Findings wake-up call, says principal

By JAMES GARDINER

The principal of the school that murdered Masterton girl Saliel Aplin attended has called for social workers to become mandatory in all intermediate schools and for regular medical health checks for all young children.

Peter Debney, principal of Hiona Intermediate, said the findings of the reports, into the death of Saliel and her half-sister Olympia Jetson, presented a challenge the Government must take up if children were to be adequately protected.

He also called for the return of child protection teams that disappeared after the 1980s.

"It's not time for our politicians to be scoring cheap points off each other," Mr Debney said last night.

"Either they've got to put up or shut up.

"Our young people are at risk. If we are real about helping kids, something has to happen."

Both reports showed a breakdown in procedures and protocols and the fact that some groups were not aware of what others were doing.

He said inter-agency child protection teams, which involved schools, police, health and welfare officials meeting regularly to discuss at-risk children, had the advantage of not letting issues slip through cracks.

They had been phased out, he assumed, because of cost, but the price of that decision had been paid by young people and their families ever since.

Mr Debney said it was also time for social workers to become mandatory for all intermediates.

Members of the murdered girls' extended family also called for action, not more words.

Olympia's uncle, Pat Jetson, said he had not had time to read the reports but was "not too happy" about what he had heard - but nor was he surprised.

"What are they going to do about it? That's the thing," Mr Jetson said.

In Kippenberger St, where the family lived before the murders, the house remains on the market, its grisly history too much of a disincentive to buyers, according to the girls' grandfather, Alan Aplin.

Mr Aplin said his daughter, Charlene, was in hiding to avoid being "hassled" when the reports were made public.