FOSTER parents of a baby snatched by his mother and sex offender father are upset by his abduction, a social services chief says.

And Roger Bone, director of social services for Blaenau Gwent, revealed that the baby had been in care since his birth.

The eight-month-old boy, named locally as Nathan, was snatched from social services care on Monday, when his mother, Helene Baker, 37, from Riverside Drive, Blaenavon, failed to return from an unsupervised visit with him.

Police revealed that his father, Gerald Baker, 46, of Clydach Street, Brynmawr, was a sex offender with seven sex offence convictions on his record - the latest when he was jailed for three years in 1998 at Bournemouth crown court for indecently assaulting a boy under 14.

The couple picked up tickets for the Portsmouth to Cherbourg crossing at 12.45pm on Monday, and police believe they travelled to France. Officers are now liaising with Interpol in the hunt for them, but say they could be anywhere on the Continent.

Mr Bone said the snatched baby was born at Nevill Hall Hospital, in Abergavenny, just before Christmas last year.

He said yesterday that a pre-birth case conference had decided the child should be taken into care immediately afterwards.

The baby boy was placed with foster parents within the county borough when he left hospital, and has been looked after by them ever since.

Mr Bone said the foster parents were naturally very upset about the child's abduction, and that they were being supported through this difficult time. He told the Argus that the child had been taken into care because of concerns about the baby's father.

At first Baker and the child's mother were allowed supervised access to their baby.

"This was within a council building with somebody watching closely what was happening," said Mr Bone.

Later the couple split up - and a decision was later made to begin allowing Mrs Baker unsupervised access.

"At first she was unsupervised within the building, and this was gradually built up to allow her to take the baby for a walk up to the town centre," said Mr Bone.

He added that apart from returning just a few minutes late on occasions, there had been no problems with her unsupervised visits, which took place four times a week.

When she failed to return from her visit on Monday lunchtime, he said she was allowed "a little leeway" - but her absence was reported to the police after just over an hour.

"She was due to return at 1pm, and the police were informed about a possible abduction at 2.15pm," said Mr Bone, adding he believed that was a reasonable and considered response.

He added that "short of a massive dose of hindsight", there was no indication of what had been about to happen. Meetings had already been held to establish if anything else could be done, he said, and everything had been gone over with "a fine- tooth comb".

But he said at the moment it did not appear that anything could have been done to foresee the abduction.

"We don't take a child away from its parents and into care lightly, so obviously we are very concerned," he added.

"We felt at the time that the child was not safe to be with his mum and dad, and now he is with them. On the positive side, however, the child's mum cares for the child and looks after him."

l Anyone with information about the couple's whereabouts should contact Ebbw Vale police station on 01495 350999.