Climbie report

Victoria was tortured to death

The official report into the death of Victoria Climbie is expected to recommend sweeping changes to radically overhaul child protection services. The 8-year old died after suffering months of abuse at the hands of her great-aunt and her boyfriend.

The inquiry - headed by Lord Laming will explain how police, social workers, medical staff and a local council all failed to save her life.

Breakfast heard from:

Polly Neate, the editor of Community Care magazine about whether the changes will make any difference. She said the pressures that social workers have to work under are enormous, and the public image needs to shift. She believes there are more successes than failures.

Click here to watch our interview with Polly Neate.

Owen Davies from Unison and Donald Forrester, a lecturer in social work about what impact those changes are likely to have. They both felt the pay, conditions and status of social workers need to be addressed.

Click here to watch this discussion.

David Behan from the Association of Directors of Social Services.

Victoria was seen by dozens of social workers, nurses, doctors and police officers before she died, but all failed to spot and stop the abuse as she was slowly tortured to death.

Victoria suffered dozens of injuries

The incompetence of the professionals responsible for her care led to the largest ever review of child protection arrangements and services in the UK.

When Victoria died, on 25 February 2000, she had 128 separate injuries on her body, including cigarette burns, scars where she had been hit by a bike chain and hammer blows to her toes.

Victoria's parents, Francis and Berthe Climbie, have travelled to Britain from the Ivory Coast to await the report's publication.

They have said they have forgiven their daughter's killers despite suffering "a wound that will never heal".

Victoria's parents await the report's findings

Mr Climbie told BBC News he hoped things would now change.

"The system at the moment is too complicated," he said.

"It needs to be simpler and more flexible. But you have to have people in place who are up to the job, people who love the job."

Mrs Climbie struggles to understand how a country so much more prosperous than her own let her daughter die.

"What's shocked me the most is that senior people haven't accepted their part in Victoria's death," she said.

"How can a great European country not accept their part of the blame?"