Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.
Strike action is looming over local government pay in Scotland after union members declared their readiness to walk out over employers’ 3% pay offer for 2025-26.

Consultative ballots by UNISON and the GMB revealed that over 90% of participants would back strike action if employers’ body COSLA did not improve the offer, which was made in February and immediately rejected by union leaders.

Member of the third local government union – Unite – also rejected the pay offer in a consultative ballot.

The offer  is just above the rate of inflation in February (2.8%) according to the government’s preferred consumer prices index (CPI) measure.

However, it is below the broader CPIH rate (3.7%), which also includes owner occupiers’ housing costs, while the Bank of England predicted  in February that the CPI rate would rise to 3.7% over the coming months before falling during the rest of the year.

That projection is clouded in uncertainty due to doubts over the impact of US president Donald Trump’s tariffs on the global economy.

Offer is less than half of unions’ claim

The unions had lodged a claim for 6.5%, which they said was designed to tackle “severe erosion of pay” in local government in Scotland over many years.

For UNISON – 92% of whose voting members backed taking strike action in the consultative ballot – local government committee chair Colette Hunter said: “The last thing anyone wants to do is take strike action.

“But local government workers deserve a fair increase to stop their pay lagging behind inflation and other sectors of the economy.

Celebrate those who’ve inspired you

Photo by Daniel Laflor/peopleimages.com/ AdobeStock

Do you have a colleague, mentor, or social work figure you can’t help but gush about?

Our My Brilliant Colleague series invites you to celebrate anyone within social work who has inspired you – whether current or former colleagues, managers, students, lecturers, mentors or prominent past or present sector figures whom you have admired from afar.

Nominate your colleague or social work inspiration by filling in our nominations form with a few paragraphs (100-250 words) explaining how and why the person has inspired you.

*Please note that, despite the need to provide your name and role, you or the nominee can be anonymous in the published entry*

If you have any questions, email our community journalist, Anastasia Koutsounia, at anastasia.koutsounia@markallengroup.com

Union members’ vote ‘should be wake-up call’ for employers

“This result should be a wake-up call for COSLA. It needs to reward council workers fairly for the essential services they provide and start to reverse years of pay cuts.”

The GMB said 96% of voting members backed a walkout were COSLA’s offer not improved.

“The offer is clearly unacceptable and nowhere close to matching the commitment of council workers, adding pennies to the hourly rate paid to the lowest-paid staff,” said Keir Greenaway, the union’s senior organiser in the public sector.

Both unions warned that a formal ballot for industrial action would follow without improvements in COSLA’s offer.

COSLA warns of ‘damaging strikes in pursuit of unsustainable pay’

However, in response, a COSLA spokesperson said: “Our current offer, which was made before the settlement date, and remains on the table, fully utilises the available funding and represents a balance between making an offer aligned with the current CPI rate of inflation and protecting services and jobs.

“We must be clear that the current offer is not without challenges for councils struggling to balance budgets.

“We implore our unions to properly consult their members on pay offers rather than immediately seeking to escalate to damaging industrial action in pursuit of unsustainable levels of pay that would result in cuts to services and higher taxes.”

The Scottish Government has approved a proposed rise in registration fees for social workers and some other regulated staff, in the face of significant practitioner opposition.

As a result, the annual fee paid by social workers to the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) will rise, at a rate of £8 per year, from April 2025, reaching £120 in 2029, 50% more than the current £80 charge.

In addition, levies on practitioners and supervisors in care services will rise from £35 a year now to £51 in 2029-30, and those for support workers will grow from £25 to £37, with these changes also implemented incrementally.

Shifting burden of regulation to practitioners

The SSSC proposed the increases to shift the cost of regulation from taxpayers to registrants, in line with the Scottish Government’s policy intentions.

As a result, the proportion of regulatory costs met by professionals will rise from about 60% now to 78% by 2029-30.

However, the policy has met with widespread opposition from practitioners; 81.5% of respondents to a consultation disagreeing that the proposed fee increases were reasonable, with 67.9% disagreeing strongly.

The SSSC made some concessions on the back of the consultation, including deciding to freeze fees for social work students at £15 a year, dropping proposals to increase these by £2 per year.

Social worker registration fees are to rise from £80 to £120 per year in Scotland by 2029, the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) has decided.

