Liz Twist

I know that people in my hon. Friend’s community were also affected by the case. I certainly agree that the law would make a real difference to people and children in future. That is what we want to do—protect other children. I have been particularly moved by Gemma and Rachael’s determination to work with other families who have had their lives changed irrevocably by child abuse, including the families of Star Hobson and Tony Hudgell, who is thankfully still alive. This campaign is not only about remembering Maya; it is about preventing other children from enduring the unimaginable pain that Maya did on that day and in the weeks preceding her death. Although the family were not known to statutory services, the child safeguarding practice review highlighted instances in which professionals could have stepped in—for example, when Maya’s mother contacted a health visitor asking for support or when Maya’s father, James, approached Durham’s First Contact service with concerns about Michael Daymond. James was told to contact the police, where the matter was progressed under Clare’s law and Sarah’s law, but when an officer followed that up, Maya’s mother told them that she was no longer with Daymond and the matter was closed. Clearly, there was a need for more professional curiosity on the part of the First Contact service and the police, but the incident highlighted the fact that neither of those laws is designed to protect children from known risks of non-sexual abuse. Sarah’s law and Clare’s law operate on a right to ask and right to know basis. Relevant third parties can request information and the police can make disclosures of their own accord if they become aware that a person may be at risk. Clare’s law, which focuses on intimate partner violence, covers children only when they are linked to a primary adult who is at risk of domestic abuse. Although children are the focus of Sarah’s law, its primary concern is sexual offending. Sarah’s law does permit the disclosure of wider safeguarding concerns, but that is discretionary, and there is a presumption to disclose information about an individual only where they have convictions for child sex offences. However, children are killed and harmed in households where non-sexual abuse is taking place and where family members have raised concerns but had no legal standing to insist on intervention.