Isabelle Trowler CBE Chief Social Worker for Children

[00:00:03] Well, welcome back to The Social World Podcast. I'm Dave Niven and as usual, it's a delight to have your company. If you want to Google it, just Google thoughts on the social world and you will now see the 167 episodes that we've had of the programme over the last 11 years. And that, pick that figure up, 11 years, that's quite coincidental with whom I'm about to talk to.

[00:00:26] Because today, I've got a very special guest, the Chief Social Worker for Children in England, Isabelle Trowler, CBE, who also just by chance happens to have been in post as the very first Chief Social Worker for Children in England for 11 years. Welcome, Isabelle, to the programme.

[00:00:46] Good morning, David. Hi.

[00:00:48] Right. Well, look, I mean, you must have seen so many changes over these 11 years, you know, as the kind of, if you like, the initial Chief Social Worker for Children. I mean, has it been a devastating sort of experience or has it been a worthwhile experience? Has it been a wonderful experience? What's it been for you?

[00:01:09] Oh, well, look, it's been a wonderful experience, I have to say. And I would not have been in it for 11 years if it hadn't been, because it is quite a long haul. I'd say that, you know, almost all of those 11 years, I've worked alongside Lynn Romeo, who's the Chief Social Worker for Adults, and she's retired in January this year.

[00:01:31] And we've got a new Chief Social Worker for Adults arriving in January. And I'm really looking forward to working with her. Her name's Sarah McClinton.

[00:01:41] But so I've had a good companion through those 11 years. We've learnt the ropes of Whitehall and how to operate within government, which has been fantastic learning.

[00:01:54] And I have seen some changes in practice and how things work, but also not as much has changed as you might imagine.

[00:02:07] And we've been on, you know, over those 11 years, I have been on with the Department for Education and the children's sector, this massive journey of building a national infrastructure for child and family services, and really critically building the evidence base about what's the most effective way to work with families facing multiple difficulties.

[00:02:33] And that's brought us to a really positive place. You know, today, we've got a new government in place, it's the first time that I've been in this role when we've had a Labour government. So that is a big shift.

[00:02:46] And we've got a really clear mandate that we are the Department for Opportunity and that we've got a really strong focus on the need for families to have security and to focus on reducing child poverty.

[00:03:03] And we've got a great new reform agenda with new money on the table and a lot of learning across those 11 years, which is...

[00:03:12] You're quite optimistic.

[00:03:14] I'm very optimistic, yeah.

[00:03:16] By the way, Isabel, cut your video, would you, and it'll make the bandwidth better?

[00:03:22] Okay.

[00:03:23] So look, the optimism then, obviously, but we've also just heard Rachel Reeves talking about 5% cuts, and it would be, I think, the Department for Education that would be one of the ones cut. Is that right, or are we picking this up wrong?

[00:03:38] Well, I'm not aware of any cuts.

[00:03:41] In fact, we've got a lot of cuts.

[00:03:43] In fact, we've just, in the last two or three weeks, had a...

[00:03:48] I mean, it's really great news, but we've got over half a billion pounds, which will be ring-fenced for prevention work with families.

[00:03:58] Excellent.

[00:03:59] And so that's...

[00:04:01] Not all of that is new money.

[00:04:03] It's about...

[00:04:03] So one of the complaints that local governments had is that they've had many different grants and lots and lots of different strings attached.

[00:04:11] And so there's been an effort to consolidate some grants, but also the Deputy Prime Minister was successful in getting money on the table for improving services for families at local levels.

[00:04:28] So we're really pleased.

[00:04:28] Well, you've been a real champion of the CSC reform programme, including safeguarding reforms.

[00:04:39] I mean, do you think that this is going to give a much-needed boost to that project?

[00:04:45] Yeah, no, absolutely.

[00:04:46] And I think, you know, what I see from my perspective is that this has been a long haul over the last few years.

[00:04:55] Local authorities, despite, you know, massive decreases in budgets, that they have been building a really clear, very practice-focused evidence base about how we can keep families together safely and reduce the need for care.

[00:05:13] Where we've actually got fewer children going into care proceedings.

[00:05:19] That's gone down recently by about 13%, which is fantastic.

[00:05:23] That we've got a decrease in the number of children coming into care for the first time.

