Examination of Witnesses (Questions 260
- 279)
WEDNESDAY 24 JUNE 2009
CATHY ASHLEY,
SUE BERELOWITZ,
JAMES BROWN
AND ENID
HENDRY
Q260 Paul Holmes: Cathy, the Family
Rights Group made similar points. You said specifically, for example,
that "we are aware from academics that they can be under
intense pressure from their institutions to maximise numbers of
entrants ... and not fail students". Do you want to elaborate?
Cathy Ashley: Yes. I think that
there is also a question of whether students who should be failed
are being failed, and the pressure put on for them not to fail
and so on. It is partly the funding. It is also true in terms
of how difficult it is to fail when it comes to practice assessment.
People have to go through a lot of hoops to actually fail a student.
I think you could shift the system to make it easier to fail,
in a sense. You might then weed out some of those who are unsuitable
to be in the profession. I also think that in terms of the question
of pay and status, you also need to do it in terms of the gender
of who is coming in. One of the pieces of work that we have been
doing around fathers is not just about the legal ignorance, often,
among social workers about engagement of fathers but also about
the fact that a lot of social workers are scared of what they
regard as violent men. There is a real problem in terms of the
gender profile of the social work profession. We have seen in
teaching that actually, the higher the standing, the more likely
you are to attract men into the profession.
Q261 Paul Holmes: For 2003-04, only
3.2% of social work students actually failed, although about 17%
withdrew voluntarily. In teaching, 30% or 40% do not finally enter
the profession, but again, many fewer actually fail. Do we need
to be failing more people, or do most people drop out because
they are not suitable and they recognise that?
Cathy Ashley: There is a question
about entry points. Looking at the variation—you have done
this, I know, in earlier sessions—it is 160 to 498 in terms
of social work, whereas the variation in nursing, medicine and
teaching is actually much narrower in terms of who gets to the
starting block, if you like. But I do think that it is an extremely
complex job being a social worker. It is a job in which you are
investing the state's responsibility for protecting the most vulnerable
children and families, and the standard that we should expect
from those going through that should be high. It should be easier
to fail students, and there should not be a financial disincentive,
in effect, for higher education institutions to fail students
who are not up to it, because the people who will suffer, although
it is obviously the profession, are, more importantly, the most
vulnerable kids.
Q262 Paul Holmes: Are people collectively
saying that we need the Government to lay down stricter criteria
for common entry standards and failure and to intervene rather
than leaving it to lots of individual HE institutions?
Cathy Ashley: I would go along
with that line, yes.
Q263 Paul Holmes: Enid, the NSPCC
has made lots of similar points. You said in your evidence: "As
an employer, we cannot be confident about the abilities and knowledge
of new social workers", so you assess each individual and
then run your own training courses. Is that not what any good
employer should do? Is a school with newly qualified teachers
any different?
Enid Hendry: No. It is good practice,
but we wouldn't have to do it so thoroughly or in such detail
if we had more confidence and people were coming to us better
prepared. We are finding significant gaps that need to be addressed.
We consistently find that people don't have the assessment and
analytical skills that you would expect people to come off a course
with, so we are having to do more of the ground work. We cannot
be confident that the foundations are there. Yes, it is reasonable
to expect employers to assess individuals and do individual development
plans, but the gaps are significant.
Q264 Paul Holmes: You talk about
analytical skills. What other major gaps are there? You mentioned
in the memorandum that you often have to run training courses
on communicating with children and therapeutic skills, but surely
that ought to be a basic part of any social work degree course.
Enid Hendry: People don't seem
to have the skills that we are looking for in the depth of communication
with children and young people. They may have done a small introduction
to it, but not the depth of theory, and particularly not observing
children and knowing about behaviours, developmental norms and
what it is reasonable to expect a child to be able to do at a
particular age. That detailed knowledge and applying it in practice—not
just in a clinical setting but in a family home, where all the
things are going on—is the sort of thing that people need
a lot more help with.
James Brown: There is some doubt
as to whether what you were saying are the things it is assumed
would be covered in a course, are things that are in fact covered
in a course—a lot of the core skills. My personal expectation
would be that in three years—you've got 1,000 days—you
blooming well have got to make sure that everything possible is
covered to get you on to the starting block best equipped: communication
skills, confidence, public speaking, report writing. All those
things have to be covered. Three years is actually a long time.