Subject to Scottish Government approval, payments will rise by £8 per year from 2025-26 until the end of the decade, after the SSSC’s governing council decided to implement proposals put out for consultation last year.

The rise for social workers would be the first since 2017, when annual fees more than doubled, from £30 to £80, and would take annual charges for practitioners above those in Wales (£80) and significantly above those in Northern Ireland (£65).

The decision comes with Social Work England consulting on increasing the annual registration fee for practitioners from £90 to £120 this year, and then further raising it by increments until 2028-29, when it would reach £127.

Concessions on original proposals

The SSSC’s decision came despite widespread opposition to the proposed changes in its consultation, which garnered 3,178 responses, 92.4% of which were from registrants.

However, it did make concessions on proposed increases for other groups of registrants, including social work students, whose annual charges had been slated to rise by £2 a year. Instead, they will now remain at £15 a year.

Managers of care services and inspectors at the Care Inspectorate will also see their fees frozen, at £80 a year, after the SSSC dropped plans to increase them by £8 a year in a similar way to social workers.

The SSSC has also delayed, by one year, plans to raise registration fees for care service practitioners and supervisors by £4 a year, and increase those for support workers by £3 a year. These increases will now kick in from 2026-27, taking charges for practitioners and supervisors from £35 a year now to £51 in 2029-30, and those for support workers from £25 to £37.

No impact, currently, on local authority staff

As currently stands, the increases in fees will not affect staff working in local authorities for whom registration is required by law, including the majority of Scotland’s social workers.

This is because, under the 2022 local government pay agreement, the Scottish Government agreed to pay these fees, something it continues to do, via a grant to the SSSC that was worth £2.6m in 2023-24.

In a statement to Community Care, a Scottish Government spokesperson said that it “continues to meet the legacy obligations of the 2022 local government pay deal”.

As of January 2025, there were 10,896 social workers on the register, while, as of the end of 2023, Scottish councils employed 6,427 social workers, meaning most practitioners do not pay the fee.

Rationale for fee increase

The SSSC’s rationale for the fee increases was to shift the balance of funding for its regulatory functions from the Scottish Government to registrants themselves.

When the regulator was set up, in 2001, the intention was for registration fees to eventually cover the full costs of regulation, as is the case for health professional regulators, such as the Nursing & Midwifery Council.

Currently, fees cover about 60% of the SSSC’s regulatory costs, though this includes the Scottish Government’s grant to cover charges for local authority employees. Under the changes, this proportion is projected to rise to 78% by 2029-30, compared with 85% under the regulator’s original plans.

Widespread opposition from practitioners

In response to the consultation, 81.5% of respondents disagreed that the proposed fee increases were reasonable, with 67.9% disagreeing strongly. Among social workers, 85.7% disagreed, 70.5% doing so strongly.

Text responses from practitioners identified “a strong sentiment that they did not agree with the fee rise or in some cases paying a fee at all, particularly with local authority workers having their fees paid for them,” said the SSSC.

Respondents also cited recruitment challenges, the “financial strain on a low paid workforce who would struggle to pay”, in the context of cost of living issues, and the disproportionate effect of the changes on part-time workers.

Alternatives suggested included having the Scottish Government fund all fees or having a smaller increase, particularly for the lowest paid.

‘More work to do’ – the SSSC

The SSSC said having the Scottish Government or employers meet the costs of fees was beyond its control, but added that its concessions were in response to some of the concerns raised in the consultation, including about the impact on lower-paid registrants.

Respondents also called for more transparency about the role of the SSSC and the value it delivers.

Addressing registrants, it said: “From the consultation we know that we have more work to do to continue to improve understanding of our role and the benefits of being registered.

“We will better explain our role as a regulator which is to improve standards and protect the public, rather than the role of a membership body which some of you think we are, and we will do more to highlight the support we provide for developing your practice and careers in this sector.”

SASW ‘deeply concerned’ by fee rise

The Scottish Association of Social Work (SASW) said it was “deeply concerned” by the rise in social worker fees.

“This comes at a time when social workers are already facing unprecedented financial pressures due to the cost-of-living crisis and years of real-terms pay erosion,” said national director Alison Bavidge.

She said the association’s recent surveys had indicated that 67% of social workers were struggling financially, while 88% reported unmanageable workloads.

“Increasing the financial burden on practitioners risks further undermining morale and retention in a profession already under immense strain,” she warned.

