Social Worker - Supporting Our Children

Contract Type: Permanent

Contract Hours: 37 hours per week

Salary: Grade H1/H2 SCP 27 - 35 £35,745 - £43,421 per annum

Closing Date: 1st May 2024 at 23:59

Supporting Our Children Service

Blackpool Children’s Services has been on an incredible journey, you could say it’s been a roller coaster! It’s been tough here at times, as we have worked through our OFSTED improvement journey and the intervention from the DFE and such intensive improvement and change has impacted on our workforce.

However, we are now developing a reputation as a good place to practice social work and the DfE’s appointed Commissioner recently recommended removal from DfE intervention. Our latest OFSTED inspection was positive and we are now seeing the positive impact of the hard work undertaken, both for our workforce and for the children and families we serve.

Our services are stable, we have an experienced and committed stable senior leadership team under our new DCS Vicky Gent and are seeing that children and families are now receiving better services.

At the heart of this improvement has been our investment in social work practice and our social workers. Our shared sense of purpose is based upon the Blackpool Families Rock values, culture and practice principals and we are proud this was co-produced with Blackpool’s children, young people, their families and our partnership agencies.

Our teams are small and strengthened by a Supervision Policy which enables a supportive relationship with your manager. We are committed to reducing our caseloads, enabling our social workers to spend time developing trusted relationships with children and their families.

Our staff care about Blackpool’s children and families, and we care about them.

We value that our staff are fully committed and often work above and beyond- we’ve seen that even more during the Pandemic.  In return we therefore offer a flexible approach to working including remote and home working and flexibility with working hours to allow you to meet your own family’s needs too.

If you would like to come and join us on the next stage of this journey please get in touch, you will be guaranteed invaluable experience, a manageable caseload, interesting work and good quality management support.

Supporting Our Children Service

Supporting our children is all about ensuring children in our care receive an excellent parenting whatever setting they are living in with the same life chances as any other young person.

In this service you will find an experienced and stable management team managing small teams of 5 staff including a senior social work practitioner

The focus within the service is where you assess, review and support children and young people who live in long term care arrangements. This gives you the opportunity to get to know a Young person and be part of their development and achievements looking to support them either to be reunified with family or a move through to independence.

Social workers within our Supporting Our Children teams are committed to supporting our children to have a great childhood and future outcomes. They support children to achieve a plan of permanence and ensure we discharge Care Order’s and achieve Special Guardian Orders for children, wherever is possible and safe to do so. You will have a passion for being an advocate and corporate parent for the children our care and committed to establishing longer term trusting relationships with them, and helping them to understand their unique life story.

For further information please contact Julie McClements, Head of Service on Julie.mcclements@blackpool.gov.uk or 01253 477304, or Lian Holland on 07887058881 / Lian.holland@blackpool.gov.uk or Nicola Bonser on 07500 786411 / Nicola.bonser@blackpool.gov.uk

This is a fantastic opportunity for qualified social workers to develop and continue their social work career and for newly qualified social workers looking to start their career.

At Blackpool we have structured career pathways, which start from the Assessed and Supported Year in Employment, to becoming an experienced social worker and all the way up to Head of Service, so there is no journey too big or too small at Blackpool.

If you are a newly qualified social worker we have established ASYE programme offers:

• A high level of comprehensive support and supervision
• Phased insight to the work / caseload
• Hands-on experience
• Competitive salary
• Supported days reflected training and practical mentoring supported by the Principal Social Worker and our Practice Development Team

Upon completion of your ASYE, we will continue to support you to enhance your social work skills to become an experienced social worker (H2 grade).

We are committed to ensure that you work with smaller numbers of children and families which allows you the time to build trusting relationships and to focus on undertaking quality child centred Social Work. You will have the time to focus on the child as well as yourself, your own development and career ambitions.

What we offer

• Pay: our salary offer is strong and candidates who are recruited from the same or similar role may be eligible for a salary match within the above salary banding
• Genuine flexible working: family-friendly patterns such as flexible start/finish times and state of the art technology support, so you can spend some time working from home.
• Small teams, clear line management and practice development support
• Caseloads: they’re going down, they’re manageable, varied and appropriate to your role. 
• Easy and regular access to the senior leadership team & Principal Social Worker
• Social Work England registration fee is paid
• 26 days’ annual leave (rising to 28 after 5 yrs & 32 days after 10 yrs) and the option to buy an additional 5 days on top of that, via salary sacrifice. 
• Encouragement to take your TOIL back – we mean it!
• Supervision: our strengthened supervision policy supports you to build a trusting relationship with your manager. 
• Leadership is ‘good’ and ‘stable’ – DfE apppinted Independent Commissioner.
• Career development is focused on supporting your development.
• Relocation support up to £8,000
• Blackpool Council Staff benefit scheme: Social Work Benefits and Diversity | Next Step Blackpool
• Employee Assistance Programme, to support you through challenging times e.g. with free counselling, financial or legal advice.
• Mental Health First Aiders that are here for you
• Principal Social Worker Best Practice Awards are our way of saying ‘thank you’ to our amazing and committed staff.

It all adds up to an exciting package. 

We’ve strengthened our recruitment process too - You’ll get a quick response to any expression of interest and application. We offer regular virtual interview days and we will keep in contact with you from the day you are offered a role to your first day with us.

Applying to more than one Social Work Team?

Please submit only one application, stating the Teams you wish to apply for and how you meet the skills/knowledge required for each Team within your Supporting Information.  Should you require further details please contact Charlotte Norris on 07407 149581

Interviews may be conducted virtually. Please click here for further guidance on virtual interviews.

Please email Charlotte.norris@blackpool.gov.uk if the interview date is not suitable as alternative dates will be considered. 

Not ready to apply yet? Register your interest Here

We are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children/vulnerable adults. This post is subject to satisfactory reference history of at least two years, Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) check, medical clearance, evidence of any essential qualifications and proof of Right to Work in the UK in accordance with the Asylum and Immigration Act 1996.

This post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act and amendments to the exemptions order, which mean that certain offences are ‘protected’ and do not need to be disclosed, guidance on the "filtering" of offences can be found at New filtering rules for DBS certificates (from 28 November 2020 onwards) - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

For further information on the health and wellbeing support on offer during your employment, please see here.

Have you got what it takes to ride the Roller Coaster ride of Social Work in Blackpool? for further information on the career path and development opportunities available at Blackpool please see here.