Implementation of social work agency price caps delayed

This signals a delay in implementing the caps - which were due to come into force this year - to reduce high levels of council spending on hiring agency workers. The plans are included in the government’s response to the Care Review.

Draft guidance, published by DfE on the use of regional caps and on data sharing around the use of agency workers states: “Each local authority should submit their price caps by Thursday 27 March 2025. It is expected that price caps should then be adhered to for all new assignments from 1 April 2025.”

• Recruitment agency practices compound workforce pressures

• Ban or regulation: steps to tackle agency dominance of workforce

It places a duty on local authorities to categorise the use of agency social workers into five groups:

• Social worker – practitioners expected to hold cases independently.

• Senior social worker – experienced practitioners with responsibility for more complex cases, who may also supervise students, less experienced colleagues and volunteers.

• Advanced practitioner – including assistant team managers and principal social workers whose role involves driving practice improvement.

• Team manager – those responsible for managing staff in a specific service and/or geographical area.

• Independent reviewing officer or child protection conference chair – practitioners who review the cases of children in care or oversee child protection conferences.

The guidance states that councils must complete the job mapping exercise by 13 September. A template to support the exercise will be published this summer, DfE’s document adds.

Under the guidance, councils must also submit two data sets each quarter - one providing details of each agency social workers hired and the other providing general information on agency usage during the quarter.

Data must include details such as workers hourly rate, total hours, whether they are paid through an umbrella company, a limited company or via PAYE, whether they were hired on an individual basis or as part of a managed or project team and how long it took the authority to fill the role.

The general data required includes the total cost of the agency workforce during the relevant quarter and the council’s level of compliance with the agency rules.

Any use of managed teams or project teams by local authorities, which sees councils hire entire teams from agencies, should also be included in the data sets.

An investigation into the use of managed teams by CYP Now shows that 43% of local authorities commissioned a managed team between 2017 and 2022, amounting to a total cost of £41mn across all councils.

The data will be used by local authorities to agree and implement price caps for each of the five roles listed in job mapping exercises by 27 March 2025, the guidance adds.

Caps could be exceeded with the sign-off of the council’s director of children’s services or chief executive, along with any additional requirements agreed by regions.

This would then need to be reported to regional partners and to the DfE, the guidance explains.