
How far is poverty taken into account in social care assessments and plans?
- Not very much (45%, 210 Votes)
- Somewhat (25%, 118 Votes)
- Not at all (17%, 80 Votes)
- A lot (13%, 60 Votes)
Total Voters: 468

Poverty and homelessness are driving demand for children’s social care, directors have warned.
Lack of adequate housing, welfare reforms and families lacking access to public funds are adding to pressures on children’s services, an Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) survey has found.
The findings come from the ADCS’s latest Safeguarding Pressures* research, its regular stocktake on the state of children’s social care in England, and were shared in a submission to the government’s child poverty taskforce.
The taskforce was set up last year to develop a cross-government strategy to alleviate child poverty, which is due this spring. It is examining how the government can increase household incomes, including through welfare reforms that raise employment levels and reduce poverty, help bring down the cost of essential goods and alleviate the negative impacts of poverty.
Rising levels of child poverty
As of 2022-23, 4.3m – or 30% of – children were in relative poverty in the UK, meaning they lived in a household whose income was below 60% of the average after taking account of housing costs. This is up from 27% of children in 2021-22 (source: Institute for Fiscal Studies).
In its submission, the ADCS cited past research that has identified a strong link between levels of deprivation in an area and children’s social care involvement (Bywaters et al), and said the Safeguarding Pressures survey had found increasing demand driven by poverty.
Poverty driving demand for children’s social care
Based on responses from 86 of the 153 authorities, the survey, carried out last year, found:
- Almost three-quarters had seen demand from families in poverty rise as a result of welfare reforms, particularly among larger families with three or more children. This is likely related to the introduction in 2017 of a two-child cap on household claims for child tax credit or universal credit.
- Nearly two-thirds said that poverty-driven demand has grown from families where one or more parents were in work.
- 59% said that increased demand on services was being driven by poor quality housing, while 61% reported increased safeguarding activity linked with homelessness and 54% said that demand on children’s social care was being driven by housing need amongst homeless young people.
- Almost half said service demand had risen in relation to families with no recourse to public funds (NRPF), who are unable to access benefits or help with housing due to their immigration status.
‘Incalculable’ impact of poverty on childhood
“The impact of poverty on childhood is incalculable, children arrive at school hungry and are unable to focus on learning, families are queuing up at food banks and schools are routinely buying coats, shoes and even washing clothes for pupils and their families,” the ADCS said.
“ADCS members believe that failure to address child poverty risks undermining the success of a range of planned reforms right across government.”
*The full results of the latest wave of the Safeguarding Pressures series will be published shortly.
Astonishing isn’t it this constant surveying of endemic economic and social drivers impacting on social work. Astonishing isn’t it that social work exist simply because our social fabric is woven around inequality but our leaders are incapable of addressing this. Without poverty, without homelessness, without substance misuse, without gender and sexuality based violence, without abuse of vulnerable children and adults, without neglect of disability provision and the rest of the long list social work would look a totally different practice. And what do we get from our leadership? Moaning that funding is inadequate to in effect sustain inequality just little bit more discreetly. It never seems to occur to said leadership that they might actually engage in the politics of change. I suppose there’s always pressure, internalised, to play in the big pool of the Establishment. That’s where reputations are made and Kings Honours are rewarded after all. It’s not that our leaders are necessarily cynical careerists, rather that the group narrative they buy into is one that never challenges the structures and policies we practice in and they lead us from. We don’t need endless surveys that tell us the same thing with the same impotance on positive outcomes. What we need is courageous, socially committed and politically active leadership. We won’t get that of course in the age of ‘balancing’ finances, budget driven provision, pointless regulation, crushing individual strengths to mould us into one dimensional mechanistic social workers. As one of our senior managers once told us “poverty is always with us, was always with us and will always be with us. Our job is to manage it to lessen the impact on our service users”. Word for word because I wrote it down. And that I’m afraid is why we are a sad, depressed, demoralised group of workers. When leaders just see today and have no vision for tomorrow let alone for the future it couldn’t be anything else can it? Fewer surveys and more fingers burnt in challenging orthodoxy and prevailing political consensus would make for better and more assertive leadership and a better motivated social workers. Don’t recommend holding our breath in for that to become our reality anytime soon though.
Moaning that funding is inadequate to in effect sustain inequality just a bit more discreetly sums it up neatly. Well said.
Basically, as social workers we are drowning so much in paperwork that our ability to do the work to effect change is very limited. Reform is as important, if not more important than increased funding. However, don’t get me wrong, social services need increased funding for sure. As social workers we need to lead by example, speak up and advocate for such improvements. For the sake of ourselves, service users and society!
