THE violent death of a two-year-old girl in her home must be a catalyst for change in Victorian child protection, a coroner says.Coroner John Olle says the girl was let down by the authorities and her life may have been saved if the child protection system had been designed to prevent abuse before it occurred.There is a need for an independent body to be established to protect the interests of children, he says.In the finding delivered yesterday, Mr Olle said the girl known as Hayley died a month after sustaining head injuries, which were likely inflicted by her father, Robert, and possibly also his girlfriend, at a country Victorian home in July 2009.He said the injuries appeared to have occurred in an “aggressive and violent atmosphere fuelled by the excessive consumption of alcohol by the adults present”.But he said it remained unclear what injury caused Hayley’s death and which of the two people were responsible.It is clear, however, that Robert had extremely poor parenting skills and was unable to cope with a two-year-old, Mr Olle said.Hayley was let down by two organisations in charge of protecting children, Victoria Police and the Department of Human Services (DHS), who had failings in their investigations into earlier injuries sustained by Hayley, the coroner said.Child-protection organisations also failed to effectively share information about Hayley and her family, Mr Olle found.But he said he could not conclude that these failings led to her death.“It is likely that a child-protection system designed to prevent abuse before it occurs was Hayley’s best chance of survival. This is the single biggest learning from this investigation,” Mr Olle said.