A psychiatrist told jurors the mother, who had also ended a relationship with her boyfriend, may have been 'retaliating' against men.

In the note, Kumari-Baker wrote: 'Jeff hurt me so much I cannot explain.'

Meanwhile, Cambridgeshire County Council announced it was launching a serious case review to look into what happened, as the spotlight turned on the role of the local authority and their handling of the family.

The trial heard that teachers at Davina's former school had a number of concerns about her and held several meetings with Kumari-Baker in 2004, during one of which the mother told her daughter: 'I wish you were dead.'

Her local doctor told the court that in 2003 Kumari-Baker was diagnosed as suffering from 'reactive stress with mild depressive features' and referred to a counsellor.

In a statement read out by his brother, the girls' father David Baker said of Kumari-Baker: 'I take comfort in the knowledge that I will in time be with my girls again. She will not.'

'Not a day passes when I don't think of my girls. Part of my heart was taken when they died and I long for the day when we shall be reunited.'