College of Social Work announces shock closure

The College of Social Work, set up by ministers to be the public voice of social work in the wake of the death of Baby P, has announced it is ‘winding down’ and will close in a matter of weeks.

The College, which had more than 16,000 members, said it is in financial difficulties and had failed to persuade the government to come up with more funding.

The college set up as one of the main recommendations of an official taskforce set up to raise the profile of social work and promote its values and identity to the public and media.

In a joint statement released this afternoon, Jo Cleary (pictured), Chair, and Annie Hudson, Chief Executive, said:  “It is with great sadness and huge regret that we must announce, due to increasing financial pressures, the closure of The College of Social Work (TCSW).

“The organisation is now in the ‘winding down’ process which, rather than instant closure, gives us time to close TCSW properly and meet our commitments to members, staff and the social work profession more widely. Members are our key priority. We know that people will have questions about their membership, including, for example, the status of their professional indemnity insurance.

“We are working hard to get clarity on this and will provide regular updates over the coming days and weeks.TCSW’s Board and staff team are fully committed to ensuring an orderly transition of the College’s functions, resources and projects to other organisations as appropriate. We will be working closely with government and other organisations on this. So whilst the details need to be fully worked out, we can assure social workers that they will be able to access College resources through other avenues in the future.

“We would like to offer our very great appreciation and thanks to the many people who have supported The College and worked with us to strengthen the social work profession over the last 4 years. TCSW has been extremely fortunate to have received the time, energies and efforts of so many extraordinarily dedicated and skilled people – College members, those on our faculties, professional assembly and other groups, people using services, friends and colleagues in other organisations and everyone who joined us at TCSW events and conferences.

“Excellent social work remains absolutely indispensable to a safe and healthy society. The work social workers do deserves great recognition and value. We hope we will leave a strong legacy that can be carried forward to the benefit of the profession and those it serves. We know too that social workers will continue to stand together as a strong and united profession.”

The Governemnt defended the decision to cease funding saying it was always the objective of the College to become financially self-sufficient and independent from government.

A Government spokesman said: “The decision to stop funding the College has not been taken lightly and follows years of Government backing to establish the College and help it become an important advocate in raising the status and standards of the profession.

“Since its inception in 2009, we have supported the College with over £8m to establish it as an independent organisation. We have also invested £100m through the Innovation Programme to kick-start new approaches to support vulnerable children and families. We will continue to work closely with the Chief Social Workers and the profession to champion and improve the social work profession sector.”

The news is seen as a fresh blow to the profession as it struggles to raise its standing in the wake of a series of child protection incidents, increasing workload pressures and negative media publicity.