[00:05:29] Now, that doesn't include unaccummented asylum seekers, which accounts for the overall increase in numbers of children in care.

[00:05:37] But local authorities have been working really hard to keep families together.

[00:05:40] And you can really see the change in the data.

[00:05:44] We've got more social workers in child and family services than we've had.

[00:05:50] We've got 5% more social workers.

[00:05:52] And actually, we're starting to see caseloads come down as a result of that.

[00:05:57] So we're in a, you know, we're in a good, good state.

[00:06:01] It sounds very positive.

[00:06:02] I mean, I've looked at your, the agenda, the reform agenda.

[00:06:07] I think it was called, what, Stable Homes Built on Love that was launched not too long ago.

[00:06:12] But it's all about early years again, thankfully.

[00:06:16] I thought that had not disappeared, but it had taken a bit of a backseat for a while.

[00:06:21] But reading what you're doing, it sounds very much like that.

[00:06:23] Because I did a lot of work at one point with Tessa Joel on Sure Start.

[00:06:30] Right.

[00:06:31] The first thousand, we ran a few conferences together on the first thousand days of a child's life.

[00:06:36] Yes, yes.

[00:06:37] I mean, I'm so pleased to see that getting a higher billing, if you like, again.

[00:06:43] I presume you would agree that's necessary.

[00:06:46] Yeah, no, absolutely.

[00:06:47] And I mean, I think it's important to say that Stable Homes Built on Love was the previous government's policy position.

[00:06:56] Our Secretary of State, Bridget Phillipson, has recently presented what they call a command paper in Parliament about two weeks ago.

[00:07:04] And there is a new policy statement.

[00:07:08] It's an extensive document for keeping children safe, helping families to flourish.

[00:07:15] And you'll see that a lot of what we have done is continuing.

[00:07:21] But there is, without doubt, a very strong focus on families, younger children, getting children school ready.

[00:07:33] And also making sure that there's this continuum of services depending on levels of need.

[00:07:41] So obviously, you've got a whole range of universal offers to families with young children, with health visiting and maternity services, etc.

[00:07:49] Then you've got the family hubs, which are, I think we've got in 75 local authorities.

[00:07:55] Got, you know, huge investment in early years.

[00:07:59] And as I say, lots and lots of change is happening, bringing together targeted early help with children in need.

[00:08:08] Because one of the things that families tell us, and we can see really clearly, is that families tend to get bounced around the system.

[00:08:17] And they hate it, obviously.

[00:08:19] And they need us to be, you know, to offer stability of intervention as well.

[00:08:26] So that sounds very positive, I've got to say.

[00:08:29] I mean, I'm really thankful that we're resurrecting things that seem to have kind of gone under the blanket for a while.

[00:08:35] Yeah, it's, yeah.

[00:08:37] So, you know, I think that we talked about, you know, what I would say to social workers going forwards and into 2025.

[00:08:45] But I think this is, it's a good time to stay in the profession.

[00:08:49] And it's a good time to join the profession.

[00:08:51] I think that, you know, there's everything to play for.

[00:08:54] It's a lot of hard work.

[00:08:56] I think families are facing, you know, huge social difficulty.

[00:09:00] We know we've got many more children living in poverty.

[00:09:03] So there's some real challenges.

[00:09:05] And that certainly, you know, is the feeling that practitioners have on the front line.

[00:09:11] And I, you know, speak to practitioners a lot in my job and do, you know, quite a lot of visits and have all kinds of mechanisms to keep close to the front line.

[00:09:19] And the social circumstances for families feel very, very deprived and intense and particularly around housing.

[00:09:32] That's been very interesting.

[00:09:35] I mean, housing's always been an issue for families, always in the whole of my, you know, 30 plus years career.

[00:09:42] And practitioners are certainly finding that the lack of suitable housing has all kinds of knock on impacts, which is very, very hard to resolve.

[00:09:53] It's fascinating, isn't it?

[00:09:55] The way the world changes.

[00:09:56] I mean, I'm just just reflecting as you're talking there.

[00:09:59] I remember back in the 1970s, one of my first jobs was as an unqualified social worker working with homeless families.

[00:10:07] That was the title of it.

[00:10:09] That's right.

[00:10:10] Yeah.

[00:10:10] I mean, the world comes and goes, doesn't it?

[00:10:14] It does.

