Footnotes

• Contributors Heather Bacon is a retired consultant clinical psychologist, specialising in child protection. At the time of the Cleveland crisis, she was the child clinical psychologist in North Tees and worked with the children involved, also giving evidence to the Butler Sloss Inquiry. Sue Richardson is now an independent attachment-based psychotherapist. At the time of the Cleveland crisis, she was the child abuse consultant to the Cleveland local authority and was a key figure in the crisis and in the Butler Sloss Inquiry. Following the crisis, both authors continued to be involved as practitioners in the field of child protection and with adult survivors of child sexual abuse and have written extensively on the subject of child sexual abuse.

• Competing interests None declared.

• Patient consent for publication Not required.

• Provenance and peer review Commissioned; externally peer reviewed.