Mother's grief at losing two children

The woman was told her unborn child would be on at-risk register

One mother whose new-born daughter was taken into care after her first child died has told of her double heartache.

She is one of thousands of parents whose children were taken into care amid fears the youngsters were at risk.

And she knows only too well the repercussions of the strength placed on expert witness statements in a case where a child dies shortly after birth.

The parent, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told her story to BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

She did not even know she was under suspicion over the death of her baby son at a few months old until she was eight months pregnant with her second child.

I had her for 20 minutes. I could only see her with a nurse or social worker Mother Civil cot deaths review urged

It was then she was told her unborn child would be put on an at-risk register and her daughter was later taken away from her shortly after her birth.

"I had her for 20 minutes. She was taken into the special baby care unit at the hospital.

"I could only see her when there was a nurse present or a social worker present."

"A few days later she was taken from hospital straight into foster care."

Experts disagreed

Since then all the contact she has had with her daughter has been tightly controlled until she was adopted.

She has now not seen her child for two years.

Her heartache at losing her son was redoubled when her daughter was taken into care.

At Family Court hearings medical professionals disagreed about how her son had died with seven favouring natural causes.

But two experts claimed she had smothered her son, including paediatrician Sir Roy Meadow.

It was his evidence in high profile criminal cases where mothers stood accused of murdering their children that has proved so controversial.

"We had not seen him, we had not met him. We had not been interviewed by him. We didn't even know who he was," she said.

Meanwhile she takes exception against children's minister Margaret Hodge's saying it was not in the best interests of children removed from their parents at birth to return them to their biological parents.

"If we could have my daughter back tomorrow I'd have her back tomorrow," she said.

She accepts it would be "traumatic" for her three-year-old to get used to a "new mummy and daddy" but questioned whether the alternative would be better - for her to find out as a teenager that she had been taken away from her natural parents "unnecessarily".