Unseen: The ‘invisible girl’ abandoned by the state

0:00Nick Martin:Coming up, the final days of a girl in care. Nanita said repeatedly that she would step in front of a train when she turned 18 and lost access to support services. Was her death inevitable or entirely avoidable? How does a banana trigger a CIA-backed coup? Do AirPods herald the arrival of a new global order? What do LED lights say about the future of humanity? I'm Ed Conway, and in each episode of my new podcast, Stuff Matters, I take an object, crack it open, and reveal the world-shaping forces hidden inside. This is economics told through the things we think we understand. Search Stuff Matters on your podcast app to listen and follow.

0:49Hi, everyone.

0:50Nick Martin:Do hope you're well. Look, before we get started, just a heads up. Today, we're going to be discussing suicide and self-harm, so this isn't one for younger ears. I'll be popping the contact details for the Samaritans in the notes attached to the episode, just in case any of you are affected by anything you hear. At the heart of this story is an 18-year-old girl called Nunita, who was, at the time of her death, in the care of Barnet Council. Although, as you're about to hear, care might not be the best word. We've spoken about the provision of mental health services for younger people a number of times already on the daily.

1:25Nick Martin:We've also spoken about the care system. Both have been shown to be creaking at the seams. But what Nunita's story makes clear are the dangers of the care cliff. That's the point at which a young person turns 18 and loses access to the services they rely on, simply because they are no longer, in inverted commas, a child. Just a few weeks after her 18th birthday, on the 28th of December 2023, Nunita took her own life. This is the tale of the women who refused to rest until they knew why. And it's been told in a powerful new documentary by Sky's People and Politics correspondent Nick Martin. Nick, what first put you on to this story?

2:04Nick Martin:Because it is a remarkable story. I was sitting at home in the summer, in early July, and I was talking to a contact of mine about doing some stories on children's social care. It is still a big issue that I'm pursuing. And he mentioned, Anita, very, very fleetingly. and the details that he mentioned to me seemed unbelievable actually and I thought I'll look into this but half of me thought I don't think that story will pan out in the way that it would it was so shocking and I started to do a bit of digging and it turned out to be true and I thought this is a story we absolutely have to tell At the heart of it, one girl, Nunita, and one woman, Catherine just tell me a bit more about both of them and how they first met So Nunita was 18 years old when she died but she was in the care of the state and she'd been in the care of the state since she was 16.

2:51She was very unwell. She'd had serious bouts of hospital admissions for self-harm and the authorities had been trying to help her, mental health support, psychiatrists, psychologists, but also social work support. Catherine Bryson had been a teacher for 40 years. She'd also specialised in special educational needs, so she knew the vulnerabilities and as she'd approached retirement she'd wanted to volunteer as a mentor a mentor for a charity action for children and the idea was that she would befriend a child in care they would go out for coffee and go to the cinema and chat and it was a way of giving a child in care an outlet of support not counselling nothing specialist just a mentor and she was paired with nanita so at that

3:38Nick Martin:point what did Catherine know about Nunita and what did she detect in the in the young woman that was in front of her when she was taking her out for coffee well she'd known that Nunita had self-harmed in the past is the words that Catherine used but was quotes in a better place now and that's all she knew she had noticed some scarring on Nunita when they'd gone for a coffee and she had some concerns but one of her major concerns being a teacher on their first meeting was at the time, and this is September, a few months before her death, Nanita was not in any college or training. Wasn't she supposed to be though?

4:16She should have been. She should have been. There had been some college places made available to her, but they just hadn't panned out for one reason or another. But she should have been in training or education. And Catherine as a teacher saw that as a massive red flag, not only for her education, but also for her state of mind. She was at a massive loose end. She kept saying to Catherine, I need to do something. I need to do something.

4:38Nick Martin:It sounds like Catherine played a big role in Nanita's life, but only a very brief role. Yeah, they met a few times and repeatedly Catherine had called up the charity and said, I'm still concerned that she's not in education. I'm still concerned she's not in training. Now, a few weeks before Nanita died, Catherine had actually raised an official safeguarding concern to the charity. And the idea, what should have happened is that charity should have passed that safeguarding concern on to the council. that didn't happen and on the 28th of December Nanita made her way to train tracks and the coroner would eventually rule that she took her own life alone in that low period between Christmas and New Year but that should not have been a surprise But it was to Catherine certainly at that stage and she couldn't let go of Nanita's story could she?

