The Corporate Director Social Services and Wellbeing provided an update of the review and restructure of Safeguarding and family Support Services that commenced in November 2014 to the Committee. 

The Corporate Director Social Services and Wellbeing explained that in November and December 2014 employees were consulted on proposals to re-structure the former Safeguarding and Family Support Service.  During the period of consultation, extensive feedback was received from individual employees and teams.  She added that consideration of the feedback from the consultation exercise consequently resulted in revisions being made to the proposed structure which was subject to a further consultation exercise in February and March 2015

The Corporate Director Social Services and Wellbeing informed Committee that the implementation of the new structure commenced in April 2015 and was completed in July 2015.  She added that staff from the previous five safeguarding teams were co-located within one of three newly formed safeguarding hubs- East, North and West of the county.  Each hub has a team manager who leads a team comprising of a deputy manager, senior practitioner, social workers, social work assistants and contact workers

She advised the Committee that a working group on recruitment and retention were tasked with focussing on:

·         Implementing the new staff structure;

·         Improving the learning and development arrangements;

·         Developing more attractive recruitment materials;

·         Marketing and promoting BCBC as an employer of choice;

·         Creating capacity by developing a flexible bank of qualified, experienced social workers who would be able to support the service if and when

required.

The Corporate Director Social Services and Wellbeing advised that Investigating why people leave and obtaining accurate information could be difficult.  Therefore, in order to focus on the retention of the current workforce, a staff survey was undertaken in July/August 2015, the outcomes of which were being considered in addition to the routine exit interviews.  The survey was issued specifically to qualified social workers, senior practitioners, deputy team managers and team managers in the front line Safeguarding teams, and was undertaken over a four week period to gain a better understanding of employees’ views. The response rate was 69%, with 45 responses from a potential of 65.

The Corporate Director Social Services and Wellbeing informed members that it was recognised that a high number of newly qualified Social Workers had been recruited which meant that the overall number of Social Workers with less than two years’ experience continued to present a real challenge for the service.  She added that it also placed a pressure on managerial capacity to provide adequate support, which was essential to enable newly qualified Social Workers to become experienced and confident practitioners who would want to continue to work in BCBC. She advised that additional measures had been put in place to support the newly qualified Social Workers so that they were better equipped to undertake the role and feel more confident and resilient; these included:

·         The First Year in Practice programme has been updated and is being implemented on a mandatory basis;

·         Consultant Social Workers based in the hubs providing direct support to staff through case mentoring, direct observation of practice and reflection and peer supervision.

The Cabinet Member Children’s Social Services and Equalities asked Officers how the senior social worker vacancies were advertised and how competitive the salary was in comparison to neighbouring authorities.  The Corporate Director Social Services and Wellbeing stated that they had worked closely with HR to create the job advert and comprehensive training induction when Social Workers join the Authority.  She stated that vacancies were advertised as a rolling advert on the BCBC website.  She added that recent Job Evaluations had made it difficult to be competitive with the salary, however Bridgend has a system in place whereby after 2 years of working for the Authority the Social Workers undergo assessments and if they prove their competency they are able to progress to a senior social worker and therefore move up the salary grading system.   Other Local Authority’s the Social Worker would start at a higher salary but were unable to progress higher. She advised that it was also difficult to retain Social Workers in Bridgend as it was easy for them to move to another local authority in South Wales due to its convenient location and proximity to the M4.  

The Cabinet Member Childrens Social Services and Equalities informed members that she had spoken with Social Workers at the Authority and after a lot of transition they were now more settled and happier in their roles. She added that the integrated hubs were working well and also that managers were more involved with the team and received regular updates from them.  She stated that the Head of Safeguarding and Assessment was settling in well into her role and that 2016 was looking positive. The Corporate Director Social Services and Wellbeing added that currently there were 6 agency workers at Bridgend which was hoped would be reduced in 2016 but in comparison with other local authorities this was relatively low. 

A member asked if professional development was a motivator in social workers and also if distance learning was available to them to enhance their development.  The Corporate Director Social Services and Wellbeing advised that the National Framework has an expectation that Social Workers would meet the minimum requirements during their first year in practice which included demonstrating that they had completed 90 hours of training per year.   She explained that Social Workers had to register and pay a registration fee each year to the Care Council for Wales for them to be able to practice in Wales.  She added that Social Workers were supported by the Authority and they try to ensure that they are matched to training that was relevant to their role.  She also advised that they provided quality practice placements for Social Workers at studying at University.   The Cabinet Member for Children’s Social Services and Equalities informed members that she had recently spoken with a student Social Worker who was studying at Bridgend College who had come to the Authority to on a practice placement and told her that they would be very keen to work for the Authority after they had qualified as they felt the quality of the practice placement they were given was very good. 

The Deputy Leader asked if there was a timescale for developing MASH and when it was likely to be taken forward as there were a high number of referrals coming through from South Wales Police that hadn’t gone through basic screening first.   The Corporate Director Education and Transformation stated that the issue was well recognised and was in issue for SWP to deal with in their internal processes, she added that they had applied for funding to be able to look at these issues.  She added that the police do need to let the Authority know of any incidents and it was for the Authority to determine if intervention was required from Social Services.  The Corporate Director Education and Transformation advised Members that the Strategic Group and Programme Board were looking to progress with the proposals within the next 6 months which required restructuring of teams, processes and ICT and agreed that it needed to be in place as soon as possible.

                        RESOLVED:               That Cabinet noted the content of the report