In your apprenticeship, you come through, and then you need protecting
for that first year, and for many years afterwards as you grow
and develop and stay within the profession.
Q265 Paul Holmes: As an agency, how
far do you run the in-house training courses, such as for the
NSPCC, and how far are you just a clearing house for employment?
James Brown: Sadly, it has to
be more the latter, because we are restricted by resource—simple.
Chairman: Sorry, we have to get a move
on, but this is a fascinating area. The Committee would like to
know why this 17.5% drop-out rate? Perhaps they counsel that they
have not got the right qualities—it is very important. I
can remember the thrust of the Robbins report, which was that
if you have fairly large numbers of students your selection processes
are not very good. However—David, content of training.
Q266 Mr Chaytor: I would like to
ask Sue in the first instance. One of the issues over initial
training is the point at which specialisation should take place.
What is your view on this? Some people think that it should be
after year 1, some after year 2. What is your view?
Sue Berelowitz: I am aware that
there are some strong views. I have said in my submission that
I thought it should be in year 2. I didn't say that because I
am fixed on the year in which this ought to commence, but my starting
point—which I want to emphasise this morning—is that
we need to be clear about what competencies children's social
workers need. When they come out into the field and start, they
need a qualified social worker year. That is the starting point.
I find that helpful, in the sense of then tracking back and thinking
when that should actually start. I don't mind which year it starts,
I just want them to have the competencies. There may well be things,
such as analytical skills, report writing and so on, that are
common to both children's and adults' social workers and that
can be part of generic training. Indeed, even things like attachment
theory I think should be common to both adults' and children's
social workers, because adults who are troubled are products of
their childhoods. You can only work with them if you understand
what happened to them in their childhoods. A lot of things are
common, but it is really important that children's social workers
come out of their training with the basic skills—by basic,
I don't mean low level but a sophisticated level of skills—to
undertake that work. I have given quite a long list in my submission.
I mentioned attachment theory, and I shall say it again—as
a children's social worker, you need a very sophisticated understanding
of attachment theory, in order to work with the family as a whole,
never mind with the child. I shall say child development too,
clearly. When I did my training, I was already a qualified speech
and language therapist. The training that I had as a speech and
language therapist, in terms of child development, was hugely
more extensive than anything that I got on my social work training.
If all that I had had was what I got on my social work training—which
was a good course—I don't think it would have given me as
much as I required in order to do the job. I was at an advantage,
having already trained as a speech and language therapist. It
is about looking at what is required, working back from that and
then thinking through how we put that into a course, such that
all the components are there, and what needs to follow on afterwards,
in the newly qualified year and in subsequent post-qualifying
training. Those are the questions that really need to be answered.
Q267 Mr Chaytor: In view of the enormous
variability of the content and structures of initial training,
is there a need for greater co-ordination at a national level?
Sue Berelowitz: I would say that
there is. The reason that I say in my submission that I favour
year 2—as does Lord Laming—is simply because in my
view there is a lot to be accomplished, and I'm not sure you can
do it all in a generic three-year course with a specialisation
commencing towards the end. There may be other ways of doing it—for
example, by having generic components in years 1 and 2 and the
capacity for some specialisation with separate models in year
2 that enable those who know already that they want to be children's
social workers to take on the kind of learning that will equip
them for the task. There are a number of ways of doing it.
Q268 Mr Chaytor: The next question
is who should take the lead on this, given the autonomy of individual
universities?
Sue Berelowitz: One of the things
that came up in the evidence given by the Social Work Task Force
is that there are a lot of people in the field who have responsibility
for regulation and so on.
Q269 Mr Chaytor: Too many?
Sue Berelowitz: Possibly too many.
Certainly there needs to be some clarity—perhaps that could
be done through the General Social Care Council, which currently
has the responsibility. We need to be absolutely clear about who
sets the basic benchmark for what needs to be covered in social
work training. There is too much variability. There needs to be
a basic benchmark set in terms of standards, and the regulators
need to assess against those agreed standards, so that we can
be confident that, wherever somebody is trained, they will come
out sufficiently competent and will be able to do the job—whatever
needs to come afterwards in terms of continuing professional development.
