SOCIAL work bosses today defended splitting up a schoolgirl from her sisters despite their mums dying wish to keep them together and insisted noone would be sacked.

Hampshire County Council has been heavily criticised in an independent report over the care of 15-year-old Emma Bursey from the Lymington area of the New Forest.

Social workers separated Emma and her two younger sisters, who cannot be named for legal reasons, in 1995 after the death of their mother, Maureen.

She had begged carers, as she lay dying of cancer, to keep them together because they would be orphans.

The childrens father, Tony, had died of a heart attack 11 months earlier.

Emma, who lives with foster parents while her two sisters have been adopted, saw her family only ten times in the two years after her mums death.

Emma was also not allowed to listen to her mums last taped, poignant message to her until she demanded to hear it.

She has since called for those responsible to be sacked or demoted.

But in an exclusive interview with the Daily Echo, assistant director for children and family services Steve Love said the department would not be sacking anybody. He said: "No one person involved made an overriding decision. We do not believe its appropriate to take disciplinary action."

Mr Love defended some of the departments actions but admitted that social workers had not properly listened or explained the adoption of the sisters to Emma.

But he explained the decision was not solely that of social services.

"The decision about the adoption was made after a reviewing or planning conference by social workers and then a Guardian Ad Litem, who independently reports to the court. The Guardian Ad Litem and a High Court judge said, on balance, it was the right thing to do.

"We tried our best to keep the family together every effort was made but we did not believe we had a suitable family to take all three children at that time.

"Although the focus of reports has been on Emma, social services had to look at the interests of all three children. The process was subject to eighth degree scrutiny, we do not have the wisdom of Solomon," explained Mr Love.

He added: "Its disappointing and distressing not to be able to meet the mothers wish. I think we have met it for the younger sisters but unfortunately not for Emma."

Mr Love admitted that mistakes had been made because social workers had not done a good enough job explaining to Emma why her sisters were being adopted.

He said: "If we had explained fully to Emma about what was going on with the adoption then we may not have had this difficulty.

"We accept that from Emmas point of view she feels she has not had enough access. We will bring about circumstances where access is acceptable to everyone," he said.

But Mr Love admitted the care was not good enough. "Given the cards we were dealt we did the best we could but we realise the practice has fallen short of the standards expected."

Mr Love refused to comment on the issue of the taped message from Emmas mother. He also refused to comment on whether he considered the practice of the social workers involved to be bad. But he has released details of the action plan social services bosses will put in place for Emma and in the hope that similar mistakes do not happen again.

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