[00:10:14] And in fact, somebody asked me on another podcast, actually, you know, what had changed.

[00:10:20] And I made the point, and I really think this, is that for families that we work with, I'm not sure that much has changed.

[00:10:28] Because most of the families that we're working with in children's social care, and that's, you know, I accept at the heavy end of things,

[00:10:35] are facing, you know, the same kinds of social difficulties that they were in the 1990s when I qualified and in the 1970s when you qualified, you know.

[00:10:45] The sort of social problems that our families are facing on a daily basis, I think, are pretty similar across those decades.

[00:10:55] Let me take you up on that and a step forward, if I might, because, I mean, I know you're well aware.

[00:11:01] If you like, the new difficulties that are facing social work, the new challenges, if you like, with, I mean, internationalization as well as kind of online threats and so on.

[00:11:12] I mean, things like human trafficking, human slavery, forced marriage, and all the grooming issues to do with county lines and the internet and everything like that.

[00:11:23] All these new headings that are coming in with the same result, they threaten families, they threaten children.

[00:11:30] And social workers are there as one of the bastions of support.

[00:11:35] I mean, how do you feel about the new challenges?

[00:11:38] Yeah, well, I mean, obviously, it's, there are, you know, new challenges, you know, you've just listed some of them.

[00:11:47] I think that the ones that we're most familiar with now is child sexual exploitation and criminal exploitation.

[00:11:55] And there's been a huge amount of work in local authorities in both those areas of practice and across safeguarding partnerships, I should say,

[00:12:03] to find effective ways of reducing the harm to those children.

[00:12:10] And then, yeah, and I, again, you know, human trafficking, forced marriage, of course, those things have always been happening, but they're just much more on our radar now.

[00:12:24] And, of course, the big threat, as we know, to children and young people is internet safety.

[00:12:30] So there are a range of subject knowledge that social workers need to develop and that, you know, local authorities have the, in the statutory sector anyway,

[00:12:42] have the mandate to make sure that social workers are, you know, have that knowledge.

[00:12:49] And I'd say two things. I think, firstly, because we now have, and this is one of the shifts that we have seen over the last few years,

[00:12:56] that we, in 2017, we changed the law so that we've now got post-qualification standards for child and family social work.

[00:13:06] We're just reviewing those at the moment and they will come out for consultation shortly.

[00:13:12] And it'll be really important to make sure that those areas that you've just described are really clearly articulated.

[00:13:20] So what's the knowledge base you need, but also what's the skills base?

[00:13:24] I do hope so.

[00:13:26] I do hope so.

[00:13:27] I mean, I was talking to a financial crimes expert on the podcast a few weeks ago,

[00:13:33] and, you know, you're talking a minimum of about $500 billion in terms of the turnover from trafficking.

[00:13:42] Yeah.

[00:13:43] Lots of it involving children.

[00:13:45] Yes.

[00:13:47] It's bigger than any one government, I think.

[00:13:50] And that's the issue, I suspect.

[00:13:52] Yes.

[00:13:53] Yeah.

[00:13:53] Yeah.

[00:13:54] Well, let me ask you something else then about innovations in social work,

[00:13:59] because, I mean, I think I'm beginning to see changes a bit,

[00:14:03] some coming from abroad, but some local as well, in terms of how we actually practice.

[00:14:08] I mean, for example, I did a podcast with a professor of social work from China.

[00:14:13] Yes.

[00:14:13] He's been working for about a decade now, turning social workers into first responders.

[00:14:18] Yes.

[00:14:20] For earthquakes, tsunamis, major catastrophes and so forth,

[00:14:25] because, you know, the skills that social work brings to the table are so helpful at that point in time.

[00:14:33] And I just wondered if we could begin to see changes like that within our social work education system,

[00:14:40] and if you've come across things like that at all.

[00:14:46] What specific things, David?

[00:14:48] Oh, sorry.

[00:14:49] To do with new courses, new ways of using social work.

[00:14:53] Hello?

[00:14:56] Yeah.

[00:15:00] Okay.

[00:15:01] Okay.

[00:15:01] So there has been quite a lot of difficulty in children's services,

[00:15:05] especially over the last few years in terms of recruitment.

[00:15:08] What's your take on that now?

[00:15:11] Yeah.

[00:15:11] So that's really interesting.