We need to have some standards set. If it is a case of the Government
setting standards, that would be absolutely fine—although
I can see difficulties around that. If I go back to the teaching
model, again, there are standards around what is expected of teachers
when they come out. There is a good system for assessing the teaching
and training institutions to make sure that they are delivering,
and there is a very good system for assessing teachers when they
are doing their PGCEs to make sure that they are coming up to
the mark. We need to learn from that and absorb those lessons
into social work training.
Q270 Mr Chaytor: Could I ask Enid
specifically about child protection. What is your view of the
extent to which initial training covers child protection? Is it
sufficiently thorough?
Enid Hendry: We are often asked
to provide input for courses on child protection. That is great;
it is part of what we should be helping with. But we are sometimes
asked to do half a day. Half a day on child protection in a three-year
training programme seems to be grossly inadequate. Obviously,
other things relate to child protection, but you cannot cover
the knowledge and practical skills that you need in that time—for
example, the application of the law, how you engage with families
and talk about some of the difficult things, how you probe. There
is so much that you need to cover in that course beyond the basics
of what is abuse, how do you recognise it and what do you do about
it. That is about all you can get in a half day.
Q271 Mr Chaytor: But surely you are
not saying that the typical social worker initial training programme
only has half a day on child protection. That is just the time
you have been invited to give your input.
Enid Hendry: On a number of occasions,
our experience has been that it is a half day or day that is specifically
focused on child protection out of three years.
Mr Chaytor: Out of three years?
Enid Hendry: Out of three years.
Q272 Mr Chaytor: I am looking at
other members of the panel to see if that is their understanding
as well because that seems quite staggering.
Sue Berelowitz: The expectation
is too often that that kind of training should come while you
are in placement. There is too great a reliance on that. Such
training is fine if you are in a good placement with a good practice
teacher and, indeed, if you are in a statutory placement. But
there are problems if you are in a placement where you have not
got a good practice teacher. The reality is that there are good
ones and not such good ones, which comes back to the point you
were making earlier about how these things should be regulated.
If you are not in a placement where you are dealing with child
protection or where your practice teacher is dealing with child
protection and you can do some shadowing work, you are not going
to see very much of it. So the content of courses in terms of
child protection is, like everything else, variable, but it can
be very light.
Cathy Ashley: May I raise one
point on how social workers or students are taught relationship
work and about identifying abuse and so on. Our concern about
specialising too early is that those are skills that adult social
workers need as well as child and family social workers. One of
our concerns is that often you get parents who have been dealing
with adult social services or mental health specialists who have
not looked at that adult as a parent and, in effect, not noticed
the child in the room at the same time. Our worry about specialising
too early is that those are skills that all social workers require,
almost regardless of what areas they later specialise in and work
through.
James Brown: How does a social
worker know on day one of their course whether they want to be
an adult social worker, a child care social worker or a mental
health social worker? They do not really know what social work
is. Practice placements, and the opportunities to get them, are
absolutely key. The only analogy I can think of is that you get
to year three in a teaching course, enter a classroom for the
first time and say, "Well, this is not for me." There
is an exact parallel in social work. Get in and find out what
the job involves, then, in your mind, say, "Right, when I
go back to my course, back to my college, these are the things
I really need to be listening for: child protection and report
writing," because you know what you are going to do. I will
quote an example from De Montfort university from three or four
years ago. All the students were straight out on placement early
in the course, found out what the job was about, then went back
to their courses, and it was a perfect start. For the ones who
begin the actual practice in year three, it is too late. Some
get to the end of year three and still have not had a statutory
placement.
Chairman: James, that leads us right
into Fiona's question; we are going to talk about placements,
so we will drill down on that.
Q273 Fiona Mactaggart: When we spoke
to young social workers we had some frank horror stories about
inappropriate placements. I think that the social worker who intended
to get into child protection was placed in a GP surgery with no
social worker attached, and so on. I want to know what we should
be recommending, very specifically, to ensure that the right quality
of practical experience is inherent in social work training. Placements
from the start, you suggest, James. That is perfectly reasonable.