Bavidge called for the Scottish Government to cover the fees of all registrants, not just those of local authority employees.

“Social workers provide essential services to Scotland’s most vulnerable citizens,” she added. “They deserve to be supported, not further burdened.”

Social worker bodies have urged action from employers to improve flexible working opportunities for staff in Scotland, after finding there was a “long way to go” in this area.

The Scottish Association of Social Workers (SASW) and Social Workers Union (SWU) released research today showing that 55% of public sector social work employers – the 32 councils plus with NHS Highland – offered flexible working in their job advertisements.

A further 36% did not, with 9% unable to answer, according to the data, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

An average of 28% of social workers had formal flexible working arrangements in place across the 17 employers that provided this information, though this ranged from 1% to 89% between areas.

Eleven employers also supplied data on the number of flexible working requests from social workers that they received in 2022-23, which ranged from 0 to 25 between areas, with all but two of these being granted.

Fewer jobs being advertised on part-time basis

The findings follow the results of SWU’s 2024 analysis of social work job advertisements to identify the proportion offering part-time or flexible hours. 

While Scotland had the highest proportion of such adverts of the UK nations, this had dropped from 30.5% in 2022 to 26.7% last year.

SASW and SWU also said that the number of social workers working part-time in Scotland had remained stagnant over the past decade, citing Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) figures showing that the number in 2022 – 1,307 – was broadly the same as that in 2013 (1,350).

Flexible working and the law surrounding it

As well as part-time hours, flexible working includes remote or hybrid working, term-time hours, flexitime, under which employees can choose their working hours within limits, staggered hours, where staff have different start and finish times to the norm, job sharing or compressed hours.

Under the Flexible Working (Amendment) Regulations 2023, which came into force in April 2024, employees can request flexible working from day one of their employment and are able to make two requests in any 12-month period.

Employers must respond within two months and must agree the request unless there is a permitted business reason – such as additional costs or a detrimental impact on quality – to refuse. They must consult with the employee on the practicalities of the request before refusing it.

Social work context

In their report, SASW and SWU said enabling flexible working had the potential to improve the retention challenges social work faced in Scotland.

A 2019 SSSC report found that three-quarters of practitioners were registered six years after graduation, entailing that a quarter had left the workforce during that time, while the regulator reported that 9.3% of local authority posts lay vacant as of June 2024.

SASW and SWU said flexible working was of particular benefit to women, who make up the vast majority of the workforce, given they took on the bulk of unpaid caring responsibilities within the home.

The social work bodies also cited the value of part-time working for workers aged over 55, with the same 2019 SSSC report finding that they constituted a fifth of the workforce.

‘Disproportionately’ high workloads for part-time staff

However, it cited barriers to social workers reducing their hours, including issues raised by part-time staff being given a caseload in line with the proportion of full-time equivalent hours they worked.

This failed to take into account the fact that they often had to spend as much time as full-time staff in meetings or training, leaving them less time per case and meaning their workloads were disproportionately high.

The report suggested this could be tackled by job sharing or part-time workers taking on duty work, co-working cases with less experienced colleagues or taking on specific pieces of more complex work.

Call for caseload monitoring

Other recommendations for employers included employers having monitoring systems to ensure caseloads were manageable, particularly for part-time staff.

SASW and SWU also called for employers to “actively encourage and support social work managers to consider how part-time working can be implemented in teams safely and effectively”.

They also recommended that employers hold information on who is working flexibly in their teams as a central dataset, enabling them to pool hours left over from people who had reduced their working week in order to offer job sharing opportunities to others.

Employers ‘need to offer more part-time roles’

John McGowan, Social Workers Union (photo: Simon Hadley)

SWU general secretary John McGowan said: “With recruitment of social workers still proving challenging for employers, now is the time for concerted action. We need to see social work employers offering more roles on part-time or flexible hours contracts.

“Flexible working provides clear opportunities to address social work staffing shortages; it will attract and retain present workers who need a flexible working environment. This can only improve wellbeing and work-life balance which is much needed in our challenging profession.”

Celebrate those who’ve inspired you

Photo by Daniel Laflor/peopleimages.com/ AdobeStock

Do you have a colleague, mentor, or social work figure you can’t help but gush about?

Our My Brilliant Colleague series invites you to celebrate anyone within social work who has inspired you – whether current or former colleagues, managers, students, lecturers, mentors or prominent past or present sector figures whom you have admired from afar.

