We are the social work champions

Melanie John-Ross is Children’s Social Work Matters lead and executive director of children’s services at Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council

Children’s social work teams have historically had to deal with ever-rising case numbers, negative public perceptions and high vacancy rates, often against a backdrop of austerity, budget cuts and adverse publicity. Throw a global pandemic into the mix and it is no surprise children’s social work teams up and down the country are now under more pressure than ever before. In Yorkshire and the Humber, the picture is no different.

Ten years ago, Children’s Social Work Matters (CSWM) was launched to champion the vital role of children’s social workers and raise standards, as well as tackle other major issues such as high agency and vacancy rates, myths and misconceptions about the role, and low morale.

To do this, children’s social work teams in all 15 of the region’s local authorities made a leap of faith. We began by building links between stakeholders at all levels and at every opportunity. A major focus was encouraging and supporting teams and individuals to be open and honest about practice challenges, but also to highlight how rewarding our line of work can be.

We launched our website in 2011. It provides a wealth of information about the role of children’s social workers, including case studies, qualifications needed and routes into the profession. This, together with a series of awareness-raising campaigns, has resulted in staff reporting a boost in morale and confidence and better acknowledgement in the community of the status and importance of the role.

A jobs page, featuring vacancies from across the region, was added to the site in 2013. The initial response was phenomenal, with some local authorities reporting a 200 per cent increase in job applications during the programme’s third year. As a region, we have since consistently achieved lower than national average workforce vacancy, turnover and agency worker rates (see graphic).

An internal portal was also introduced in 2013, which provides a platform where children’s social workers from across our region can share knowledge, resources and best practice. The site has around 5,000 registered practitioners, students and academics.

Online and in-person events play a huge role in our approach to training, learning and sharing knowledge, and we have hosted wide-ranging activities attended by thousands of registered users. Our Festival of Social Work conferences, for example, are a platform to both celebrate and educate, and recognise children’s social workers’ achievements and feature keynote sessions from sector experts and those with care experience. We have also hosted a series of interactive, information-sharing workshops led by colleagues, parents and young people, covering topics such as workforce resilience, poverty, neglect, accreditation and transitional safeguarding.

Such issues have always been at the forefront of children’s social work practice, but the pandemic only served to exacerbate them, resulting in a spike in demand for our services.

When the pandemic first hit, we were in the lucky position of having a well-established infrastructure in place to support our children’s social workers at a time when they needed it most. This included the continuation of regular online events and meetings via our secure, online portal, allowing everyone to share good practice and implement different ways of working with families during the lockdowns.

Several partner authorities used our webinar platform to deliver local training. Our online portal allowed the regional principal social worker group to meet more frequently, which meant collaborative planning could take place at a regional, more senior level. We also held an online, interactive event to help support effective practice and child safety during the lockdowns, covering topics from staff working arrangements and wellbeing, to online safety and emotional support for children in care.

Those well-established regional partnerships proved to be invaluable during those difficult months. Without those trusted, close connections we would not have been able to have such open and frank conversations about the challenges we were all facing. This made it much easier to implement better working practices with all stakeholders, including neighbouring authorities and adult social care teams.

We are living in a very different world to a decade ago, not just because of the pandemic. With the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care in England reporting a 24 per cent rise nationally in the number of children entering the care system in the past 10 years, the CSWM programme is just as relevant now as it was when it started, if not more so.

Increasing numbers of families living in poverty and the ongoing refugee crisis, are just two examples of issues that will inevitably continue to impact on how we deliver and develop our services. Transitional safeguarding for young people entering adulthood is another area where we will be sharing knowledge and expertise on a multi-agency level.

While there are no quick or easy answers, the CSWM programme has made significant progress in addressing some of the issues faced by our children’s social workers and in recent years we have been approached by other children’s services teams in England looking to replicate our model.

In the past 10 years, the model has resulted in collective cost savings of more than £700,000 for local authorities in Yorkshire and the Humber. Much of these have been achieved by local authorities advertising their jobs on our website, rather than externally, and through delivering events internally, online and at a discounted rate.

The feedback from colleagues, partners and stakeholders has been overwhelmingly positive. CSWM gives our children’s social workers a voice, allowing innovative practice to be highlighted, celebrated and shared for the benefit of those needing our services.

The development, growth and success of the programme has been due – in no small part – to the long-standing commitment of all our local authorities and our many established working groups. As pressures continue to increase and with budgets squeezed, we need to stay one step ahead, not least when it comes to ensuring our staff feel valued and supported. We know working and learning together as one big children’s social work team is helping us improve outcomes for the children and families we strive to support and protect.

FACTFILE Children’s Social Work Matters (CSWM)

What is it? A collaboration between all 15 of Yorkshire and the Humber’s local authority children’s services departments to champion children’s social work.

Who is involved? Barnsley Council, Bradford Council, Calderdale Council, City of York Council, Doncaster Children’s Services Trust, East Riding of Yorkshire Council, Hull City Council, Kirklees Council, Leeds City Council, NE Lincolnshire Council, North Lincolnshire Council, North Yorkshire Council, Rotherham Council, Sheffield City Council, Wakefield Council.

How is it staffed? The programme employs a full-time programme manager. Up to 30 colleagues and academics from across the region are voluntarily involved in planning and delivering events, campaigns and answering questions from the public.

How is it funded? The programme was set up and funded through a £150,000 Regional Improvement and Efficiency Programme investment for the first two years. In subsequent years, local authorities have each contributed £7,500 annually – a total of £112,500 per year.

CHILDREN’S SOCIAL WORK SHOULD BE CELEBRATED

By Sasha Midgley, advanced practitioner, NE Lincolnshire Council

The final placement of my social work degree was with one of North East Lincolnshire Council’s frontline teams and nine years on, I’m still here. I initially worked in referral and assessment, progressing to more complex cases before becoming an advanced practitioner. My role is to support staff, particularly newly qualified staff and those on work placements. I also promote social work in schools, colleges and universities.

The CSWM programme has been a positive experience. It supported my development as a children’s social worker and now helps me support the development of my team. I recently worked with CSWM on a campaign to promote jobs in our area. Some of my colleagues were featured on their website and on social media, which gave them a sense of pride and achievement.

One of the hardest parts of the job is not always having the answer to everything. We rely on each other for kindness, compassion and a listening ear. CSWM provides an additional layer of support, particularly during challenging times, which gives everyone a real sense of community. At the start of Covid, we had a lot of newly qualified social workers who needed training and emotional support. In the absence of face-to-face contact, we were able to do this via CSWM’s secure online platform.

There are so many wonderful aspects to our role. Every day children’s social workers achieve positive outcomes and this should be celebrated regionally and nationally. For parents, carers, children and young people, having a children’s social worker shouldn’t be seen as something negative but as an opportunity for support to make positive change. The more it is spoken about openly, and the less it is stigmatised, the better the outcomes on recruitment, morale, retention and for children and families.