Bring on the 48-hour alert

And who isn't? My son is the same age as Madeleine and he often asked about the posters of her in the weeks following her disappearance. (I told him she got lost on her holidays and that is why he must always stay close to mummy.)

With this week's release of the police files, for a few seconds I allowed myself to be hopeful. Now we can see the contents of the dossier and pore over them in the way the McCanns must be doing, examining all the leads in shock and disbelief. How could they not release the e-fits, the video footage, the sightings? Surely there is an answer somewhere here?

It is all far too little, way too late. It has been obvious for a long time that the Portuguese police were out of their depth. How does criticising them help anyone? We are seeing only the tip of the iceberg of this "evidence" and it doesn't take a master detective to see how impossible it is to pick apart the useful from the fantastical.

The false leads in this case are mind-blowing. So many CCTV images of blurry blonde girls who are obviously not Madeleine and the thousands of sightings which are taking on an Elvis-like quality.

In the absence of any facts or evidence, this case quickly became about blaming the police or the parents - and not the person who took her. Of course, the police should have done more. But the only time their actions really mattered was in the first 48 hours after Madeleine disappeared.

After that they stood little chance. Even by the early hours that same night she could have been in another country. The problem was not so much incompetence or missed leads.

It was that no alert was put in place in the hours after she vanished.

That is what the McCanns have campaigned for - so far without success. There should be a formal procedure that automatically kicks in whenever a missing child is reported. No police force should ever have to think twice about what they are supposed to do in this situation. They should just do it, instantly. Instead there was no form to follow: no rapid response unit, no borders closed, no official alert.

This is the lesson to be taken from this tragic mess. Because the chilling fact that has got lost is this: no matter what Madeleine's fate, the person - or group - who thought they could get away with stealing a child is still at large. Without a standard alert system, there is no reason to think they won't do it again.