Nominate your colleague or social work inspiration by filling in our nominations form with a few paragraphs (100-250 words) explaining how and why the person has inspired you.

*Please note that, despite the need to provide your name and role, you or the nominee can be anonymous in the published entry*

If you have any questions, email our community journalist, Anastasia Koutsounia, at anastasia.koutsounia@markallengroup.com

Social work assistants would be regulated in Scotland under plans issued for consultation.

Regulator the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) is also consulting on adding adult day centre supervisors, practitioners and support workers, and offender accommodation managers, supervisors and practitioners to its register.

The SSSC currently regulates about 176,500 of the approximately 213,000 people working in the sector in Scotland, including social workers, social work students, children’s and adults’ residential care staff, day care workers in children’s services and adult home care workers.

The proposed new groups would add about 7,400 to this total, including 2,800 social work assistants.

The social work assistant role

The role, which is not regulated anywhere in the UK currently, involves supporting “the co-ordination and management of cases and [supporting] social workers to carry out statutory responsibility within their role”.

The SSSC said that social work assistants may contribute to assessments of needs, risk assessments, care plans and developing and sustaining relationships with individuals, however, this would always be under the direct guidance of a social worker and a supervising manager.

Under the plans to regulate the role, social work assistants would need to hold both an academic and a practice qualification.

Proposed qualification requirements

The academic qualification would either be the higher national certificate in social services or the award of at least 96 credits under level 7 of the Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework (SCQF).

The proposed practice qualification would be the Scottish Vocational Qualification (SVQ) social services (children and young people) or the SVQ social services and healthcare course, at SCQF level 7.

Because they would need to gain two qualifications, they would be given five years to complete these, from the point of registration.

The SSSC said it had found that many social work assistants already had a relevant qualification, though added that the need to complete both may cause additional pressure for those without any.

Like other SSSC registrants, social work assistants would need to carry out continuous professional learning (CPL) annually.

The regulator has proposed an annual registration fee of £35 for the group, compared with the £80 charge currently in place for social workers, though the latter will rise to £88 in April and then by a further £8 a year until 2029-30, when it will be £120.

Variation in assistants’ pay and conditions 

The SSSC said its scoping work had indicated there was “a large degree of variation in the conditions and pay across social work assistant roles”.

“Setting the qualification requirements at a level that accurately reflects the roles they are required for will assist in demonstrating the complexity of the roles, that the workforce is highly skilled and help to support the professional identity of the role,” it added.

The proposed extension of the register was initiated, in 2023, by the Scottish Government, which then asked the SSSC to scope out the case for regulating roles including social work assistants, adult day centre workers and offender management staff.

The Scottish Association of Social Work (SASW) welcomed the consultation but raised concerns about the impact on social workers.

“Regulation provides assurance to the public and other professionals that services are being delivered by competent and qualified people,” said national director Alison Bavidge.

“However, we need to be careful that decisions taken do not reduce these important job roles simply in to task defined functions.

Concerns about impact on social work role

“All of these roles carry a duty to support people to exercise their human rights, particularly choice and control.  They are intimately connected to the role of the social worker and there is a risk that by defining what these roles do, we define preventative support and early intervention for individuals, families and communities out of the social work role.

“If social workers are left with only the crisis and statutory intervention tasks, this will increase social worker burnout rates and make the current retention and recruitment crisis even worse.”

The consultation runs until 9 April 2025, and you can respond by filling out this survey.

The Scottish Government has ditched plans to restructure adult social care in the country into a ‘national care service’ (NCS).

Social care minister Maree Todd said that she was scrapping the flagship Scottish National Party (SNP) policy because of a lack of support within the Scottish Parliament, in a ministerial statement issued this week.

She said that ministers remained committed to creating an NCS in Scotland, and would proceed with its National Care Service (Scotland) Bill, but shorn of any structural reform, meaning responsibility for adult social care will remain with councils.

Plans for ministers to take responsibility for sector

The SNP’s original plans, issued in 2022, were for ministers to take control of adult social care, with services commissioned nationally through regional care boards, which would be under ministerial direction.

At the time, the then cabinet secretary for health and social care, Humza Yousaf, said the NCS would “end the postcode lottery of care in Scotland”, to ensure “everyone has access to consistently high-quality care and support so they can live a full life”.

