……..it is about time people started helping themselves instead of blaming others

I couldn't agree more.

All these "abused" children – why don't they sort their own bleedin' problems out ?
…….. instead of always expecting others to do it for them.

The problem as I see it, is that we have a useless and incompetent government. Plus all social workers are,
as we've discovered, fundamentally evil.

How much better would it be, if the relevant authorities reflected more the level of simple wisdom, and common humanity, which is expressed by so many on here…….

are trying to do your bit. Good for you

You sanctimonious tosspot TJ!

People have different experiences and opinions and you think they're wrong because you're employed by the NHS and know-all, but as usual this has been somewhat exploded, again.

This whole SS debate is very much in the public spotlight and it's not working very well.

Very interesting ,everyone of you either works with social workers or has met one,not one has been screwed by them,and not sexually thank god,when they screw you then your whole image of them changes.

30 years ago we didnt have sw we had families and if all else failed prison and asylums and they worked well.

Maybe a bit patronising but I was trying to say that people who try to do their bit to make the world a better place should be aknowledged and thanked.

Whereas people who denigrate and snipe from a position of ignorance should be called to task. Many questions have been asked of you on this thread and you haven't answered one.

Your postings on public services shows the depths of your ignorance. How do you know social services are not working very well? How about the 40% reduction in murders of children?

Your ignorance, arrogance and stupidity is breathtaking. Its an unpleasant and dangerous combination.

30 years ago we didnt have sw we had families and if all else failed prison and asylums and they worked well.

yeah right ! No child abuse back in the 80s was there. No children being killed by their families. Most child abuse and murders are committed by family members.

30 years ago ……… we had …….. asylums and they worked well.

Well you know who to blame for getting rid of them.

They weren't needed as 'Care in the Community' would deal with all the problems.

Hopefully it's already been said…Social services are well under-resourced and roles such as child protection are extremely stressful & wearing not to mention thankless.

Of course the OP et all wouldn't be "daily Fail"-style moaning if their taxes went up to pay for better services 🙄

Well you know who to blame for getting rid of them.

They weren't needed as 'Care in the Community' would deal with all the problems.

Isn't that an urban myth – long stay psychiatric facilities started closing well before the care in the community act, in the 60s, 70s & 80s.

Not that asylums have anything to do with it though, surely the vast majority of abuse is carried out by supposedly sane people?

Joe

explain why 40% reduction in murders of children has anything to do with social services please

Also, whatever you think of social services, as we've seen in Ireland recently, they are probably a lot better than farming it out to an church (or another organisation with absolutely no accountability and massive power).

Joe

"Isn't that an urban myth – long stay psychiatric facilities started closing well before the care in the community act, in the 60s, 70s & 80s."

As I recall, the closures started in the mid to late eighties, just after I started my (psychiatric nurse) training. It's possible that plans had been made well in advance of this, of course, but it's a fairly safe bet that we'll see them opening up again, once some bright spark spots the misleading part of the term 'care in the community'.

Isn't that an urban myth

No

zeicke – Member

explain why 40% reduction in murders of children has anything to do with social services please

Over the last decade Social services have had major overhauls in procedure and policy as a result of shortcomings and are now better at seeing problems arising – and more children are taken into care now since the climbie scandal.

I am sure there are more factors but if rates of child murders fall the agency that is trying to prevent child murders must be getting something right

i would think there a lot more factor's at work here to be able lay that success at social service door

Better monitoring by social workers and improved liaison between health visitors, paediatricians, GPs and police had led to the drop, it said.

zeicke – a simple google search reveals there certainly are more factor's at work, but it seems you may be to lazy to look into it, and it is easier to just blame social workers.

i would think there a lot more factor's at work here to be able lay that success at social service door

Like ?

Given that you seem to be implying that SS have had little impact on the reduction in child murders, maybe you could just tell us which factors you think have had a bigger impact?

Or do you think any reduction is just random?

