Rosie Lewis

The video released on Thursday of Preston Davey smiling up from his highchair is difficult to watch. It captures the unguarded happiness of a baby who has no reason yet to distrust the world. Knowing what happened to him afterwards, you find yourself wanting to reach into the screen and lift him up to safety. A baby who had already experienced more upheaval than most of us will in a lifetime was failed in the worst possible way I won’t repeat the details of Preston’s death. They’re too horrific. Suffice to say that a baby who had already experienced more upheaval than most of us will in a lifetime was failed in the worst possible way. Cases like this inevitably prompt calls for tighter regulation and more safeguards.

The sentencing this week of Jan Jahanzeb and Israr Niazal for the rape of a 15-year-old girl in Leamington Spa has reignited the immigration debate. The two 17-year-old Afghans arrived in the country by small boat, claimed to be minors, and were duly absorbed into the British care system before they committed this horrific crime. We continue to ask ordinary families, often single women like me, renting modest semis, to absorb adolescents who may speak no English, observe strict religious codes, and carry more trauma than most adults ever will But behind the justified outrage, a quieter, more uncomfortable truth has been forgotten: the care system we ask to absorb these young men was never designed for them and everyone is paying the price.

If the leaks are correct, Rachel Reeves will use today’s Budget to abolish the two-child benefit cap. Another £3.4 billion a year will flow to larger families. On paper, half a million children will be lifted out of poverty. Labour backbenchers will congratulate themselves on a job well done, and columnists on the left will cheer that compassion has been restored. Forgive me for not joining in with the applause. Addiction, chaos, and learned helplessness don’t vanish because the monthly bank transfer gets a little fatter For 20 years I’ve been a foster carer working closely with underprivileged families, and what I’ve learned is that simply giving parents more cash won’t necessarily give those third, fourth or fifth children a better start.

As a foster carer and adopter, I’ve spent more mornings than I care to count coaxing my 13-year-old daughter into her uniform and then into the car. She has fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, the UK’s most underdiagnosed neuro-developmental condition, which leaves her with a brain wired for impulsivity, memory lapses and emotional storms that no local school can contain. Each day, I drive her across several counties to the only specialist placement that can meet her needs. Four hours a day, every week day. While I’m grinding through the traffic, taxpayers are footing bills that could fund whole classrooms. Councils and schools spent a record £2.26 billion on special educational needs and disabilities – ‘Send’ – transport last year.