Another plank of the proposals was the creation of a national social work agency to oversee social work education, professional development, improvement, workforce planning and terms and conditions.

Widespread opposition leading to policy shift

However, the plan ran into widespread opposition, including from social work and local authority leaders, leading ministers to make significant revisions.

Notably, in 2023, the government said it would share accountability for the NCS with the NHS and councils. Local authorities would remain responsible for employing adult social work and social care staff and for their existing buildings and assets, under an agreement with local government body COSLA.

Instead of creating new care boards under ministerial direction, the government proposed reforming existing integration authorities – partnerships between councils and health boards that are responsible for adult social care and primary and community healthcare.

These would be accountable to a new national care service board, which would be responsible for overseeing the NCS, as delivered by integration authorities.

Revisions to national care service legislation

Then last summer, ministers announced proposed amendments to the bill to put its reformed approach into action, including creating the national board.

Under the plans, the board would have been subject to ministerial direction, while also being able to intervene in local services to drive improvement.

The proposals prompted COSLA to withdraw support for the bill, on the grounds that it risked a “restrictive centralised model which removes key local decision-making, prioritises increased national monitoring and reporting”.

In her statement this week, Todd said the Scottish Government was now scrapping the plan for the board and all other structural changes planned under the legislation.

Proposals ‘not supported by Scottish Parliament’

“We made considerable effort to find compromise and a way forward. But it is clear those proposals are not supported by this chamber,” she told the Scottish Parliament. “I have concluded that we must deliver our Scottish national care service without legislating for structural reform, securing a different means to deliver our goals.”

This includes creating a non-statutory NCS advisory board, including representation from people with lived experience, councils, unions and the NHS, to advise ministers on using their existing powers to drive improvements to adult social care.

Other elements of the National Care Service (Scotland) Bill – including a duty on care home providers to facilitate visits to and by residents, action to facilitate information sharing between services and new rights to breaks for informal carers – will remain, Todd added.

Positive response from local government leaders

In response to the changes, COSLA’s health and social care spokesperson, Paul Kelly, said he welcomed the fact that the Scottish Government was “listening to the many voices who raised concerns about aspects of the legislation and in doing so have set out what appears to be a more promising and positive direction”.

He also backed the continuation of reforms to carers’ breaks, care home residents’ rights to visits and information sharing, a view backed by sector leadership body Social Work Scotland.

However, the changes raise questions about what will happen to the planned creation of a National Social Work Agency.

Planned creation of social work agency

The reformed version of the bill put forward last summer would have placed the existing chief social work adviser role into statute and arranged other civil servants into an executive agency called the national social work agency. But this is within the part of the bill that is now being removed from the legislation.

Following this week’s announcement, the Scottish Government said there was a need to “future-proof reform to support the whole social work profession”.

It added: “The social work sector agrees and, along with the social work workforce, we all believe we must work differently. We must work in partnership to drive lasting improvements that support the vital role of social workers across Scotland.”

Discussions on future of social work

This statement was welcomed by Social Work Scotland, whose director, Ben Farrugia, said: “We were heartened to also hear specific references being made to a partnership approach to social work, and the commitment to improvement for generations to come.

“As a key partner in discussions around a future national social work structure, we believe that securing the right partnership approach – empowered by local and national politicians and accountable to social workers, will be critical to ensuring that legacy of support and improvement for the profession, and can contribute a significant co-ordinating role in addressing systemic issues like poverty and mental health across our communities.”

In its response to the changes, the Scottish Association of Social Work voiced support for the plan to create an executive agency for social work, working in partnership with the sector.

It said this was “the clearest route and best opportunity to create that greater consistency and continuous improvement in social work across Scotland”.

Unions have lodged their claims for an increase in pay for local government staff in Scotland this year.

UNISON has called for a 6.5% rise in 2025-26, while the GMB and Unite have jointly urged an increase of £1 per hour, or 6.5%, whichever is greater, along with more annual leave for staff.

The proposed rises are comfortably above the rate of inflation, which was 2.5% in the year to December 2024, according to the government’s preferred consumer prices index (CPI) measure (source: Office for National Statistics). The CPIH measure, which, unlike CPI, includes the housing costs of owner occupiers, was 3.5% as of last month.

