An investigation into child protection services in Birmingham has found that they are “not fit for purpose”.

Councillors on Birmingham City Council carried out the investigation after eight children known to social services died in the space of only four years as a result of suspected neglect and abuse.

Among them was Khyra Ishaq, a seven-year-old girl from Handsworth, who was allegedly starved to death last year.

According to the report, social services were guilty of “a decade of underperformance”, with dozens of initiatives and projects being launched and then shelved, resulting in little improvement.

Lack of senior management was a “major risk” and a shortage of experienced staff “hampered progress”. One in five social workers was off work sick at any one time, undermining any continuity of care for children at risk.

Child referrals, a crucial stage in the protection process, had been often made by “inexperienced staff with insufficient management oversight”. The report committee was also “shocked and dismayed” by the standard of accommodation at some of the council’s residential children’s homes.

“Our findings demonstrated an extremely fragile management structure and the inevitable conclusion is that the current social work model is not fit for purpose,” the report concluded.

There are 1,400 children on the at-risk register with a further 2,400 in contact with social workers.

Councillors stepped in after Ofsted, which regulates standards of groups which look after children in the UK, judged the department to be inadequate when inspectors reviewed the work of eight authorities known to have problems after the tragedy of Baby P, later revealed as Peter. The Government has given the department a year to improve its performance or have new managers parachuted in.

One expert who has recently visited social workers in the city told The Times this week that it was the “classic problem” of managers not communicating with staff. “The social workers I met appeared to have been sent out to do their visits with very little support, feeling that their managers had no idea where they were or how much danger they were in,” she said.

The report said current structures were “patently not working”, adding that urgent investment was needed. Overall, the quality of case files for children in care was not adequate.

Like Haringey, which had the death of Peter, Birmingham had its own wake-up call in 2003 with the death of Toni-Ann Byfield. She died when social services let her visit the man she thought was her father in London. He was a convicted drug dealer and both were shot and killed at his bedsit in a hostel for ex-offenders.

Major changes were promised but only minor reforms took place.

Tony Howells has been strategic director for children, young people and families in Birmingham since April 2006. Last night he blamed the cumbersome burden of record-keeping for stopping social workers from seeing families in their care.