[00:15:15] So we don't have a problem recruiting and retaining social workers in the profession.

[00:15:24] And so we've got more social workers registered with Social Work England than we've ever had before.

[00:15:31] We've got over 100,000 social workers in England.

[00:15:35] And so that's great.

[00:15:37] So we've got this committed group of social workers that join the profession and they stay in the profession.

[00:15:44] Then we've got social workers and this is about 36,000 social workers in local child and family, children's social care services, local government.

[00:15:58] Yeah.

[00:15:58] And the problem that we've got there is turnover.

[00:16:04] So there's a high vacancy rate.

[00:16:09] But it's not that we haven't got agency workers that are filling those.

[00:16:14] Most of those vacancies are filled by agency workers.

[00:16:17] But the problem, of course, is that creates instability in organisations.

[00:16:23] So social workers don't leave the profession.

[00:16:28] A lot of them stay within child and family services, but they move around a lot.

[00:16:35] And we've got this agency.

[00:16:37] There's about 17 percent of our workforce are agency.

[00:16:41] And it's an increasingly popular route.

[00:16:44] And we've just actually government has just recently put out statutory guidance on what we're expecting local authorities to do to try and limit the amount of movement across local authorities.

[00:17:01] And there's some really, really important principles in it.

[00:17:05] So, for example, is that for new social workers joining local government, that they have to be they can't become agency until they have done three years permanent employment in local government.

[00:17:23] Because it's I think it's absolutely crucial for newly qualified social workers to really understand and the practice and the role.

[00:17:37] And that I think you're much better placed to do that well and with confidence if you're really established as part of an organisation and that you've got real stability.

[00:17:46] And there's a range of other rules that are being put in place.

[00:17:53] But I would also say that we have to value our agency staff and that there are some very good reasons why people do eventually move into agency.

[00:18:05] And not least because often they want to stay in practice and want, you know, a whole range of family reasons, etc.

[00:18:15] They want some flex.

[00:18:17] But we are.

[00:18:18] Yeah, we're trying to limit how much that happens because of the impact that it has on children and families.

[00:18:25] Absolutely.

[00:18:25] Yeah, because it's very, very disruptive for them to see, you know, a string of social workers coming and going.

[00:18:35] So, yeah.

[00:18:35] I do remember in the early, sorry, I remember in the early days when I, London days, for example, it was easy for people every couple of years to move from one London borough to the next, to the next, to the next.

[00:18:45] Yes.

[00:18:46] Yeah.

[00:18:47] However, in the rural parts of the country, the rest of the country, I mean, I found that social work essentially, a lot of it was lifestyle choices as much as anything.

[00:18:59] Yes.

[00:18:59] Yeah.

[00:19:00] For example, you know, Northumberland or Cornwall or wherever, people would go because they would like to live there as well as work there.

[00:19:09] But other places, people would just flit sometimes from job to job because of the easy accessibility of the next door neighbour.

[00:19:17] Yes.

[00:19:18] Yeah, exactly.

[00:19:19] So, you know, the London, for example, is a classic.

[00:19:24] You know, there's 32 local authorities.

[00:19:26] You can get from across those 32 local authorities from one side of London to the other in probably, you know, an hour, an hour and a half max.

[00:19:34] So you really have got a lot of options.

[00:19:38] So, yes.

[00:19:40] But I think that there's also something to just consider about, you know, we have to ask ourselves why social workers want to be agency.

[00:19:48] And the feedback that we get from that part of the workforce is that they, and it is in part about the pressures that they experience in certain local authorities, that they just feel like they have more control and autonomy.

[00:20:06] And that, yes, that they have the freedom, I suppose, to not be tied to one place.

[00:20:14] And so, and I can understand that, you know, that people make different choices for different reasons.

[00:20:21] But I do think that there's a limit to how much instability that we can oversee.

[00:20:27] So hopefully these new arrangements will help stem some of that.

[00:20:34] Totally agree.

[00:20:35] Totally agree with you on that.

[00:20:37] And I really hope that what you've said actually gets traction.

[00:20:40] Hmm.

[00:20:41] Simply, too, for the fact of I do, the distress that social workers suffer from, and especially if they're people down within their teams and so forth and having to shoulder extra cases, extra burdens and so on.

