THE former head of children's services at Haringey Council has hit out at her sacking in the wake of the Baby P scandal.

Sharon Shoesmith, giving evidence to MPs this morning, admitted mistakes had been made in the death of 17-month-old Peter Connelly in August 2007.

But she asked why there had not been sackings in police and health services in the wake of the death and subsequent revelations of failures.

Ms Shoesmith said: “There never was any doubt about how sorry I was, and everybody in Haringey was about the death of Peter Connelly. Absolutely no doubt at all.

“To construct a narrative so simple which told the public that Peter Connolly died because Haringey was uniquely weak, to sack everyone from the director to the social workers and all would be well, was quite frankly absurd.

“The honest story will be told eventually.”

She added that the statistics for children who die at the hands of parents, close family members, and extended family has remained fairly unchanged since this case, despite a “wider net” of care agencies to try to prevent this from happening.

Ms Shoesmith argued that the response to the Baby P scandal, in terms of changes to social care, has not had the impact that many had wanted.

She said: “The whole sector is now motivated by fear of failure and not the conditions for success. Clearly there's much to do.”

Ms Shoesmith was dismissed by the council in December 2008 after a media outcry over the case, but she had launched a bid to clear her name claiming she was unlawfully sacked.

She asked the question at the Education Committee this morning that if sacking everyone was the correct approach to deal with failings, why had people not been dismissed in other bodies that were involved in the Baby P case?

She also said directors of children's services at councils across the country would change every six months if the same measures were applied to every death of a child.

Ms Shoesmith had been called in to give evidence to an inquiry by the MPs into child safety, and she was asked whether there was anything she would have done differently in the Baby P case.

She replied: “That's one heck of a question given what I've experienced, dealt with death threats and so on, brought myself back from the brink.

“If I go back to August 3, 2007, when I heard the news about Peter's death, and the cynical me, the cynical view would been 'jump then'.

“But I didn't as I was always very committed to Haringey and I still am and wish them well as they go forward.”