I remember that when I taught teachers one of the things we did
was send them out a day a week, right at the beginning. But what
can we do to make sure that these placements are good? Because
clearly, at present, they are frequently appalling; not in every
case, but there is a pattern that tolerates inappropriate placements
to train future social workers.
Cathy Ashley: I think there is
a question about the suitability of placements in authorities
that are deemed to be failing, and whether the culture of the
organisation sometimes reinforces poor practice, so you get students
going out with the wrong culture. You want at least one placement
in a statutory child protection setting. That would be a strong
preference, with a qualified social worker overseeing that.
Q274 Chairman: We had an example
on Monday of a young man, a social worker, one of whose placements
was in a GP surgery.
Cathy Ashley: That is clearly
ludicrous, but if you are going to ask for what would be ideal,
you also have to look at what support and incentives are being
given to employers to encourage that, because at the moment it
is seen as an onerous extra responsibility, given all the other
pressures on child protection departments. You have to shift what
you are offering to employers if you are going to expect that.
Sue Berelowitz: No social worker
should be on a placement with no practice teacher on site. That
just seems absolutely basic. There are problems at the moment
with the number of placements; people are desperate and they take
whatever they get. I think that, in order to qualify, whether
in adult services or children's services, there need to be some
basic standards. One is that you must do, and pass, a statutory
placement. Practice teachers should go through some training themselves;
they should get financial recognition for that. They should be
able to demonstrate that they have reached a certain standard
so that they know what they are looking for; what work and reading
they are setting their students; that they are involved with,
and pulled together by, the course; and that they get together
with other practice teachers from time to time, so that their
professional development is also kept up to speed and feeds into
the course.
Q275 Fiona Mactaggart: Are you telling
me that that is not happening at the moment?
Sue Berelowitz: It will not be
widespread; I cannot think where it is happening. But that does
not mean it is not happening, because I certainly will not know
about everything that is happening. It certainly will not be widespread.
But I think that those are absolutely basic requirements.
Chairman: Enid, you are nodding.
Enid Hendry: I agree with those
views completely. There was a big investment a few years ago—I
have forgotten exactly how many—in raising the standards
of practice teachers, so they had to have a qualification, and
it became a valued thing to do. Then as the size of the social
work programmes increased, and the numbers of people being put
through and the length of the placements increased—for good
reasons—the demand and the lack of supply meant that standards
were eroded dramatically, so our robust investment in good quality
has been lost over the past three or four years.
Q276 Fiona Mactaggart: What I am
hearing is that too many students are recruited who are not intellectually
up to the rigours of the job, that there are too many poor-quality
placements, and that in those poor-quality placements they are
not properly supervised. Is this a strong argument for reducing
the number of training places and the number of people who can
supervise placements, but insisting on standards and some kind
of continuing commitment to the students? Will that produce a
better qualified social work work force?
Enid Hendry: That makes sense
in terms of quality. My hesitation is about supply and whether
that will make it more difficult for employers to fill the gaps
and to meet the needs of the service users.
Q277 Chairman: There is a lack of
placements, and you have a system in which something like 50%
of the social work staff in some local authorities are from an
agency. Are agency people able to supervise a trainee social worker?
Is one of the problems that you would not give that sort of role
to an agency worker?
Enid Hendry: I had not thought
about that. I would be worried about continuity and what their
previous experience was.
Chairman: That is what I mean.
Enid Hendry: You would need to
know that they were going to be able to see through a placement
from start to finish.
Chairman: Is that right, James?
James Brown: There is no reason
why an agency worker could not supervise a practice placement.
Q278 Chairman: Enid just said the
continuity would not be there. Some local authorities say three
months max.
James Brown: Yes, there would
need to be the tie-in on the contract. But some contracts are
quite lengthy and would be able to cover that period.
Q279 Chairman: Some of the evidence
we have taken says that the high percentage of agency staff is
a sign of instability and churn, which surely does not provide
the environment for good supervision.
James Brown: If you are talking
about an individual piece of supervision for a student social
worker, you have to take it on a case-by-case basis. If there
is a very experienced agency social worker, they are as well equipped
as any other, and perhaps better equipped. We have looked at working
with universities to match our agency workers to practice placements,
and it has actually broken down as an idea.
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