Double suicide could have been averted

Niamh Lafferty, 15, and Georgia Rowe, 14, died after jumping from the Erskine Bridge together into the River Clyde in October 2009.

They had run away from the nearby Good Shepherd Open Unit, where Niamh had been placed by Argyll and Bute Council, and Georgia by Hull City Council.

The girls met at the unit, where they shared a room. At the time of their deaths, they were living in a small flat annexed onto the main care home, next to an unalarmed fire exit.

Niamh was a known self-harmer and Georgia was categorised as at high risk of absconding. They had both attempted suicide in the past. It was the unit’s policy not to accommodate young people with a history of self-harm or those at high risk of absconding in the small flat, yet the girls were placed there.

There should have been at least four staff working at the unit on the night of their deaths, but only two were on duty, one of whom spent part of the evening out running errands. The girls’ absence from the unit went undetected for approximately one hour and ten minutes, by which time they had jumped to their deaths.

In her judgment on the case, North Strathclyde Sheriff Ruth Anderson, argued that all residential care homes should carry out “stand alone” written risk assessments for each young person in their care, to consider their vulnerability to self-harm and suicide.

Anderson added that the Good Shepherd Unit’s management should have paid more attention to how severe bullying by another resident had affected Georgia.

She also criticised Argyll and Bute Council and Hull City Council for failing to provide the care home with “detailed, comprehensive, concise and readily accessible information” relating to the girls, including psychological assessments.

“There was a need for systems of communication (both verbal and documentary) to be set up and adhered to by all staff responsible for the care and safety of young persons to ensure that accurate and up-to-date information relating to an individual child was available to decision makers and to those responsible for day-to-day care,” she said.

Professor Stephen Platt, professor of health policy research at the Edinburgh University Centre for Population Health Sciences, gave evidence to the inquiry.

He called on local authorities to commission a set of guidelines for staff working with looked-after children about recognising and mitigating suicide risk.

Sarah Brennan, chief executive of Young Minds, said lessons must be learned from the “terrible tradgey”. “We need to urgently examine how we safeguard the mental health of looked-after children and young people,” she said.

“With 60 per cent of looked-after children and young people suffering from emotional and mental health problems it is vital that authorities identify, prioritise and act on the complex vulnerabilities of young people in their care.”