Why do social services need more funding and why is current funding inadequate? Lack of money as a default moan seems to be constant but is it true? What do social workers want extra funding for? As far as I can see the whinging about lack of money stems from the irritation social workers feel when asked to resubmit their assessments. Trust me, believe me don’t ask any questions and certainly don’t hold me accountable dies not professionalism make.
If a family wish to come to the UK to live, they should be able to support themselves, or have close relatives who can. To expect ‘public funds’ to be available to anyone and everyone who rocks up at our ports and airports is financial lunacy! However, to those who advocate access to public funds for all and sundry, might I suggest they contribute to one of the many charities which exist solely for the benefit of “those without access to public funds “?
I could not agree more. It is also not right that people without the legal right to live in the UK (bar genuine asylum seekers), can have their children educated for free, and can also have access to all other public services.
There needs to be a rule that the child comes with their Parent or Guardian, and they must be able to accommodate and financially support themselves whilst they reside without legal or asylum status in the UK.
Poor Victoria Climbe came to live in the UK with her Great Aunt and boyfriend, who were motivated to ‘care for her’ by gaining access to free social housing and welfare benefits. It was not the fault of her in wanting a better life for their daughter, but it was the fault of the UK Government which allows (and funds) this.
We have people who were born in this country living in tents because they are homeless, and now I have seen asylum seekers in the same situation, as there is no available or affordable housing. It is just sad all around, and it is keeping people in poverty.
Some of the reason Local Authorities (including Public Services and Housing) are struggling so much, is because of the increased migration and pressure on adults & children’s services, however the number of Social Worker’s have not increased to match and meet the demand, we are just expected to ‘deal with it’, whether we like it or not, and and we also won’t be paid for it either in terms of all the hours required to keep the system ticking over.
So people “rock up” and are provided with gold plated care but there are also charities for “those without access to public funds”? Nowt like folk not thinking through how to articulate prejudice logically it seems. Why would there be charities if people rocking up are lavished with public funds?
I agree 💯 with Abdul and Joannie Hammond. Before asylum seekers and immigrants started arriving in our borders and Potts there were no homeless people in England, access to social housing wasn’t restricted, schools had overcapacity on their rolls and every parent sent their child to their first choice school, there were so many social workers that caseload of 6 were unheard of. There were no ‘indigenous’ unemployed so no one accessed public services if they had not contributed tax to the state. In our part of Northumberland migrants out number farmers. Although I haven’t met any myself so they must all be in the posh bits of the county.
It’s sad that in the same thread we have such a thoughtful post by Tahin, even though I have some disagreement and reservations, we get to the point of almost vitriolic comments on migration and poverty. The level of considered and polite debate in social work has been declining for quite a while now but I never anticipated the political views that have been creeping in. I suppose the pointer was the general election voting intentions poll by Community Care. I appreciate the not so subtle sarcasm from Michael Andrews so I should own up to some prejudice myself. Thank you Community Care for providing a forum where the reality of practice and the ideologies that drive it gets articulated. However uncomfortable some contributions might be.
I was interested to read the recent article about poverty and its place in contemporary SW practice, and especially the reactions from readers.
It’s struck me for some time that its significance in social work practice has progressively declined considerably over the years since I entered the profession in 1973. Logically, this is odd given how obvious it is when working on the “front line” that poverty and deprivation are relevant factors across almost the whole spectrum of problems embraced by our profession. Today’s SW’s should not need the welter of research evidence about the link between poverty and social problems to justify and so encourage them the take the issue into account in their work. As some respondents commented, a full and proper assessment cannot ignore the role played by poverty where it is present. Of course there will be instances where it is not a factor, but that should also be acknowledged for consistency of practice, to demonstrate this essential matter has been considered.
In my first post as a social worker in Manchester, the financial circumstances of the people we were helping was one of the first issues we were expected to prioritise in assessment. If people were not working their benefits position was carefully checked to make sure they were receiving all eligible benefits, work which included liaison with the benefits agency, and if necessary, support and representation at tribunals. An important part of this poverty alleviation activity also included approaching charities for additional help, which could be financial or material eg home necessities including for example domestic appliances. Easing financial problems, especially for families presenting for all kinds of help ( we were “Generic SW’s” in those days ), was often the key to beginning to restore people’s independence, and so improve lives. After all, put very simply, the purpose of social work is to help people to have better lives. At the time, the City of Manchester invested heavily in establishing an anti-poverty infrastructure consisting of what were known as “Welfare Rights Officers”, who were usually based in social services offices, giving the SW’s ready access to specialist advice and practical assistance to help them to be as effective as possible in tackling poverty. It worked very well, but sadly it has withered away.