Comments for Community Care

Comment on Guidance revised to help social workers place children more quickly for adoption by sunny monday

sunny monday — Mon, 10 Mar 2014 08:26:57 +0000

There seems to be a gulf between policy and practice on adoption here and in all other European countries. Why is the UK the odd one out? If the UK are acting in the best interests of children at all times, why is nobody else in Europe doing the same thing? Are children in Europe suffering more because their countries do not do as we do?

I suspect the answer is that children are not worse off in France, Ireland or Germany, etc. It concerns me greatly that the UK is actually increasing the pressure for adoptions to be made. The checks and balences are not working effectively now and speeding up things will only make this worse.

There seems to be an increasing number of programmes and articles in the media, apparently the adoption of babies and toddlers is now at a 35 year high, and yet deaths of children from abuse has not dropped.

Something has gone very very wrong with our system.

Comment on Programme launched to prepare care workforce to deliver Care Act 2014 by Alex Knapp

Alex Knapp — Sun, 09 Mar 2014 13:44:53 +0000

Just a small point, but the consultation is about learning and development, not training.

The changes that are being proposed for the “Fundamental Standards” are much more focussed on the practice of staff and the impact of their practice on the people they support.

Perhaps you could amend your terminology to align with the thinking of the future rather than that of the past…

Comment on ‘It’s time we paid proper attention to the central role of practice educators within social work education’ by Pat Curran

Pat Curran — Fri, 07 Mar 2014 15:46:57 +0000

I am privileged to be an off site practice educator supporting social work students from the University of Bedfordshire. Not only do they provide a high level of training for students but they invest in their practice educators by offering a wide range of regular workshops to meet our CPD requirements. Everyone benefits from this approach and more importantly service users.

Comment on Jo Brand to star in new social work sitcom by Bonnie

Bonnie — Thu, 06 Mar 2014 18:12:15 +0000

I think it’s a great idea – in fact i don’t know why it hasn’t been done before – Homour is a great therapy in times of difficulties, and I’m sure some parents who have Social Workers in their life will find it hilarious – personally I will be watching it ..!

Comment on Home care contracts should enforce minimum wage, Labour review told by Penrose Care

Penrose Care — Thu, 06 Mar 2014 10:56:57 +0000

Penrose Care is pleased to see Dr. Hussein calling for the enforcement of the National Minimum Wage (NMW). We were in attendance at the roundtable at the House of Lords on Tuesday and also called for enforcement of the NMW: http://www.penrosecare.co.uk/newsdetail/Penrose-Care-praises-and-contributes-to-Baroness-Kingsmill’s-efforts-to-improve-England’s-care-system/33.html

Comment on Study finds link between parental domestic abuse and direct harm to children by Janet Francis

Janet Francis — Thu, 06 Mar 2014 02:28:13 +0000

Domestic abuse is not a crime and layered up problems impact more on the main caregiver whilst the perpetrator is not accountable and so the kids can only take their issues to the person who is available to them. The issue of availability is arbitrary as in the main it is the victim who needs to turn into the survivor to make themselves available to their children. Once drugs and/or alcohol feature then it is nigh impossible to find a stable enough basis to move forward into education, work and the creation of a new life for the provision for your children by example as well as by promotion of normalisation of the childrens daily needs being met

Comment on Stress among social workers in mental health teams hits record high by Ess

Ess — Wed, 05 Mar 2014 22:25:57 +0000

It’s just the same in CAMHS too. I’m a social worker in CAMHS and just about all of the team are experiencing severe stress due to cuts in staffing and doubling of referrals into the service and more and more pressure from managers.

We are forced to carry double the recommended amounts of cases and these caseloads are unsafe yet we are offered no support from management…we just have to live with the stress and worry day in day out of having an unsafe caseload and the worry that any day someone could die because of that. Nothing is done, and we are not listened to.

I used to love my job but the current situation is not want I trained to be a social worker for. I will be leaving the profession within the next few months due to the unrelenting stress levels.

Comment on Care homes face paperwork ‘industry’ that damages quality of care by Alex Knapp

Alex Knapp — Wed, 05 Mar 2014 22:20:43 +0000

It is really good to hear that the CQC inspector was more interested in the quality of care and I think the consultation around the “Fundamental Standards” is an opportunity to get the message out there that it should not be about paperwork, but PRACTICE.

It is what our staff put into practice that effects the outcomes of the people we support, not the bits of paper!

http://ow.ly/3hylVn

Take the opportunity to tell CQC via the consultation that it is time to change, we must focus outcomes, results, practice, competence and safety, rather than attendance or completion.

Comment on Social workers must face regular quality checks to remain in practice, says government review by Christian Kerr

Christian Kerr — Wed, 05 Mar 2014 20:19:57 +0000

I have long argued that social workers should be confident in engaging a diverse range of service users across a variety of practice settings. Rather than promoting a model of specialisation, which serves to undermine worker confidence by creating and reinforcing artificial lines of demarcation between ‘children and families social work’, ‘mental health social work’ and so on, we should promote the idea of a competent, multi-faceted ‘total social worker’ who is able to work with individuals, families and communities to address and deal with the complex issues they face. Many children’s safeguarding social workers work with parental substance misuse, mental ill health and so on, but it seems few feel confident in doing so. The key skills for social workers, such as the ability to communicate effectively and to work with complexity, apply across all practice settings and should be the focus of generic training. The specialist knowledge required to engage specific can be gained and developed through practice experience. This model of total social work could underpin greater integration of hitherto disparate specialist services in order to reduce the number of professionals involved and facilitate improved collaborative working, leading to better experiences and outcomes for service users. In addition, a defining characteristic of social work education is the critically reflective application of theory in practice, yet students and practitioners seem to view theory and practice as separate and distinct, leading to theory being undervalued by practitioners (and employers). However, theory and practice are not separate. Everything we do as human beings is informed by some theoretical notion. Likewise, everything we do as social workers is underpinned by theory – from holistic assessment and planning (systems theory) to welfare reports (attachment theory, child development) – yet this is largely left implicit or, worse, unrecognised. A greater, more explicit engagement with the theoretical underpinnings of the proforma and templates, the very tools of assessment, administration and accountability we use every day, will lead to better quality social work, while enabling us to understand, challenge and refine those tools for the benefit of service users. A deeper understanding and appreciation of theory should be one basis for the programme of ongoing professional development.

Comment on CQC seeks mental health social workers to help ‘peer review’ services by Godfrey

Godfrey — Wed, 05 Mar 2014 19:49:22 +0000

While the idea sounds OK but it only works on the premise that the NHS departments are well staffed to be able to manage their caseload / workload and spare a few extra staff to be seconded to this programme. The £300 / day reimbursed to the Trust sounds attractive but their is a risk of further under staffing their departments and focusing more on this [secondment to CQC] to the detriment of their respective services. As far as I know most Trusts are already struggling in terms of staffing levels and workloads due to current cuts. A more sustainable solution will be to employ and train more staff for this special task.

The survey below is an indication of what staff and various departments are going through and is the base of my view:

http://www.communitycare.co.uk/2014/03/05/stress-among-social-workers-mental-health-teams-hits-record-high/#.UxcIefl_t8E?cmpid=NLC|SCSC|SCNEW-2014-0305