5:30Of course Catherine when she got the news was absolutely devastated this was a shock to say the least She had just formed a good relationship with Nanita. She was trying to help her. Nanita had sent her her CV. She was trying to get placements at animal welfare hospitals and things like that because she had a love for animals. And for this to happen, given that Catherine wasn't aware of all of the deep-seated health problems that Nanita had had, was a shock to say the least.

5:55Nick Martin:And she knew, I think, in her mind, she told me something was up. So this is presumably the point at which the inquest process begins. But Nanita didn't have representation there. So the inquest, the original inquest, the London Borough of Barnet, who was Nanita's corporate parent, she was in the care of London Borough of Barnet, weren't officially part of the inquest process. Neither were the accommodation owners who Nanita was staying with. The NHS Trust weren't on the list and Action for Children weren't on the list. So all of the main players in Nanita's life were not initially represented at the inquest.

6:30Why might that be? They either weren't notified or the coroner didn't believe that there were any circumstances which would lead him to believe that they need to come in and give evidence.

6:39Nick Martin:This is the point, though, in the story where Catherine kind of casts her net a bit wider and recruits a little bit of help to try and get some of the information that would have been available to the people you've just mentioned, had they been active participants in this process. Well, it was by pure chance because Catherine sang in a choir and one of the fellow members of the choir knew Caroline Willow, who's a very esteemed and experienced child human rights official and she runs the charity Article 39. She couldn't really have picked a better person, a more experienced person. Caroline Willow then contacted Deborah Coles at Inquest, the charity that represents families through the Inquest process.

7:18Again, someone with huge pedigree in this area. She's helped represent the Hillsborough families and those who are representing families of Grenfell Tower disaster. So here she has two women who know their stuff. They know the process. Immediately they saw a red flag that Catherine had raised a concern, but seemingly nothing had happened. Those two ladies then contact a young barrister called Keira Bartlam, and those four women together embark on quite an astonishing endeavour to try and win the right to represent Nanita at the inquest. So how did they do that? They need to prove to the coroner that they have suspicions that something is not right with this death.

7:55and in a British legal first, they managed to get access to the inquest to represent Nanita. It just doesn't happen. To be given what's called interested persons, you need to be connected with the deceased. You're either family or someone who represents them. These ladies didn't know Nanita, so they had no connection. But they managed to persuade the coroner that they had something to bring to this, that there was perhaps more to the story. And crucially, once the coroner granted them inquest, the printer started rolling and all of the case files had to be disclosed to them. And within those case files, unlocked the story of what happened to Nanita.

8:31Nick Martin:But was this process resisted at the Codinus Court? So when Article 39 and Inquest made the application for interested person status, London Borough Barnet objected. Why did they object? Well, they would have known that any extra people involved in this inquest would get Nanita's case file. And they would have known that within that case file were a litany. failures. Nanita was receiving a lot of help, primarily from child and adolescent mental health services. She had tried to take her own life about 20 months before she actually died, and she was in hospital for a couple of months. Now, within that hospital, she disclosed to a senior doctor that next time she would make her way to train tracks and kill herself.

9:16A very specific warning. That wasn't specifically noted down on the case file, but it did eventually find its way into a case file and Barnet Council knew of those intentions. And she didn't just say it once, it's repeated in the case file. She said, when I turn 18, I'm going to go to train tracks and I'm going to kill myself. The when, the where and the how. It couldn't have been plainer, but nothing was done.

9:40Nick Martin:The grimmest detail in this story is where she was sent to stay, the supported accommodation that Barnet Council allocated to her. So despite all of those warnings, Nanita was sent to unregulated supported accommodation about 250 metres from a high-speed railway line. She even said on the notes that we've seen that Nanita expressed discomfort actually at being near the fenced railway line and that's in the log. And you said unregulated there, what does that mean? So often children are sent to supported accommodation. They're sometimes like semi-detached houses where three or four children live with a supervised adult.

10:16Some are regulated and some aren't. Now, recently legislation has demanded that unregulated care homes, so not regulated by Ofsted, that then became a requirement. So all unregulated care homes, the October of 2022, had to register with Ofsted. The singing tree where Nanita was staying missed that deadline. So at the time that Nanita was there, it was operating unlawfully. She shouldn't have been there.