[00:20:55] I do, because I remember in practice all the time, whether I was managing teams or I chaired a couple of partnership boards for several years as well.

[00:21:04] And effectively, the reflective supervision got lost.

[00:21:12] Yeah.

[00:21:12] It's all about looking at cases, managing the cases.

[00:21:15] And you can understand that, but nothing about what's between.

[00:21:18] I mean, because the social workers' tools are between their ears.

[00:21:21] Yeah.

[00:21:22] And they really need to have that health maintained.

[00:21:26] And I often feel that reflective supervision, you know, how are you and how can we support you individually, gets lost sometimes.

[00:21:35] Would that be your experience as well?

[00:21:37] No, absolutely.

[00:21:38] And I think that if you look at the data on local authorities and agency, there's definitely a correlation between your stronger authorities

[00:21:49] and that have a good track record in effective practice with families, well-supported staff, that their rates of agency are much lower.

[00:21:59] That I went to a visit in York recently, and they've got a fantastic DCS there, sorry, Director of Children's Services there, and fantastic team.

[00:22:10] And they have now, they don't have any agency workers at all.

[00:22:15] In fact, I think they might even have a waiting list of people wanting to work for them.

[00:22:18] But it's, you know, so it is very varied across the country.

[00:22:23] But we know that if you provide the right practice conditions, that social workers feel that the senior leadership has got their backs in, you know, very fraught day-to-day work context,

[00:22:37] that they do get that supervision, not just, you know, one-to-one, but possibly group supervision as well really helps,

[00:22:45] that they've got opportunities to develop their practice, knowledge and skill, then that helps enormously to retain staff.

[00:22:54] And just also, David, I mean, the other thing, there's been quite a few changes that we've made.

[00:23:00] And one of them is that we have now introduced, for the first time, a national framework for practice for children's social care.

[00:23:08] This is statutory guidance.

[00:23:11] And it is absolutely about what we want to see practitioners do, but it's also very clear about what we expect leaders to do,

[00:23:18] and to create those right conditions for practice.

[00:23:23] And then we've got two other things that link to that.

[00:23:27] So we are publishing a suite of practice guides, which are the kind of best evidence in relation to certain areas of practice.

[00:23:37] But also, and some of your listeners might be interested, is that we now have a public-facing dashboard,

[00:23:43] which shows by local authority, and you can do all kinds of comparative analysis, et cetera,

[00:23:48] about how different local authorities are managing.

[00:23:54] And, of course, some of the data over time will show agency rates, et cetera.

[00:24:01] And we can see sort of patterns across regions as well as individual local authorities.

[00:24:07] That will be very helpful.

[00:24:08] And, I mean, I might as well say at this point, because, I mean, it's good for people listening to know,

[00:24:13] before, when I actually published this podcast, the front page, which essentially is text,

[00:24:20] you know, apart from having a nice picture of yourself and whatever on it, we'll have lots of links, any links that you need.

[00:24:26] Oh, good. Yeah.

[00:24:27] And we'll put them on it.

[00:24:29] And things like you've just mentioned, you know, we'll make sure that all of that's on there,

[00:24:32] so that people can actually easily, you know, follow up what you've been talking about.

[00:24:39] But let me just ask a couple more areas of work that I'm quite interested in.

[00:24:44] I mean, a lot of people abroad listen to this podcast as well.

[00:24:49] And I wonder, I mean, do you have much contact with colleagues of a similar sort of position abroad?

[00:24:58] And what, because I've always been in favor, if you like, to not put it too bluntly, of stealing from the neighbors.

[00:25:05] Yes.

[00:25:06] And looking to good projects and good innovative kind of things happening elsewhere.

[00:25:12] I mean, are you very much in favor of that?

[00:25:15] Have you any kind of experience of that?

[00:25:17] And would you recommend that as something to actually build on?

[00:25:22] Yeah, no, absolutely.

[00:25:23] And I think that those international links are, you know, hugely helpful.

[00:25:27] And, you know, I have some of those, obviously, that are live.

[00:25:31] And I'm just thinking one of the best examples, I suppose, which has been emerging over many years,

[00:25:37] is the role of family group decision making and in particular family group conferencing,

[00:25:45] which, as we know, originated in New Zealand.

[00:25:49] And we've been looking at very closely over the last few years here and have done one of the largest

[00:25:56] randomised control trials on family group conferences in the world, actually.

