just some of the facts for you.
At a meeting of council officials on July 25 last year, a lawyer advised social workers that the evidence Baby P was being abused was not strong enough to warrant removing the child from his mother.
On August 3, Baby P was found dead. One lawyer has been given a written warning, along with two social workers.
John Suddaby, Haringey's head of legal services, admitted last night to The Sunday Telegraph that it was "of concern" that such advice had been given.
At the time, Mr Suddaby was deputy head of legal services, acting up in the top role following the departure of his predecessor. Following Baby P's death he was promoted to the top job in March this year, on an annual salary of £120,000.
He is the latest figure at the beleaguered council to be accused of serious failings. It can also be revealed that concerns that social workers were failing to protect children in Haringey, north London, were raised a year before Baby P was tortured and killed.
Residents told councillors as far back as 2006 that they believed children were in danger and that they feared a repeat of the murder of eight-year-old Victoria Climbie, who was tortured to death in Haringey in 2000.
A report into Baby P's death overseen by Sharon Shoesmith, Haringey's head of children's services who has come under intense pressure to resign over the latest tragedy, has not been published in full.
The executive summary, which was disclosed last week, suggests that:
:: One of the factors in Baby P's death was a delay in holding legal meetings and in providing legal advice on whether social workers could justify moves to have the toddler removed from his mother
:: Legal advice was given by recently-recruited lawyers whose work was not checked by a senior member of staff
:: The council was short of experienced specialist child protection lawyers and did not have systems in place to obtain advice from outside firms.
Asked why his team advised social workers that the threshold for initiating care proceedings for Baby P had not been met, Mr Suddaby, a barrister who previously worked as a trade union official, said: "That's obviously of concern and is one of the things that will be looked at."
But the lawyer, who lives in a 1930s semi-detached house in the north London suburb of Muswell Hill -- a few miles from the house in which Baby P was killed -- refused to comment further on the case.
Six days after his department advised that Baby P should not be taken into care - and three days before the little boy was killed - Mr Suddaby accepted a "badge of quality" from the Law Society on behalf of Haringey's legal department, which council leader George Meehan said meant the team was "among the best in the country".
In his spare time the lawyer sings for the Crouch End Festival Chorus, a leading amateur choir which sang with rock band Oasis at this year's BBC Electric Proms in Camden, north London.
Baby P, who was 17 months old, suffered more than 50 injuries while living with his mother, 27, her boyfriend,32, and their lodger Jason Owen, 36, despite being on the "at risk" register and receiving 60 visits from health and social workers. The three adults will be sentenced next month for allowing or causing the child's death, and have been told they face a "significant term in prison".
Ed Balls, the Children's Secretary, has ordered an inquiry into the affair but opposition politicians warned that any investigation should carefully examine any failings by Mr Suddaby's department.
Michael Gove, the shadow children's secretary, said: "We know there are serious question marks over the council lawyers' handling of this issue. The public will be rightly concerned that the man who led Haringey's legal response to the Baby P case has subsequently been promoted."
Lynne Featherstone, the local Liberal Democrat MP, said: "The legal department has got off lightly so far in terms of scrutiny. It is clear there have been failings in that department."
A Department for Children, Schools and Families spokeswoman said: "The remit is very wide and it will look at everything the serious case review has brought up."
On Friday more than 60 Haringey headteachers joined forces to write a letter in support of Ms Shoesmith, describing her as "an outstanding public servant" and suggesting that children in the borough would lose one of their most "committed champions" if she were made to resign.
However, fears raised by residents about standards at Haringey council were so credible that in October 2006 a member of the council's cross-party Overview and Scrutiny Committee committee, Martin Newton, requested a full review of child protection.
Yet the Labour-controlled authority took eight months before deciding to carry out a feasibility study into whether a review was even necessary.
In January this year -- five months after Baby P died -- Ms Shoesmith recommended that a full review was not necessary. The committee rejected that decision but the review has still not been published.
Mr Newton, a Liberal Democrat councillor, said: "We raised serious concerns that the recommendations from the inquiry into the death of Victoria Climbie had not been implemented and that children were at risk of abuse."
He was prompted to act after his wife Gail Engert, also a Haringey councillor, received letters and other approaches from residents expressing concern that social workers were failing to identify cases of parental abuse -- and also removing children from families unnecessarily.
Ms Ingert said: "The sources were credible. The only way we, as the opposition, could get to the truth of this was to ask for a review, but those in power kicked it into the long grass - and it is clear now that the concerns were very real."
Families said they had been victimised after making complaints. One parent said she was forced to resign as a school governor after making complaints
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