A CHILD care worker has been struck off over an “inappropriate personal relationship” with a 15-year-old girl in her care.
Amanda McDonald worked at Moore House Care and Education in Bathgate, West Lothian, a school for teens with serious emotional and behavioural issues.
She was said to have sent text messages to a child which contained “inappropriate affectionate language” as well as swearing.
The texts also contained “inappropriate and offensive language directed towards [her] employer”, a Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) panel found.
She was also found to have taken her own child to meet one of the school’s service users.
Six charges of misconduct, relating to April and March last year, were found proved against Ms McDonald at the hearing last month.
She was suspended from her post at Moore House after concerns were raised about her.
The SSSC panel said Ms McDonald sent the texts to a 15-year-old child, named only as BB in the hearing, after being told not to communicate with any children at the school while she was suspended.
The SSSC panel said: “The text messages disclosed that [Ms McDonald] had been suspended by her employer.
“[Ms McDonald] should not have communicated this information to BB.
“The text messages included inappropriate affectionate language and also abusive language including profanities. It was wholly inappropriate for the Registrant to have communicated with BB in this way.”
The panel said Ms McDonald also took her own child to a meeting with another service user at the school, who was named only as AA in the hearing.
They said: “It was also wholly inappropriate for [Ms Mcdonald] to ask service user AA to collude with [her] in keeping the fact that [her] children accompanied her on her contact meeting from her employer.”
The panel said Ms McDonald “ought to have known that it was not in BB’s best interests for her to form an inappropriate personal relationship with BB.”
Announcing their decision to strike the residential child care worker off, the panel said they were “concerned that the misconduct was very serious, that it involved potential harm to service users and to others, it also involved dishonesty, and a serious failure on [Ms McDonald’s] part to adhere to professional standards.”
Ms McDonald was not present and not represented at the hearing.
A spokesman for Moore House said: “As soon as we became aware of concerns about Amanda McDonald’s conduct she was immediately suspended from her post.
“We conducted an investigation and then referred the matter matter to the Scottish
