The grieving mother of two teenage twin sisters who took their own lives after suffering sexual abuse and mental health problems has said opportunities to save them were missed.
Sam and Chris Gould, from Fulbourn, Cambridgeshire, aged 16 and 17, died within four months of each other after struggling to cope with the consequences of the abuse that they suffered as children.
Their mother Jane Cannon has now said 'there were many opportunities early on' to save her daughters, and that they were missed by the authorities.
It comes as two reports, published by Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Safeguarding Children Partnership Board, came up with around 20 recommendations for improvements across the two cases.
Sam and Chris Gould, from Fulbourn, Cambridgeshire, died within four months of each other after suffering sexual abuse as children
Ms Cannon told ITV News Anglia: 'If the issues that they had had been spotted earlier, treated earlier, if the professionals at an earlier stage had been more curious, we think there were many opportunities early on to help them.
'Opportunities to stop the abuse happening at a much earlier stage and give them the care and therapy they needed. Clearly, the longer it went on the worse it got for the girls and for us and the harder it would have been to make a difference.
'But there was never a point that anyone gave up. There were many opportunities that we believe that, had things happened differently, we would be in a completely different place.'
The sexual abuse of the twins began when they were around six-years-old, and living in Hampshire, and continued for several years, the coroner heard.
While their teachers saw worrying behaviour early on, including Sam pulling out her hair and eyelashes, it was only when Sam began self-harming at the age of 13 that support was offered, by which time the family had moved to Cambridgeshire.
Chris took an overdose for the first time at the age of 14 and while in hospital, admitted she too had been self-harming.
In May 2016, a police investigation was launched when Chris
