A DISGRACED social worker who failed to act on vital information about an abused Huddersfield toddler has been banned from working.

But Judyth Kenworthy, who was employed by Kirklees Council, will be able to return to her career after two years.

A disciplinary panel last night imposed the two-year suspension on Mrs Kenworthy, of Shepley, who failed to pass on information about the abuse of Deighton toddler Sanam Navsarka a week before she was murdered, and then lied about it.

She was guilty of misconduct, the panel found, but they did not strike her off the social care register.

Mrs Kenworthy was warned that Sanam had a bruise on her head and had been locked in a cupboard, but she did not act. In neglecting to do so, she was found to have put at risk the two-year-old, who died shortly afterwards in the wake of appalling mistreatment.

The social worker denied having been told about the cupboard incident, but a General Social Care Council committee in London found this to be untrue. She admitted failing to pass on warnings about the bruise on the child’s head, however, saying she had been “extremely busy” at the time and had dismissed the information as “tittle tattle”.

A spokesman for the panel said: “The registrant’s professional failings in 2008 were serious and multiple.

“She was a professional with 18 years experience in social care who had received training in Child Protection Law and Procedures. She failed to report alarming information that Child A (Sanam) had a bump on her forehead, believed to be caused non-accidentally and had been locked in a cupboard.

“Her omission was not in accordance with The Children Act 1989 and was an unambiguous breach of established child protection procedures and policies that she knew about.

“Although not her social worker, she failed Child A who died just over a week later”.

The spokesman added: “When interviewed by the police after Child A’s death, the registrant concealed information about what she knew about Child A being locked in a cupboard.

“The registrant knew it was an exceptionally important piece of information that was relevant to the police investigation into the cause of Child A’s death as it was a strong indicator of abuse.

“Her failure to relate even this information could have impaired the police investigation.”

She said there was little evidence that Mrs Kenworthy had learned from the errors and she had shown “limited evidence of remorse, insight and victim empathy”.

Mrs Kenworthy had acknowledged that she made a mistake in not acting on concerns about Sanam, of Riddings Road, who died on May 8, 2008 after suffering more than 100 injuries. Explaining why she had failed to pass on information about the bruise, she told the panel: “The only thing I can say is, I was extremely busy. I was trying to get to somewhere else, to go to an important meeting, and it was just one of those situations where it took over and that just didn’t register as being vitally important and that was the mistake I made.”

She added that she had never worked with children before.

Sanam’s mother’s partner, Subhan Anwar, was jailed for a minimum of 23 years for her murder, while her mother, Zahbeena Navsarka, was jailed for nine years for manslaughter.

Mrs Kenworthy had been warned about the child on May 1 2008 by Jacqueline Peel, who ran a home for vulnerable people.

The trial of Navsarka and Anwar at Bradford Crown Court in 2009 heard Sanam, who had fractures to all four limbs, died after fatty deposits from her broken thigh bones entered her bloodstream.

Her hand prints and blood stains were found inside cupboards where she had been put as a punishment.

A metal pole was used to shatter Sanam’s leg and she was bruised and battered repeatedly in the four weeks before her death.