The British Association of Social Work Conference April 2014

Isabelle Trowler

Chief Social Worker for England

Children & Families

Current Key Messages

Critical importance of family and community

Beyond good exam results and good dentistry

Proportionate state intervention

Low-level impact of early intervention on high risk

families??

Empathy not blame. Support not punishment (Selwyn et

al 2014)

We must rethink skill set and practice support

Towards a theory of service

Practice Skill

Regulation and endorsement

Knowledge and Skills

Initial qualifications

Assessed year in employment

Licence to practice – refocusing on responsibility

Teaching Partnerships (supply and demand)

Rethinking Children’s Social Work

Building on Munro

The watchers

Responsibility with authority

Retention & practice based career pathways

Bureaucracy at its best

Who does what? The role of health and the non-

qualified

Rethinking Support For Adolescents

Looks at support for adolescent entrants or potential entrants

to the care system and those in residential care

Adolescents (11+) account for 39% of care entrants, and are

at increased risk of having multiple placements, cycling in

and out of care, and facing problems on leaving care

Adolescents make up the bulk of children in residential care

but only 9% of the total number of children in care. We spend

a third of our total spend, or £1 billion, on their care

6

Context: Vulnerable Children

The number of children supported by children’s social care is increasing

1 Department for Education, Characteristics of children in need in England : 2012 to 2013. Estimates of children in need started being collected in 2009/10

7

Context: Spend On Children’s Social Care

And annual gross expenditure on children’s social care is increasing

This is in the context of significant cuts to other LA budgets

1 Department for Education, Section 251 data collection, budget summary 2008-09 to 20013-14. Collection of expenditure on children’s services began in 2008-09 in the S25 collection. LA functions in relation to child protection is grouped together with the line on commissioning and social work in the 2012/13 and 2013/14 planned expenditure releases. Previously the two items were separate.

8

The system doesn’t appear to incentivise or support better-performing LAs to innovate and improve.

1 Proportion of children looked after continuously for at least 12 months attaining five A*-Cs at GCSE minus proportion of all children attaining five A*-Cs

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Comparing across LAs, there is unacceptable variation in proxy measures of outcomes, quality, value and pace of improvement

17.2%

67.1%

95.3%

80%

£686,389

£3,720,353

4%

-1.4%

1 Proportion of children looked after continuously for at least 12 months attaining five A*-Cs at GCSE minus proportion of all children attaining five A*-Cs

Towards A Theory Of Service

SCRs, Ofsted, evidence and innovation

Lead responsibility for child protection is with local government

(not social work)

Usual suspects in unusual roles?

Focus on decisions about children key focus

Too much ££ spent on plugging the gaps – deficit model

Engagement with the challenge, not a random solution

Sign up at a system level

Accelerate and replicate