Council Adopts ‘New Style Of Social Work’

Hackney Council is introducing a new style of social work that will give staff more freedom to practice and extra training. All social care staff will receive training in systemic family therapy, where social workers support whole families.

Additionally there will be opportunities for completing the training up to a qualification level and some staff will also get the chance to take doctorates. The training will give staff an understanding of behaviourist techniques for discouraging bad behaviour and encourage good behaviour.

Following the training the social workers will be expected to support whole families not just individuals and use the theories they’ve learned in their day-to-day work. The changes to the service follow an analysis of what sort of approach suits the people the council works with.

Isabelle Trowler, assistant director of Hackney’s children and young people’s service, added that the council is to appoint a consultant social worker to support social work teams on individual cases.