‘Severe erosion of pay’

However, UNISON said an above-inflation deal was necessary to address “the severe erosion of pay” in local government in Scotland in recent years and ensure staff were fairly compensated.

It also said this year’s pay settlement needed to address “growing recruitment and retention problems across councils”, claiming that staff were “increasingly compelled to leave, and vacancies [were] becoming harder to fill” because of the “declining value of pay”.

Council pay in Scotland is negotiated through the Scottish Joint Council for Local Government Employees (SJC), which comprises representatives from the three unions, the 32 councils and employers’ body COSLA.

2024-25 pay rise

In 2024-25, staff were given a rise of 3.6% or 67p per hour – whichever was higher – after COSLA increased its initial offer with the help of a cash injection from the Scottish Government. This was above the CPI inflation rate (2.3%) at the time of the settlement.

Though the deal was accepted by Unite and the GMB – enabling COSLA to implement it – it was initially rejected by UNISON, which took strike action in schools in protest, before finally agreeing to the settlement.

Unite and GMB said their priority for the deal was moving towards the objective – shared by COSLA – of achieving a £15 an hour minimum wage in Scottish local government, up from the current £12.56. That explains why it included a flat-rate element to its claim – the proposed rise of £1 an hour – which would benefit the lowest paid.

Scottish Government budget settlement

According to the Scottish Government, annual revenue funding for local authorities in Scotland is due to rise by about £1bn, to £15bn, in 2025-26. Of this, £289m of the increase being available to authorities to spend on meeting local needs, and the rest committed to particular services or schemes.

COSLA said the budget was “step in the right direction” but warned that it “may not be enough to reverse planned cuts to vital services”.

In relation to pay, COSLA said that a 1% increase in pay would cost councils £125m in 2025-26, with a 3% rise – less than half of what the unions are claiming – wiping out the £289m in increased resource.

Social work and social care staff shortages

It also said the budget did not “provide sufficient funding to improve social care and social work capacity”, and enable councils and providers to “attract and retain a skilled and supported workforce”.

This was in the context of 97% of authorities having reported social care staffing shortages and 90% social worker shortages in a 2023 survey carried out by the Society of Personnel and Development Scotland and council leadership body Solace.

COSLA told Community Care that the SJC would meet later in January and in February to discuss the unions’ pay claims and councils’ budgetary position. Over the same period, Scottish council leaders would meet to agree their negotiating position.

“We have still to receive pay claims from some of our unions within our chief officials and teaching negotiation groups. In addition, at this time of year, council budgets are still being worked on and finalised,” a COSLA spokesperson added.

The number of social work students registered in Scotland has fallen for a second consecutive year, with student poverty cited as a factor.

Student numbers fell by 2.7% in 2023-24, from 1,998 to 1,944, following a a 5.2% drop the year before, according to the Scottish Social Services Council’s (SSSC) annual snapshot of the registered workforce.

The SSSC said that higher education institutions (HEIs) had reported that poverty and cost of living pressures were factors in a drop in the numbers applying to social work courses.

Student-led campaign for improved financial support

The news follows a student-led campaign to improve financial support for those studying social work in Scotland, to prevent hardship and attrition from courses and provide equity of support with those studying to become health professionals.

The Scottish Government has addressed the campaign’s aims in part, extending student loan access to postgraduate social work students ineligible for a bursary from SSSC and increasing practice learning support from £350 to £750 per placement.

However, campaigners, who are backed by the Social Workers Union and Scottish Association of Social Work, have warned that this is insufficient.

They have called for annual bursaries of £7,500 for third- and fourth-year undergraduates, who may currently only obtain means-tested support worth £8,400 to £11,400 a year, mostly in the form of loans. By contrast, nursing, midwifery and paramedic students receive non-means tested bursaries of £10,000 in each of their first three years and £7,500 in their fourth year.

The Scottish Government has also announced plans for a social work apprenticeship – open to those with or without a degree – to provide a new route into the profession in Scotland.

Decrease in student numbers linked to poverty

A spokesperson for the SSSC said: ‘There has been a slight decrease in social work student numbers and HEIs have cited a reduction in applications in part due to student poverty and financial/ cost of living pressures.”

For SASW, national director Alison Bavidge: “The fall in numbers of social work students is in the context of almost existential crisis of funding for services, sky-high workloads and burnout.

