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SASW says welfare reforms are stigmatising the most vulnerable
Vulnerable people are being “stigmatised” by welfare reforms supported by a public which does not understand their implications, social workers warned.
20th March 2013
Scotland’s children’s minister uses SASW event to attack welfare reforms
Scotland’s children’s minister Aileen Campbell used the Scottish Association of Social Work’s (SASW’s) annual awards event to call on Prime Minister David Cameron to rethink welfare reforms, which she said will unfairly impact upon the most vulnerable. Speaking at the SASW Awards in Edinburgh on World Social Work Day yesterday, she warned there was a lot of “heartache” ahead.
20th March 2013
SASW Awards honour superb social work practice
Tribute was paid to the “life changing” work of social workers at the Scottish Association of Social Work Awards yesterday.
20th March 2013
DVD launch at NIASW World Social Work Day event puts service users centre stage
Service users across Europe want their social workers to be good listeners, empathetic and politically motivated, a DVD launched to mark World Social Work Day in Northern Ireland has suggested. The film, International Messages on Service User and Carer Involvement, featured comments from service users in Spain, Slovenia and Northern Ireland, revealing similar demands in each country. Launched at the Northern Ireland Association of Social Workers’ World Social Work Day event on 19 March, the film showed student practitioners in each country asking the same six questions of service users. Responding to a question about the most important qualities a social worker needs to have, a Spanish service user told the student: “Not to feel judged, not being judged. I would also need to be spoken to with words I can understand.”
20th March 2013
World Social Work Day: Social workers have a vital role to play in reducing inequality
The vital role that social workers play in reducing inequality was the clear message sounded at BASW’s event to mark World Social Work Day in Westminster.
20th March 2013
Using World Social Work Day to press for more equal societies
On World Social Work Day, Linda de Chenu, Social Work Lecturer at the University of Hertfordshire, claims the recently-created Global Agenda for Social Work should serve as a rallying cry for social workers to unite and speak out against inequalities at home and across the world.
18th March 2013
The struggle to practise social work in Syria as the country collapses into war and retribution
One of the world’s most troubled zones, an estimated 60,000 people have died in Syria since the uprising of March 2011. Save the Children has warned of a “collapse in childhood” in the country, with one in three children having been hit, kicked or shot in the fighting. Sundus Saeed, a volunteer with Hand in hand for Syria - one of the few aid organisations working in the country - describes the huge task faced supporting a traumatised nation and BASW’s Interim Chief Executive Bridget Robb explains why the plight of the Syrian people should be of concern to us all.
18th March 2013
BASW – World Social Work day challenges us to find new ways of working together
Speaking at a celebration event in Westminster later today, BASW Interim Chief Executive Bridget Robb will tell an audience of MPs and social work professionals that money is not the answer to all of the current problems faced by local authority services and make a plea for both sides to work together.
18th March 2013
The work of the Palestine-UK Social Work Network
The Palestine-UK Social Work Network held a hugely over-subscribed event late last year, an initiative aimed at linking up British and Palestinian social workers. Jointly sponsored by BASW and the University of Durham, the event followed a trip to Palestine undertaken by UK social workers in 2011, in which the challenges facing social work professionals in Jerusalem and the West Bank were all too clear [see PSW article on this visit]
18th March 2013
BASW: Treat children in care as individuals, not criminals
As a new report from MPs claims the youth justice system is currently failing children in care and care leavers, BASW has reiterated the need to treat looked after children as individuals. The report by the Commons' Justice Committee said vulnerable children were being drawn into the criminal justice system in a way that those from family homes were not. Committee chairman, Lib Dem MP Sir Alan Beith, commented that the committee had even heard one example where police had been called to a children's home to investigate a broken cup.
14th March 2013
BASW Cymru report - April 2013
14th March 2013
NIASW Report - April 2013
14th March 2013
Can we afford social costs of legal aid cuts?
Public sector cuts risk eroding social cohesion, warns BASW, following concerns raised by the highest judge in the land that cuts to legal aid may see people "take the law into their own hands".
13th March 2013
BASW: Social workers need knowledge of the law and community to tackle human slavery
BASW has endorsed a major report that lifts the lid on the lack of multi-agency understanding about how to tackle human slavery and called on social workers to “play their part” to stop this abuse.
12th March 2013
BASW's concern at Baby P social workers appeal court ruling
BASW has said that difficult questions remain about the approach taken to staff involved in the Baby Peter Connelly case, following today's decision by the Court of Appeal to reject a claim of unfair dismissal brought by two of the boy's social workers against Haringey Council. Maria Ward and Gillie Christou were appealing against a ruling by an employment tribunal in 2010 that the north London council was within its rights to dismiss the pair for errors of judgement in the case of 17-month old Peter Connelly, who died in August 2007 after suffering more than 50 injuries. His mother Tracey Connelly, her boyfriend Steven Barker and Barker's brother Jason Owen, were jailed in 2009 for causing or allowing the toddler's death.
12th March 2013
International Women’s Day – Deeds not words needed on domestic violence say BASW
BASW has responded to comments made by home secretary Theresa May that the Government “can only do so much” and that people must speak out against violence against women and girls, with a reminder that cuts to services are leaving many unprotected.
8th March 2013
BLOG: DPP to be congratulated for recognition that justice system is failing sexual abuse victims
Following the failings identified by the Jimmy Savile case and the exploitation of young girls by gangs, the director of public prosecutions Keir Starmer QC has called for a new approach to tackle child sexual exploitation prosecutions, so that claims are taken seriously and cases are not dropped at an early stage. Mr Starmer has been quoted as saying police and Crown lawyers need to change the way they deal with cases of alleged sex abuse to avoid “another Savile moment.” BASW professional officer Sue Kent, who will be attending a roundtable meeting with the DPP to discuss proposed reforms, explains.
7th March 2013
BASW: Ministers must understand that the situation for many social workers is deteriorating not improving
BASW has responded to education secretary Michael Gove’s assertion that the current social work reform agenda will enable social workers to spend the time they need with at risk children by calling for more far reaching reforms of practice, training and funding.
6th March 2013
Butler-Sloss praised for hearing BASW’s concerns on adoption reform
The British Association of Social Workers (BASW) has issued strong support for today's comments by Baroness Butler-Sloss, Chair of the House of Lords Select Committee on Adoption Legislation, who has taken on board the message from social work that the Government's focus on driving up the number of adoptions should not ignore the need for better post-adoption support, more accurate data on adoption breakdown and the reality that adoption is not suitable for all children.
6th March 2013