10:43Nick Martin:You and I have talked about the care system before, Nick, and we have talked about the care cliff, I think is the phrase that's come to be used. She mentioned, Nuneita, didn't she, that she was fast approaching her 18th birthday. What is it that she and others lose at that point when you stop being a child and become an adult in the eyes of the law? So researching this piece, I sat down with several young people who are either in care right now or have just left. And one of the big themes to come out of those conversations with those young people is the peril and the dread that often children in England in particular face when they reach 18.

11:17Now, that's because often all of the scaffolding that's around a child in care, social work, accommodation, help, access, everything's done for them. They are a child of the state after all. by the time they reach 18 often on their 18th birthday actually all of that can often fall

11:36Nick Martin:away so you're talking your access to mental health services you're talking a social worker accommodation as well was that the case in anita's situation did she lose all of those things on the day that she turned 18 one of the saddest aspects of this story is just a few days before her 18th birthday. So she's now peering over this care cliff. Her CAMHS, her child and adolescent mental health support, is abruptly stopped. Now, what should have happened is that there should have been a referral to adult mental health services. That didn't happen. Also on her 18th birthday, she was not in any education or training.

12:13And she wasn't told where she'd be living after her 18th birthday. So she is now in a very dangerous position. For someone with her extreme mental health problems, she is in a really precarious position, very vulnerable to the self-harm and the suicidal talk that she'd been warning about.

12:33Nick Martin:What I cannot understand is when there are repeated warnings of suicide being made by Nunita and noted down in her file, why that wasn't acted upon. So in the inquest, the coroner's findings were quite remarkable, really. he cited several reasons that probably contributed to her death and coroners don't often use the word probably either it's no wrong legal term he said that the lack of transition from school to college impacted her the falling away of the cams at a known and dangerous point in her life was a really important factor in her life and the uncertainty that was surrounding her accommodation And he said the agencies involved in her care, the NHS, the council, etc, just did not share information enough.

13:23They did not share all of those warnings and all of those cries for help. And he said that probably contributed to her death. And he said, crucially, Neil, that her death could have been prevented.

13:35Nick Martin:So that's what I was about to ask. Was there a way in which this young person, clearly in an awful lot of trauma, it was by no means inevitable. had the system worked that she would end up killing herself. This was a whole system failure. Nanita did not need to die. She did not need to go out of her house that day in the lull period between Christmas and New Year and do what she did if she had received the support. And I have to say through the inquest process and I have read the full transcript, it was apparent to me that some social workers did care about Nanita. This was a system that was not caring for her enough.

14:16The social workers knew about her, cared for her. Why didn't they then practically care for her? I don't know, Neil, actually. I don't know why they didn't go, this girl is high risk, let's take her under our wing anymore. It's one of the aspects of this story that makes me the most sad. And I've been telling stories for nearly 32 years. No story I've ever done over the years has made me more sad as this one. What have we had?

14:42Nick Martin:from let's start with the local authority, let's start with Barnett. Well, Barnett Council, when I originally approached them, I said, can we sit down and talk to you about this? They refused that request for an interview. Did they give a reason for that? No, they didn't. They said that they sent their condolences to all that knew Nanita. They said that they'd carried out two reviews into her death so that lessons could be learned. I asked for copies of those reviews. They weren't provided and they've not been made public. They said that they had engaged with the inquest process from the point at which it was notified.

15:12Now, what that really means is the coroner went to them and said, you need to come to the inquest. They didn't say, this is one of our children in care who's died. We've got a big case file on her. We think we've got something to add to the inquest. The coroner had to go to them. And that's something I put to Bridget Phillips and the education secretary who's responsible for children's social care. I said, that can't be right that when a child in the care of the state dies, that there is not an automatic obligation for a corporate parent to appear before the inquest. It was really the endeavour of our remarkable ladies that dragged the council and the NHS and the singing tree and Action for Children along there.

15:50Nick Martin:I'm presuming that Nunita is not alone, that there have been others who have seen this care clift fast approaching, who may have found it have an incredibly negative effect on their own mental health. I mean, if anyone's listening and they've been in care, they will know exactly what I'm about to describe. It is a sense of foreboding when the 18th birthday comes. It's a milestone that no one in care wants to get to. And Nunita was no different. Over the last five years, since pretty much coming out of the pandemic, more than 300 care leavers have died. That's an enormous number. Just in the last year, 91 have died.