I am sure more factors are at work – but equally I am sure that improved procedures and training in SW have helped

Other factors are improved interagency co operation, better awareness in healthcare and rising prosperity

TJ, If you're going to help zeicke with his homework, then really , he's never going to learn, and what's the point of me asking?

Anyway, I expect everyone else has lost interest in the thread now, which is a pity as I was just about to employ this, as the definitive response to all STW discussions about "serious worries/concerns" from now on:

And it's on Youtube too for those who don't like reading much.

STW discussion dramatised for TV

I don't normally post in these type of threads, as it seems futile (and probably is), but this time I feel compelled to do so.

My GF has now been a social worker for about 18 months. She works in Child protection. She has a caseload of about 15 children and doesn't have anywhere near enought time to deal with the cases she has. For example, this week she has been in court for 3 days for one child. Yet she is still expected to write reports and fit visits in for all her other cases into her working week (LAC & CIN statutory visits must continue in a regular manner and acn't be put off to a time when things are quieter). She works a minimum of 12 hours a day; has little or no support from management or colleagues (there appears to be a large amount of bullying by management in her department); and gets paid £22K for the privelege. This is for a masters level qualified graduate.

She is passionate about what she does, but the immense stress and pressure is already getting too much for her. She struggles to sleep as she can't stop worrying about her caseload. She'll have quit within the next 6 months.

I believe there are some serious failings in SS that do need to be addressed, but the ignorant folk on here who are demonising people like her are completely out of order. I couldn't imagine doing one day's work as a SW, let alone committing to a career in such an underpaid, under resourced and undervalued occupation.

It seems that Social Workers are very restricted to how they can approach their clients, they cannot use such words as Homeless to describes someones living situation in case it hurts their feelings, so if thats an example of the ludicrous guidanc esocial workers have to abide by, its no wonder they are getting bad press as it seem all wishy washy IMO.

Your evidence for that bit of stupidity?

they cannot use such words as Homeless to describes someones living situation in case it hurts their feelings

You heard wrong ….it is when someone says something as stupid as that they cannot call them a stupid retard as that may offend genuine retards rather than those who just believe everything they read in the press or heard from a mate in the pub 🙄

I cannot believe you actually believe that … I hope you are more critical/sceptical of things you hear in the future

like ?
maybe the courts imprisoned more potential child murders
maybe more potential child murders were sectioned under the mental health act
may be more drug addict's prone to killing there childern overdosed before they could get round to it
3 reasons off the top of my head

zeicke, under what model of legislation would you imprison a potential criminal?

someone locked up for fighting or any other offence,had they still been with their family may or may not have killed one of their children

You are aware that our legisaltion is based on a presumtion of innocenct until proven guilty with the burden on the prosecution to prove their case again. How would /could/can you "prove" this beyond a reasonable doubt with a potential crime that has not been committed and has only a possibility of happening?

like ?
maybe the courts imprisoned more potential child murders
maybe more potential child murders were sectioned under the mental health act
may be more drug addict's prone to killing there childern overdosed before they could get round to it
3 reasons off the top of my head

How about some that you've really thought about? These don't seem very good. If we call your reasons A, B and C

Firstly, how would A have happened? Being a potential child murderer wasn't a crime the last time I looked. So lets say that they just happened to have been locked up for some other crime. What sort of crimes do child murderers do? Domestic violence say? Hmmm… I wonder if that is the sort of thing that would involve social workers in the first instance?

Looking at B, are more mentally ill people being sectioned and locked away? Or are more people these days being supported in the community by (amongst others) social workers?

And C – or maybe not?

So even if your reasons do add up to anything, they would still only happen with the involvement of social workers.

You are aware that our legisaltion is based on a presumtion of innocenct until proven guilty with the burden on the prosecution to prove their case again. How would /could/can you "prove" this beyond a reasonable doubt with a potential crime that has not been committed and has only a possibility of happening?

C'mon Junkyard, don't feed the troll imbecile

"Is it just me or are those who working in Social Services completely useless?"