[00:26:03] And when we've been talking about this over the years, we've really used the expertise,

[00:26:08] particularly from the previous chief social worker in New Zealand,

[00:26:14] who really came over here and helped us think through that and how we might want to approach it.

[00:26:21] And again, we're very much hoping that we will see in new legislation that family group decision making

[00:26:30] becomes an entitlement for families.

[00:26:33] So that, you know, that learning from New Zealand has really influenced our thinking

[00:26:40] alongside, obviously, people like the Family Rights Group and various people that have been pushing for that for many years.

[00:26:47] So it's not handled properly.

[00:26:49] That does make good sense.

[00:26:51] Yes.

[00:26:51] Yeah.

[00:26:52] Yeah.

[00:26:54] There has always been, and I know you would agree with me, but over the decades,

[00:26:59] there's been a kind of a roller coaster in terms of the relationship between education and employers.

[00:27:08] How have you...

[00:27:09] I mean, social work education.

[00:27:10] Yes.

[00:27:11] Yes.

[00:27:12] Universities, for example, you know, and employers, with each kind of thinking sometimes

[00:27:17] that the other's not doing something either well enough or often enough or whatever.

[00:27:22] Yeah.

[00:27:23] I mean, what's the position in your mind at the moment?

[00:27:26] Are we in a better place?

[00:27:28] Yeah, I think we are, actually.

[00:27:30] I totally recognise what you're saying, and that's always historically been a really fraught conversation.

[00:27:37] But over the last few years, we've been funding something called Teaching Partnerships,

[00:27:43] which is this arrangement between, exactly as you say, social work educators and local authorities

[00:27:51] to work much more closely together to make sure that students are getting the, you know,

[00:27:59] a good quality social work education and also insight into different areas of practice.

[00:28:05] And I think that when I...

[00:28:08] If I think sort of 10, 15 years ago, I think that debate was really fraught.

[00:28:11] I think that's much less so.

[00:28:14] I'm glad to hear it.

[00:28:15] I mean, because about that time, for about three years, I did a stint for the Department

[00:28:20] of Education in the newly qualified social worker programme.

[00:28:25] Okay.

[00:28:26] Yeah.

[00:28:26] For the 15 Southwest authorities.

[00:28:30] Yeah.

[00:28:31] I vividly remember, let's just put it this way, the differences that were going on then

[00:28:37] that were quite, almost quite toxic, I thought, you know, at some point.

[00:28:41] Yeah.

[00:28:41] Yeah.

[00:28:42] And I think that, I think in, yes, I'm not saying that there aren't any debates to be

[00:28:46] had, but, you know, I think, I think also what's happened in a lot of the work that

[00:28:52] I've been focused on is post-qualification.

[00:28:54] So that's sort of taken the pressure a bit off initial education.

[00:28:59] And, you know, the sort of consensus is that we have a generic first qualification and

[00:29:05] then the post-qualification landscape is where you really hone in on your space.

[00:29:12] And, you know, I think that that has really calmed the debate down quite a bit.

[00:29:19] But it is, I mean, I'm a, you know, staunch defender of specialism.

[00:29:23] I think that, you know, that if you aren't, you know, particularly, for example, if you

[00:29:32] are on a generic course and you don't have a statutory placement, for example, or you are

[00:29:38] not coming into contact with higher level needs or, you know, significant harm, then

[00:29:45] moving straight into a local authority setting can be really hard.

[00:29:49] So it's really making sure that everybody in those first couple of years are properly

[00:29:54] supported and developed.

[00:29:56] And that really helps, I think, people stay with it, which I think is a, you know, a fantastic

[00:30:01] career, I have to say.

[00:30:04] And I know I've had a bit of a, you know, particular route, but I think, you know, for many of us

[00:30:11] who stay in social work, there's so many avenues that it takes you.

[00:30:14] I just think it's a fantastic qualification to have.

[00:30:18] And, you know, statutory work, I think is really hard.

[00:30:22] It's intellectually, you know, some of the most challenging stuff you'll ever do because

[00:30:26] it's really about that relationship between private family life and the state.

[00:30:31] And we're often, you know, the go between, between those two things.

[00:30:36] But that's just, you know, part of what social work can offer.

[00:30:39] So, yeah, I think it's a great working life, I think.

