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The head of a Scottish executive programme looking at innovative practice in social work believes there will be fewer qualified social workers in 10 years’ time, writes Derren Hayes at Community Care Live Scotland.

Keith Makin, programme director of Care 21 – which is based in the policy co-ordination division of the executive – said that he expected some functions currently carried out by social workers to be with less qualified staff allowing the development of a smaller, but more focused, group of qualified social workers.

“At the moment we don’t use our qualified social work resources efficiently enough,” Makin, who was social services director at Dumfries and Galloway Council up until early 2003, explained. “A lot of them are engaged in tasks that could be carried out by someone else.

“If we enabled them [another group of workers] to do these tasks we could be in a position where social workers can concentrate on carrying out their core tasks.”

He envisaged qualified social workers would be those that had a degree in social work and would be registered as having the title with the Scottish General Social Care Council.

Care 21 is looking at current practices in social services, challenging them and developing innovative new ways of working and delivering services. Its work will dovetail with that of the executive’s current overall review of social work in Scotland.

More from www.scotland.gov.uk/socialwork/swsi