Undercover Social Worker

[ASecretLemonadeDrinker]

Anyone watching?

What you are all saying sound horribly familiar ...

Such a sad programme.
God, they need to cut their paperwork and have a huge injection of money to get more social workers. I can see why social workers are desperate and stressed out and dislike their jobs so much. I'm sure the vast majority have very good intentions when they start and just get ground down.

OMFG!

Extremely shocking and depressing viewing. Like the support worker in tears who said something along the lines of she cares too much but that's her problem, you're not meant to care.

This is so whacked and messed up and will get even worse with all these austerity cuts.

when i was a newly qualified social worker, i had to sit and argue why a young person should be sent to a secure unit I didnt have a bloomin clue what i was doing, my manager was less than helpful - and to be honest - i got most of my info from the web!

This is too familiar and too depressing

this is so depressing and awful!

i cant believe they let that 15 year old fend for himself Even our team didnt do that - if we didnt find someone a placement, we didnt go home until we did - many many times it was late into the night - or out of the borough which then involved many hours of driving.

But still, you just wouldnt leave them on their own!

what are the odds that social services are on the top of the list for new funding? or rather, what are the odds that SS are top of the list for more cuts?

it makes me soo sad. i really would take every cut that is coming if it meant these children benfitted from it. sadly i dont think funding is the only issue.

It's so short-sighted because if you don't invest in children and their well-being, you wind up with even more very unproductive adults, criminals, people who are more likely to become poor parents, etc.

It's like that bumper sticker: If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.

It's so short-sighted because if you don't invest in children and their well-being, you wind up with even more very unproductive adults, criminals, people who are more likely to become poor parents, etc.

It's like that bumper sticker: If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.

you're so right expat - some of our family support workers were working with the children of the children they worked with years back (did that make sense) The cycle just continues.....

and yes, until proper funding is put in place, and decisions are made in the best interest of the child, and not best value money wise, nothing will change

They mostly seemed to be doing their best under terrible circumstances. They needed twice as many workers and half as much paperwork really.

social services have no bloody money. nothing more to say sadly

i got a terrible sense of everyone's hands being tied. they all seemed to be drowning in teh workload and had no choice but to ask unqualified staff to take on critical cases.

Paperwork and lack of foster carers are my biggest problems.

For 2 1/2 day week I see around 2 children/families. Rest of the time is meetings and paperwork , oh and initiatives ( some are good ...)

And lack of foster carers, too, a lot of that linked to high house costs. Younger people can't afford to rent/buy a home big enough to foster.

It doesn't pay well and you have to give up work.

There are more and more extremely damaged children coming into the system as you now have several generations of people procreating who were in the system themselves.

FC get overloaded and end placements which happens v regularly screwing up kids even more.

Well I have a place on the social work degree in Spet and am strongly considering rejecting it and going into youth work or social policy after watching this.

onadietcokebreak- that would be a shame as there is a major need for SW. The system just needs its priorities straightened.

asecretlemonadedrinker - I have to assume then that you are a foster carer and if not why not? As the SW said she cannot manufacture a placement if there isn't one. It is sickening seeing people like journalists stick the knife in to social workers, if he gave that much of a shit about child protection he wouldn't have left child protection work six years ago to work in television.

I felt very depressed after watching this. I thought the manager was very ineffectual. I know it is a demanding, frustrating job and she probably isn't getting the support she needs either.........but I was still shocked.

jetcat - that boy wasn't left to fend for himself he was at his grandads and that is where he went back to. We do not know what happened after that in terms of placements.

Didn't they say that he left his grandad's afterward and was fending for himself?