[00:30:45] Well, let's talk a little bit then about how, in the last few minutes, one of the things

[00:30:51] that's really kind of dominated my experience of social work, especially over the last sort

[00:30:56] of 20 or 30 years, has been our image in the media.

[00:31:02] Yeah.

[00:31:04] And, you know, when I was in position, you know, before like Baswa or wherever, you know,

[00:31:10] doing various things, I was catapulted in with no training whatsoever and had to learn

[00:31:14] it very fast.

[00:31:15] And I know that colleagues now get a little bit better training and preparation for that.

[00:31:21] But it's still an uphill battle in many ways in terms of how we're perceived and fighting

[00:31:28] to remain an equal partner in the shop window, as it were.

[00:31:33] Yeah.

[00:31:33] I mean, it's interesting, isn't it?

[00:31:35] And I have lots and lots of debates about that because some social workers really hanker

[00:31:41] after that public recognition.

[00:31:43] But some social workers don't and in fact feel the opposite in that, you know, we definitely

[00:31:48] don't come into this profession to be, you know, for the glory or, you know, for public

[00:31:55] acclaim.

[00:31:56] And that we tend to be very stuck in this idea of us not being understood and not being liked.

[00:32:05] And actually, very recently, an academic, and again, you can put the link in to the podcast

[00:32:11] if you'd like, really challenges this notion that the public don't understand and, you know,

[00:32:17] are negative about social workers.

[00:32:19] And I think, I think it was actually in Scotland, they did a whole piece of work on this and actually

[00:32:26] found that the public understood very well what we do and certainly did not feel negative

[00:32:32] about the profession.

[00:32:34] And this piece is worth reading because it's really sort of pushing back on that narrative.

[00:32:40] Please send me the link if you can, please.

[00:32:44] I mean, I'm more than happy.

[00:32:46] That's amazing.

[00:32:47] And then I think that, you know, I mean, I think that it's obviously, you know, I mean,

[00:32:53] there are, I think there are far fewer examples, actually, of when social workers are getting

[00:33:00] a hard time in the media, but it does still happen.

[00:33:04] And, you know, usually on the back of a series.

[00:33:08] It prompted, I'll tell you this, Isabel, it prompted me to go in.

[00:33:11] I mean, I did run a training company for a while and a lot of stuff I did here and in America

[00:33:17] was I put a course together about managing the media in a crisis.

[00:33:23] And effectively of all, because I mean, all the sometimes very bumpy experience I had myself

[00:33:29] and how to deal with it.

[00:33:30] But basically, I've always thought that if the local social workers were allowed to talk

[00:33:37] to the media a bit more, only if they wanted to, of course, you know, and actually explain

[00:33:41] to maybe a couple of local journalists, the local free newspaper, the local free radio station,

[00:33:46] whatever, just a little bit more about all the successes we have, all the good news.

[00:33:52] Yeah.

[00:33:52] But eventually, when that one call came in of a new family that was in crisis and there

[00:33:57] was a lot of trouble and there was suspicion and all sorts of things, that it would just

[00:34:02] help that little bit of time for the social worker to get his or her feet across the threshold

[00:34:07] and in there and trust.

[00:34:09] It would help the trust.

[00:34:11] Yeah.

[00:34:11] If we were much more kind of balanced in terms of the views of the media.

[00:34:16] Yeah.

[00:34:17] I mean, I think there's two things to say about that before we close.

[00:34:20] And I think the first thing is, is that local authorities do that much more than they used

[00:34:25] to.

[00:34:26] And I see lots and lots of examples of local authorities, you know, using exactly as you

[00:34:32] say that the local and regional press to showcase, you know, really positive work that they're

[00:34:38] doing alongside families.

[00:34:40] And also, I think Basra has done quite a lot of that.

[00:34:43] I think you're much more likely to see Basra representatives in the media and pushing back

[00:34:49] on some of that kind of media negative script, which is...

[00:34:53] It wasn't always the case.

[00:34:54] Sorry?

[00:34:55] I'm saying, thank goodness, it wasn't always the case.

[00:34:57] Yes.

[00:34:58] No, no.

[00:34:58] Yeah, I definitely see more of that.

[00:35:01] But just a little story is that when I started this and with Lynn Romeo, that we invited all

[00:35:12] the big media outlets to a meeting in the department and, you know, really to try and fresh

[00:35:20] out why do they do this.

