CHILDREN at the highest risk of sexual and physical abuse continue to be let down by Birmingham City Council’s failing social services, a highly-critical government report has concluded.

The government has not ruled out introducing a compulsory payment scheme for social care, sources say.

The government has axed £15m of funding promised by the previous Labour government to help local authorities implement integrated children’s systems.

BASW has warned that the College of Social Work could become dominated by trade union interests if it links up with Unison to offer joint membership to social workers.

RIOT police armed with tasers raided a secure Midland hospital after patients went on the rampage. Mental health inmates at the Brooklands Hospital site in Marston Green, Solihull, smashed windows, doors and furniture as terrified nurses locked themselves in the office out of danger.

Massive growth in the number of Cambridgeshire children in care has opened a £3.5 million budget black hole.

Social workers in the West Midlands have welcomed Sandwell Council’s decision to pull out of the government’s social work practice pilot for children in care.

BASW’s chief executive Hilton Dawson has written to the prime minister to urge him to prioritise social work jobs and services at the expense of arts funding

Unison is in talks to negotiate a joint membership deal that could see more than 40,000 of its social work professionals become the founding members of the College of Social Work.

A FORMER director of social services for Cheshire has called for lessons to be learned following the death of a patient at the hands of an out of hours doctor from Germany.