16:24That's nearly two a week. They are almost twice as likely to die than their same age group who've not been in care. That's an absolute shocking statistic. And I think it is a reflection on a system which has been crumbling for many years. And unfortunately, Nanita will not be the last invisible child to die in this system that desperately needs reform.

16:47Nick Martin:What is the reform? What can be done short of finding£10 billion down the back of the sofa and investing that into social care and the other services that we've been describing? So I've been speaking to a lot of people who've got experience in the care system, who've gone on to become campaigners. When you meet people in care, you know, they're a feisty group. They want to see change, but it's the government they've got to persuade. Now, the government have got a bill going through Parliament at the moment, the Children's Wellbeing in Schools bill. Now, within that, campaigners want to tighten up the responsibilities of councils, make the rules stricter, make their obligations stricter, Act more like an actual parent, like you and I parent our own children.

17:29To act like a reasonable parent and to have regard for the decisions that they make. And some of those amendments are being resisted by government. Now, there's a cost implication. There's a potential litigation implication for when things go wrong. But the government are resisting amendments and campaigners are now knocking on their door. There are some young people in the House of Lords today trying to persuade the Lords to bring forward change. but it's really about making councils more responsible for the children who are in their care, the same responsibilities that we would have as parents.

18:02Nick Martin:Are we in a position to say that in the case of Nanita, people actively tried to make sure that we didn't know the detail of her death or the detail that could have prevented her death? The evidence is there. There was a concerted effort by Barnet Council to block this endeavour from these ladies to get access to the case. There was, I think, an attempt to block any public scrutiny of Nanita's case file because the council knew exactly what was in it. They knew that they had not done a good enough job. And I think whilst they should have taken responsibility for Nanita in her life, they did not, it appears, want to take responsibility for her after her death.

18:45Nick Martin:Let's finish where we started, Nick. And of course, none of this would have come to light without the efforts of Chiara, Deborah, Caroline. But at the core, it all goes back to Catherine and the brief amount of contact that she had with Nunita. At the conclusion of this coroner's process, with the verdict that he gave, how does Catherine feel? I think Catherine is haunted by this. I know she is because she's told me that. She rang the bell, loud and clear, and waved her arms around saying, this is not right, we need to support this girl more. Action for Children should have acted on that. Now, they told me in a statement that they have tightened up their rules now so that any safeguarding concerns will be passed immediately onto the council.

19:27But I think there is also questions for the NHS and how quickly they've pulled away from that support. And they, in a statement to us, have, yes, expressed condolences, but they were quite clear with me that they appreciate and accept that the care that they're given Anita was not good enough. Barnard Council have never apologised in any statement to me for Nunita's death when it's clear that the coroner had ruled that their actions or inaction had contributed to her death, which I find remarkable.

19:57Nick Martin:In the absence of that apology, let's focus on Nunita herself. How does Catherine remember? She was described as small and a petite girl, young for her age. She had loads of teddy bears. She had unicorns hanging off her bag. It was very clear that she wanted to stay a child and she didn't want to enter adulthood. She described her as softly spoken and gentle and they'd gone to see films, they'd gone to see Wonka and they'd eaten popcorn and they'd really forged a strong relationship. And I think Catherine was desperate to try and help her as any teacher would, put her on a path. And she had so much promise.

20:32Yes, she had autism, but she had six good GCSEs, which given her challenges is remarkable. And she, I think had a really promising life ahead of her if she'd just been given the support that she was entitled to Nick, thanks very much

20:47Nick Martin:Now if you've been affected by anything you've heard, the Samaritans are available 24-7, you can call them free of charge on 116123 or you can email joe at samaritans.org Nick's full documentary Unseen, A Girl Called Nanita is on Sky News at 9pm this Friday or it's available right now through the app or the Sky News YouTube channel. The Daily's back tomorrow. Till then, take care.

21:15How does a banana trigger a CIA-backed coup? Do AirPods herald the arrival of a new global order? What do LED lights say about the future of humanity? I'm Ed Conway, and in each episode of my new podcast, Stuff Matters, I take an object, crack it open, and reveal the world-shaping forces hidden inside. This is economics told through the things we think we understand. Search Stuff Matters on your podcast app to listen and follow.