‘Social workers need proper supervision’

The Government’s new Child and Family Support Agency should not hire any new social workers until it ensures all of its social workers are being properly supervised by more senior staff, according to the chief executive of Barnardos.

His comments come in the aftermath of the publication of the review of deaths of children in care between 2000 and 2010. The standard of care provided to the children was described as a “disgrace” by the children’s minister who said there was a need for an “utterly reformed system of state care and intervention”.

The report found wide-spread evidence of social workers not being allocated to children at risk, of children being shunted from social worker to social worker, and of staff not keeping proper records of their interaction with children.