[00:35:21] And they said, you know, no one's ever going to read the good stories.

[00:35:26] You know, people are not interested.

[00:35:28] The public like to read, you know, a bad story.

[00:35:33] And the other thing that was really fascinating was that the, you know, the people that are

[00:35:40] reading those are just as likely to be social workers as anybody else.

[00:35:44] So it's, you know, it's tricky.

[00:35:47] And I don't know how much of our energy we should be putting in trying to force the public

[00:35:53] to read good stories, because I think our best advert is our own practice and leadership.

[00:36:01] And so that every interaction we have with families is, you know, the best that it can

[00:36:07] be in the circumstances that practitioners and managers find themselves in.

[00:36:12] And, you know, that's really where I think our focus should be.

[00:36:17] It is crucial.

[00:36:18] All of what you've just said, of course, is crucial.

[00:36:20] I do think I'd like to suggest, though, that 98% of the population, if not more, get their

[00:36:28] opinions and their news from some kind of media, whether it's written or whether it's broadcast

[00:36:33] or whether it's social, that we've got to be in there with our views.

[00:36:40] We've got to be in that shot window.

[00:36:42] One in six children in this country at some point has a social worker.

[00:36:47] One in six.

[00:36:48] Incredible.

[00:36:49] It is.

[00:36:50] And so, you know, the idea that we're some kind of small, unknown little thing over here

[00:36:56] in the public sector is just not the case, is that one in six children access a social

[00:37:03] worker or a child in need at some point.

[00:37:06] And so that experience of the child, young person, their family, that's what will change

[00:37:14] people's minds about the role that social work has and the positive impact that they can

[00:37:21] have.

[00:37:21] Right.

[00:37:22] Final question.

[00:37:23] Couple of minutes, if I may.

[00:37:24] We're coming up to a kind of a big holiday period now and an awful lot of children in this

[00:37:32] country still are way below the poverty line, experiencing and seeing all this other kind

[00:37:38] of glut of kind of commercialism and everything going on.

[00:37:41] And social workers are having to try doubly hard in some cases to sort of affect kind of

[00:37:48] balance and change and good feelings towards families.

[00:37:53] I mean, what message would you give as the chief social worker in England to children and family

[00:37:59] social workers?

[00:38:01] And maybe even tack on a little bit about people who might be considering social workers a

[00:38:06] profession.

[00:38:07] Would you like to just give a kind of a Christmas message, if you like?

[00:38:10] Gosh, well, I suppose the first thing I'd say is thanks to everybody that won't be having

[00:38:14] a break over Christmas and New Year because they'll be working.

[00:38:17] And, you know, there are lots of social workers out there who'll be working over the festive

[00:38:22] period on, you know, out of hours, duty, etc.

[00:38:26] So, you know, a huge thanks to everybody over that period.

[00:38:31] And a huge thanks to all of you for everything that you've done over this year and, you know,

[00:38:39] the years that I've been in this role.

[00:38:41] I can really see a sea change in the quality of practice.

[00:38:46] And whenever I'm out and about, I'm always, you know, so impressed by all the brilliant

[00:38:53] work that goes on.

[00:38:54] And the commitment, you know, to local children and families is always palpable.

[00:39:00] So long may that continue.

[00:39:02] I think, and I, you know, I have said quite a lot of positive things in this podcast.

[00:39:07] And that's because of the work that's going on in child and family social services, that

[00:39:13] we've got, you know, a lot of good news.

[00:39:15] We've made, you know, significant progress.

[00:39:18] And I think from everything that I've, you know, said, David, is that there's some real

[00:39:25] hope that we can make even more of a difference to children and families.

[00:39:29] And yes, so those of you that are listening, you know, keep on carrying on the good fights.

[00:39:35] And for those, anybody that's thinking about social work, that I have no doubt in recommending

[00:39:40] it as a fantastic career option.

[00:39:42] It really is the best.

[00:39:44] It's a great, it's a great working life.

[00:39:46] Well, Isabel, it's been a pleasure having you on the program.

[00:39:50] I wish you a good holiday as well.

[00:39:53] And keep up the good fight.

[00:39:55] And thank you very much indeed for your time.

[00:39:58] Thanks very much.