It's just you, you are apparently a reactionary moron. You seem to have manged to stir up the usual "It's pc gone mad!!!" cretins up though, so that's something to be proud of I suppose.

Baldysquirt – your gf's experience is very similar to my friend's experience as a ~23 year old new graduate: thrown into the deep end with an unmanageable caseload, no support, chronic understaffing and completely out of their depth. Anyone that cares about what they do would be driven crazy; anyone that doesn't care about what they do shouldn't be doing social work in the first place.

In line with what was said above, "as having no knowledge of a subject is no bar to expressing an opinion on here, then I'll chip in my tuppenceworth", I'll chip in too, admitting that I have only second-hand knowledge of social services through a) someone who was reported to social services for something more or less similar to the off-night-shift-can-of-beer story above and whose case was dealt with discreetly and appropriately, and b) a whole bunch of people that deal and work with kids in really crappy situations.

My impression of being a social worker is that by nature it is incredibly hard, presents a lot of very difficult dilemmas about risk and conflicting objectives, involves dealing with the victims and perpetrators of unfathomable misery, and is emotionally and intellectually draining – and all of this interspersed with positively impacting someone in a way that can change their life for the better. Moreover, by virtue of the apparent poor management and poor funding of the services as they are now from the top down, most social services departments (to my ignorant eyes) seem to be a complete shitshow of an unpleasant place to work. This is such a difficult and important job that we want the best people available to do it, to reward them properly for it, and to make their working environment and processes as comfortable and conducive to success as possible. And what do they end up with?

I've done some pretty tough/high-pressure work in the past that involved following some pretty nasty and violent people, but I don't think I would last a week as a social worker.

Konabunny and baldysquirt – it's a shame that your respective friend and partner have had such bad experiences early in their careers. The opposite has been the case for me – from the start I had regular supervision, a protected caseload which was added to steadily as my experience developed and decent managers in both authorities that I've worked for so far. I should point out though that I work for an adult service rather than the children and families which is generally accepted to be less stressful – I know of people from my uni course who have experienced situations similar to those that you describe. You still face daily dilemmas and big caseloads though – most of the more exepreinced workers in my office have caseloads of 40 plus. Having a decent boss and supportive, approachable colleagues makes all the difference I guess.

Finally – cheers for all the support from the posters on this thread. It's good to know that the Daily Mail idiots are in the minority, at least on STW 🙂

You know I hate people who dish it out to social workers who really have the most thankless job in the world

I have adopted two children and EVERY social worker I have met has the interests of the children as their primary concern.

They are however very restricted by regulation, they cannot by rumour hearsay or guess work they need definitive proof to be able to interviene,and their primary directive is to keep a child with birth parents where possible.

I would love to see all the nay sayers above do a better job under those circumstances

Konabunny and baldysquirt – it's a shame that your respective friend and partner have had such bad experiences early in their careers.

Don't get the wrong idea – I should also have said that she loved her job, worked endless hours and was buried in the detail, and has since gone on to do at least 2 or 3 other jobs in the same sort of child protection/youth justice/whatever the right term is. (Also, like everyone else I happen to know in the health/caring/teaching professions, she is superprofessional in working hours and batshit crazy outside them – not sure if that says more about those professions or the people I choose as friends!). But all the same she was thrown in the deep end and given too much responsibility by default when so many other positions were unfilled. This was 6-7 years ago – maybe everything has improved since then.

The only experience I've had with Social Services was when my Dad was getting on a bit & couldn't do much for himself. They organised care workers to visit him 3 times a day to help get him dressed, do his breakfast & lunch then they even came round to get him ready for bed. One of the girls was a right joker & she'd go round & say 'right Frank, get yer pants off' & Dad would say, 'if only I was 40 years younger', they were really good with him. When the time came & he had to go into care they couldn't do enough. They got him into a good home not far from me where he was well looked after. 10/10 for them in that case.