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The reform programme, outlined by Moira Gibb in the Social Work Task Force report, is still very much part of the Government’s agenda. Proposals to strengthen initial and post-qualifying training, to ensure that new social workers get a better deal and to see that long term career development linked to a new continuing professional development (CPD) culture, are being developed by the Reform Board, and Ministers support the Reform Board’s efforts to develop a plan for delivering the task force recommendations.
The Board’s priorities for the next year are likely to focus on:
- improving the quality of entrants to social work
- better social work education and training
- boosting support for current social workers especially in CPD
- establishing a new overarching set of standards for the profession
- publishing a standard for employers which will spell out what they need to do to support social workers
Alongside this work, Professor Eileen Munro is pressing ahead with the work she has been asked to do which is specifically about social work in child protection, aiming to see how social workers can be better supported and, where possible, freed up from the old reporting systems that got in the way. She has already attended meetings of some Reform Board working groups and will be at the next meeting of the Reform Board itself in September. It is clear that Moira Gibb and Eileen Munro will be working to ensure that the reforms they back are as well aligned as possible.
Many of the reforms proposed need the support and involvement of the GSCC. It is our intention to continue to support the work of the Reform Board and to seek to ensure that any changes that we are called on to make - to ensure that regulation supports the new arrangements - are made in such a way that they will survive the transfer of GSCC functions to HPC.
A key part of the reform programme will be the Assessed Year in Employment Programme and this will be developed on the basis of what we have learned from the Newly Qualified Social Worker Programmes run by the Children’s Workforce Development Council and Skills for Care.
For more information about the role and priorities of the Social Work Reform Programme, please see a copy of the Reform Board’s letter to ministers reporting on progress and outlining priorities for the next year.
Newly Qualified Social Worker Programme |
If you are starting your first job as a qualified social worker with children and families this autumn, ask your employer about the Newly Qualified Social Worker (NQSW) Programme. The NQSW programme, supported by the Children’s Workforce Development Council, enables your employer to offer you, over your first 12 months:
Over the past two years, nearly 3,000 NQSWs working in local authority children’s services and voluntary organisations have joined the programme. For more information and to see which employers are taking part, please visit www.cwdcouncil.org.uk/nqsw |
