Quarter of social workers in Wales experiencing financial difficulties, finds survey

Almost a quarter of social workers in Wales are finding it difficult to manage financially, with most practitioners having seen their financial position worsen since 2023, a survey has found.

Just over a third of practitioners were dissatisfied by their pay, found the research commissioned by regulator Social Care Wales, answered by 5,024 members of the country’s social care workforce, including 838 social workers, in February this year.

However, compared with a similar survey carried out in March-April 2023, greater proportions of social workers reported higher morale, that their services were appropriately staffed and that they felt valued by managers, colleagues and those they supported.

The Have Your Say survey, whose results were published last week, was designed to capture what it was like to work in social care in Wales. It was carried out by researchers from Buckinghamshire New and Bath Spa universities, and from the British Association of Social Workers (BASW).

Quarter of social workers struggling financially

It found 23% of social workers were finding it very or quite difficult to manage financially, up from 20% in 2023, while 62% said they were finding it slightly or a lot more difficult to cope financially than a year earlier.

This is despite the annual rate of inflation having come down from 10.1% in the year to March 2023 to 3.4% in the 12 months to February 2024. In the meantime, social workers employed by Welsh councils received a pay increase of £1,925 for 2023-24, which was worth between 4% and 6% for most practitioners.

In relation to pay, 37% of social workers said were fairly or very dissatisfied with their pay, with a higher rate of dissatisfaction, 41%, among children’s practitioners.

Improved workplace satisfaction

However, this marked a fall from 47% being dissatisfied with their pay in 2023, one of a number of areas in which social workers demonstrated greater satisfaction with their roles in 2024.

Most significantly, 70% said they always or mostly had positive morale, up from 38% in 2023. In addition:

• 72% said they had good management support, up from 69% in 2023, while 74% felt valued by their managers, up from 68%.
• Though there was a fall, from 86% to 81%, in the share of social workers who reported always or mostly having good peer support, the proportion who felt valued by their colleagues rose from 78% to 85%.
• Just under three-quarters (74%) felt valued by individuals or families, up from 64% in 2023, and while only 35% felt valued by the public, this was up from 20% the year before.
• Under half (48%) of social worker respondents said they always or mostly had appropriate staffing, but this was an increase on the 34% who reported this in 2023.

In relation to retention, 23% of practitioners said they were considering leaving social work and anticipated spending a further 17 months in the sector. This compares with one in five (21%) social workers saying they were very or quite likely to leave the social care sector within the next year in 2023, when the equivalent question was phrased differently.

Rates of bullying and discrimination

Despite the positives, 11% of social workers said they had been bullied by their managers in the past year, with the same proportion reporting discrimination from managers. This was higher than the rates for all respondents to the survey, which was 8% in each case. Four per cent of social workers reported harassment from managers, in line with the rate for respondents in general.

Social workers were less likely to have been bullied (6%), discriminated against (4%) or harassed (2%) by colleagues than respondents in general, but were more likely to have faced these issues from individuals or families.

Notably, 12% of social workers said they had faced harassment from individuals or families, compared with 7% of all respondents, while 8% reported bullying and 6% discrimination.