Social workers to get bunk bed style desks to save money

Social work leaders accuse government of treating staff like “battery hens” but taskforce says “bunk bed technology” funded by private firm sponsorship will quadruple desk space at cash-strapped councils

March 28, 2013 in Community Care

Social workers will be forced to work on top of each other under controversial new government plans to introduce two-tier desks “based on bunk bed technology”, Community Care understands.

The government’s Blue Sky Social Care (BSSC) group, a “thought-leadership temple” of Eton graduates set up by ministers, claims the stackable desks will quadruple capacity at local authorities and bring an end to the hotdesking crisis that afflicts social work teams across the country.

The desks – developed in Japan – will allow councils to allocate up to four social workers to each desk.

The BSSC recommends that councils fund the move by allowing private firms to place adverts on the desktops and sponsor social workers’ notepads, mugs and biscuit tins.

April Loof, chief workspace officer at the British Association of Colleges for Social Workers, hit out at the plans, saying that they would see staff treated “like battery hens rather than skilled professionals”.

Frontline social worker Mr B Raveheart told Community Care he was furious over plans to privatise biscuit tins.

“You may take our desks, but you’ll never take our biscuits,” he said.