the council. That in turn would certainly lead to more tragic child deaths.