No one likes to take their work home with them. But for social care professionals it can be difficult to avoid. For some staff, slashed car tyres, stalking and threats have become part of the job. In extreme cases professionals have had to move, take their children out of school or leave the office at the same time as colleagues to stay safe.

Sandra McCulloch,* a mental health social worker in Scotland who chose to return to work part-time after the birth of her son, soon felt as though she was working round the clock seven days a week after a service user threatened her son's life (see panel). Twelve months on, she is still off sick and unsure whether she will ever return to social work.

McCulloch's case is not unique. Mental health, probation and social care workers are forced to accept that service users see them as care professionals, irrespective of where they are and whether they are on duty.

Most of the time, this does not carry serious consequences. But when a user holds a particular care professional responsible for an unpopular decision, or for the failings of the wider system, the impact on that professional's personal life can be immense.

Steps have been taken towards ensuring that violent clients are better controlled and staff better protected. Risk assessments are supposed to be carried out, incidents recorded and safety measures put in place.

But when that violence or threat of violence follows a care professional home, the impact on their life is multiplied. The feeling of being violated is intensified and the level of fear experienced - both for themselves and for those they live with - is raised dramatically.

By law, employers have a duty to protect the health and safety of employees "so far as is reasonably practicable". Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations require employers to assess risks so that they are reduced "to the lowest possible level".

Public sector union Unison says there is no doubt that work-related violence is not limited to the workplace but can happen in the community, to and from work, and even in the worker's home.¹ It says this is acknowledged by the Health and Safety Executive's own definition of violence at work as "any incident in which an employee is abused, threatened or assaulted in circumstances relating to their work".

Despite this apparent clarity, councils' and NHS trusts' responsibilities towards off-duty employees remain unsatisfactorily vague. While employees are forced to carry the responsibility of their professional status outside work, employers often consider that their responsibility towards them ends as soon as they clock off.

In McCulloch's case, the local authority failed to offer support after her son's life was threatened, failed to follow its own post-incident procedures for such events and, in her opinion, failed to meet their duty of care towards her. "I kept thinking somebody from the department would contact me," McCulloch says. "All the guidelines talk about the support that should be available and the mechanisms for allowing a person to talk. But a week after the threat was made, no one had phoned. They treated me very badly."

An HSE spokesperson admits that violence towards care professionals outside work is a "bit of a grey area" in terms of employers' duties. She believes such cases would normally constitute harassment and simply be a matter for the police.

"The unions want to push it as far as they can," she adds. "But if we look at that in a logical way, it's almost impossible. Do you want a secure door put on every worker's house? Look at the costs of it."

But police involvement in a case does not preclude employers playing a role. Hugh Robertson, Unison's head of health and safety, is resolute that employers have a legal and moral duty to employees who are assaulted or threatened as a result of their professional status, wherever they may be. He says employers should make it clearer to service users that abuse of staff will result in the withdrawal of services, and to follow through on these threats - unless this is inappropriate, for example, for people with diminished capability.

Robertson says that, when a member of staff is being harassed, it is up to the local authority to work with the police and the individual. Where necessary, the local authority must be prepared to take out restraining orders against suspects, despite the costs involved.

He insists it is the employer's responsibility to fund the replacement of damaged property, such as slashed tyres, if it is likely that the damage was caused as a result of the employee's work. He also believes employers should provide counselling and support.

Ian Johnston, director of the British Association for Social Workers, doubts whether employers will ever be good enough in terms of fulfilling their duty of care towards employees. "It's a challenge that employers should continually be rising to," he says. "The approach of some employers falls far short of what is required."

He would like a new indicator measuring such support to be introduced into the performance assessment framework rather than it always focusing on staff performance.

Steven Sumner, national health and safety policy adviser for the Employers' Organisation, acknowledges that all public contact has the potential for becoming difficult, "particularly if a service provider is becoming a service remover". He argues that if threats and harassment are affecting an employee's private life, local authorities should be prepared to provide legal support, such as the injunctions already sought by some councils. "Local authorities want to be seen as good employers and would wish to support their employees," says Sumner.

Key to any employer's response to a violent incident or threat must also be their ability to learn from the experience, and improve practice as a result. A former senior manager says social workers in the child protection field are particularly at risk because parents are often unhappy with decisions made about their children. She says more regular support and supervision for front-line workers would allow difficult cases to be transferred as soon as potential problems were detected, and greater openness would enable employees to say when they were finding a case stressful.

With the already existing problems in the recruitment and retention of social workers, it is imperative that everything is done to ensure that those who choose a career in social care, mental health or probation are not also sentenced to a life of fear. CC

¹ Unison, Violence at Work: A Guide to Risk Prevention, January 2003, from www.unison.org.uk/acrobat/13024.pdf  

* Names have been changed.

Life for man with grievance 

A man who developed a grievance against social workers who were involved in care proceedings over his son in the 1990s was sentenced to life at Preston Crown Court last year.

Andrew Roberts broke into the former home of one of the child protection social workers involved in his son's case expecting to find her there.

Instead he subjected the new occupant to a terrifying ordeal, refusing to believe that she did not know where the social worker was.

He tied up the woman and doused the house in petrol while her children were upstairs sleeping before eventually leaving. Roberts was arrested after a car chase.

He pleaded guilty to false imprisonment, possession of articles with intent to cause damage by fire and possession of an offensive weapon.

Damaged by employer's series of blunders

Mental health social worker Sandra McCulloch* returned from maternity leave last year to work part-time for a Scottish local authority's homelessness team. During a community care assessment of a woman with mental health problems living in a council-run hostel, McCulloch made a reference about her recent maternity leave to a colleague. When the woman was later assessed by a psychiatrist she said she could kill McCulloch's baby if she wanted to.  

Two to three weeks passed before the woman was detained in hospital. During that time, McCulloch claims the woman could have run into her and her child. Stressed, she was prescribed Valium to help her sleep. McCulloch believes she has been left even more damaged by the case because of the way her employer treated her. 

 A series of gaffes began with her line manager "forgetting" to alert her to the threat posed by the woman and culminated in an unsatisfactory investigation report into the way the department had handled her case. 

At that point, the department agreed to investigate her case further and to put her on "special leave" and take off her record the six months' sick leave she had already taken.  

McCulloch is now back on sick leave and is being treated for anxiety by a community psychiatric nurse. She is on a waiting list for treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder and says it is difficult to imagine ever again being able to interview someone who is mentally ill or potentially dangerous.   She also feels guilty about the impact the whole experience has had on her relationship with her son and her partner.

Harassed out of the service 

In 1994, Clive Plassey* was a probation officer with a London youth offending team. One of his cases involved a 17 year old who had committed between 60 and 70 aggravated burglaries. The day the teenager was sentenced to 10 years, Clive received a message that he should watch out because the length of the sentence was "his fault". 

There was a series of calls over the next week, each more menacing and explicit. Then Clive's car tyres were slashed. He was traumatised by the incidents and worried that something might happen to his new son.  Clive also felt unsupported. His line manager had suggested in front of his colleagues that he must have done something to upset the man's family, while the borough manager wanted to discipline him for his "unauthorised absence" while the police were investigating the incidents. Fortunately for Clive, a third manager intervened to prevent this and organised counselling sessions for him, funded by the service.  Although Clive recovered from the experience, he says he has been left emotionally scarred by the menacing calls and the attitude of his employer. He left the service as a result of his experience.