UNISON's
approach
Implement the UNISON/BASW social work manifesto to help
people change their lives by reducing bureaucracy, improving
staffing levels, effective workload management and accountability.
BACKGROUND AND OUTLOOK
UNISON Scotland believes that excellently provided, publicly
funded social care services are an essential part of a caring
and compassionate society. To deliver these services
requires supporting the people who deliver them, as they
are essential to the quality of service provided.
The Scottish Government needs to ensure that social work
staff are trained, supported and resourced to undertake
the often difficult and complex tasks required by service
users.
The recent increase in demand across the whole range of
social work services, from home care to child protection,
criminal justice to services for people with learning disabilities,
has not been matched by an increase in available resources.
This means that staff are constantly overstretched, leading
to stress and burnout, which can result in deterioration
in the quality of service.
Negative Portrayal of Social Work
We are concerned at the current negative portrayal
of social work in the media and the tendency to treat social
work staff as scapegoats when things go wrong. Newspaper
editors and politicians are too ready to highlight individual
failings instead of recognising the enormous achievements
of social care with extremely limited resources. Politicians
and the media should recognise that social work staff are
employed in difficult circumstances with the most vulnerable
people in the community. They would be better served challenging
these negative portrayals of the service and doing more
to promote a positive understanding of the role of social
care workers.
UNISON /BASW Manifesto
UNISON Scotland, in partnership with the British
Association of Social Workers (BASW) recently produced a
ten-point manifesto for improving the way social workers
carry out their duties in Scotland.
The manifesto arose out of the Scottish Government’s
21st Century Review and subsequent Changing
Lives report, together with the recently introduced
regulatory framework, including the registration of staff
and inspection of services, both of which were welcomed
by UNISON.
However, much is still to be done and there are several
areas identified in the manifesto that we would wish to
be addressed by a future Government to continue the good
work contained in Changing Lives
Workload Management
Workload management is key to ensuring that tasks
allocated to staff are manageable and allow sufficient time
for them to use their skills appropriately and meet the
demands that are placed upon them. All employers must
be made to introduce effective workload management systems.
We believe that a time-based scheme can be applied universally
in all settings but this does not mean that it has to be
prescriptive and it must provide for local variations.
In addition, it would have to take into account the individuality
of the worker, e.g. a newly qualified worker would take
longer over most tasks than experienced workers.
Bureaucracy
Social workers accept that report writing is part
of their job, as clearly records have to be kept of work
carried out. However, increased requirements can result
in some children or families having at least 8 reports or
assessments being carried out on them at any one time.
Clearly a reduction in bureaucracy should be implemented
by employers, although this must be driven by government.
Staffing Levels
Guidelines should be produced for local authorities
on appropriate levels of staffing to meet the needs of communities
which should be monitored by the inspection process.
The guidelines should take account of safety and assessment
requirements as well as the demographics and poverty indices.
Supervision, support, mentoring and consultation
Working with people where meeting need, assessing
risk and ensuring human rights are respected is a skilled
task. Whilst workers are responsible for their own
level of decision making and recommendations, they need
access to good quality support and supervision to do the
job. This provides quality assurance; learning and
development; support and shared decision making.
Accountability
All social service workers are accountable for
their professional conduct through the Code of Practice
for Employees and ethical social work is also promoted through
training and professional development. However, although
employers have begun to be accountable through the Inspection
Agency and Care Commission procedures, we believe that employers
must fulfil their responsibilities under the SSSC Code of
Practice for Employers to support staff and service users.
Reporting Problems
All staff must be able to identify and report problems
within workplaces as an essential part of improving services.
Staff can feel reluctant to report problems for fear that
they will be blamed. A non-blame culture where problems
can be discussed and addressed with support is critical.
Strong unions and professional organisations can assist
with this.
Career and Reward Structure
Clearer career paths and reward structures must
be introduced to enable experienced practitioners to be
valued and remain in practice whilst moving on in their
careers. Often the only promoted posts are in management
and away from the frontline. We need the development
of Social Care Leaders in workplaces, not just in management
teams.
Accessibility
Social services are for all people, not just the
poor or disadvantaged. Most of us will use services
at some time in our lives, whether we are old, or have to
care for elderly parents, need to use a nursery for our
children, have adoption or mental health issues. Some
social work offices are old, run down and depressing to
service users or staff. Modern, bright, welcoming
workplaces that people are happy to visit or work in are
essential.
Communities
Achieving safe, strong and cohesive communities
is part of the role of social service workers. Families’
problems cannot be addressed in isolation and there needs
to be more investment in community and group work where
social work professionals employed by local authorities
and the community and voluntary sector could build on building
capacity in the communities and address poverty, lack of
resources and fear which have an adverse affect on our communities.
Resources
Increased spending across Scotland in recent years
has not managed to keep pace with demands of governments
and communities. Cuts in budgets are leading to real
fears about service cuts in the near future at a time when
increasing levels of unemployment, homeless and poverty
will place even greater demands on the services needed.
Now, more than ever, social work needs additional resources
to meet these challenges.
Social work staff are expected to perform miracles by helping
people to change their lives. However, with increasing
demands upon them, it becomes difficult to maintain the
high standards they set themselves. The above issues
all need to be address in the near future to support social
work staff to maintain and surpass these standards.
KEY QUESTIONS
How do we make workload management a political issue?
How do we make the case for increased resources?
How do we ensure that tackling bureaucracy is used to free
up staff for more productive work rather used to meet cash
saving targets?
How should we encourage employers to adhere to SSSC Code
of Practice (…and what sanctions should we recommend
if they don’t)?
Draft published: 5 December 2009
Current version updated: 20 January 2010
Members and branches can help to develop these
policy ideas further.
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voices for change - PUBLIC WORKS!
