Social workers must visit homes to help children

IRISH child protection workers must get out of the office and into children’s homes if they are really to protect children from neglect and abuse, a leading social worker has said.

Child protection expert, Professor Harry Ferguson, said that Irish social workers must avoid following the British model where “bureaucracy is in control of what social workers do”.

While acknowledging the importance of audits, accountability, rules and procedures, he said that the social workers’ emphasis needed to return to “the child” and “meaningful interaction with the child”.

Professor Ferguson warned that social workers must avoid becoming desk-bound managers as this would serve to “de-skill” their profession as they would “spend less time with service users”.

“We must steer a middle path between lack of formality and the necessary formal position. A social worker must relate to the child as without this there can be no protection,” he said.

“There is a risk that social workers could lose touch with some of the key aspects of what it’s like to do this work ... the experience of being a social worker.”

Social workers must also try and get over the common reservations about travelling to the child’s home — somewhere where they are often highly resented. He acknowledged that social workers often find that such visits “provoke disgust and fear”.

These feelings, he said, must be contained if they are to think clearly and “keep the child in mind”.

Prof Ferguson is a professor of social policy and social work at Bristol University and is charged with independently investigating the case of 14-year-old Michelle Bray from Co Waterford.

The young girl died on January 21 last after inhaling gases from a deodorant can near her home at Dungarvan, Co Waterford. He has been appointed to determine if the Health Service Executive failed in its duty of care to a teenager who died after inhaling aerosols.

Professor Ferguson refused to comment on the continuing investigation.