“To address this we must support students with fair bursaries and good quality placements and also make social work a more attractive profession to enter and stay working in. We know how rewarding social work can be but the unsustainable and ever-increasing pressures being faced by those who join the profession are taking the joy out of our work.”

Apprenticeship scheme ‘must be rolled out quickly’

She backed for an apprenticeship, adding: “This will enable an earn-as-you-learn, workplace route into the profession, culminating in a social work degree and hopefully a post as a NQSW. This is very much welcomed and needs to be rolled out quickly.”

However, while welcoming improvements in support for postgraduate students, Bavidge said that “undergraduate students still lack support and there is still no parity with other public sector professions”.

Leadership body Social Work Scotland also expressed hope in the impact of the apprenticeship.

‘More routes into social work needed’

“We hope to see more new routes into social work to help mitigate the reported reduction in workforce numbers and welcome the recent Scottish Government announcement regarding the social work graduate apprenticeship programme,” a spokesperson said.

“Implemented well and resourced appropriately, this programme will help the profession grow whilst also promoting an inclusive and diverse workforce.”

The number of registered social workers in Scotland rose for the second consecutive year, increasing from 10,826 to 10,914 in 2023-24, according to the SSSC’s figures.

Campaigners have welcomed a boost to social work student support in Scotland but say more is needed to prevent burnout and provide equity with those studying to become health professionals.

From this month, eligible undergraduate and postgraduate students will receive a £750 grant from the Scottish Government for each of their two placements, up from £350 per placement in 2023-24.

The practice learning support grant, administered by regulator the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC), is designed to cover the costs of travel, subsistence and other practical requirements to support students while on placement.

Student-led campaign

Its introduction follows a student campaign – backed by the Social Workers Union (SWU) and Scottish Association of Social Work (SASW) – to increase levels of financial support, particularly for undergraduates on placement.

The campaign called for annual bursaries of £7,500 for third- and fourth-year undergraduates, not only to support them to complete their placements, but also to tackle inequalities in the support they received compared with healthcare students.

Currently, undergraduate students in Scotland spend nine months working full-time on placement in their third and fourth years but, during their course, can only access means-tested support worth £33,600 to £45,600 (from 2023-24), mostly in the form of repayable loans.

By contrast, nursing, midwifery and paramedic students receive non-means tested bursaries of £37,500 during their four-year courses.

Extra money ‘welcome but enough’

Leading campaigner, David Grimm, who recently completed his course, said the practice learning support grant would “help ease some of the pressure on students who are working and managing case work as part of their degrees”.

However, he added: “It does not provide enough to help students to live while studying and working in placements. Many end up burning out due to the pressure, dropping out of courses or building up unsustainable debt.”

Fellow campaigner Lucy Challoner said: “While we welcome the steps forward, we need to see a pathway towards equality with other public-sector degree courses.”

Union vows to continue campaign

For the SWU, general secretary John McGowan said: “We understand the financial pressures the Scottish Government is facing, but the students’ campaign is about two basic principles, that people should be fairly compensated for doing frontline work in the public sector and that students on social work courses should be treated like their peers on nursing and paramedic degrees and receive bursaries while on placements.

“Until these principles are met, we will continue to back the students in their campaign.”

The news follows a Scottish Government pledge to introduce an apprenticeship scheme to provide a new route into the profession.

The latest local government pay offer for Scotland will come into force despite the country’s biggest union for council staff planning strike action in protest against it later this month.

The 32 council leaders, through their representative body COSLA, have agreed to implement the increase – worth 67p an hour or 3.6%, whichever is higher – based on the agreement of two of the three unions, the GMB and Unite.

However, UNISON members have overwhelmingly rejected the offer. This week, the union said it would hold a two-week strike later this month for school and early years centre staff working for Perth and Kinross Council, the area that includes first minister John Swinney’s constituency.

UNISON has particularly criticised the fact that the offer, which is worth an average of 4.27% for council staff in Scotland, is less than the 5-6% given to large numbers of public sector workers across the UK.

‘A strong settlement for employees’

But COSLA, which increased its previous offer of 3.2% with the help of Scottish Government cash, said that councils could not afford any more. It has also highlighted that the deal is worth more than the offer of £1,290, or 2.5%, whichever is higher, made to council staff in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

“The [Scottish Joint Council for Local Government Employees] pay award of 3.6% or £0.67 (whichever is higher)…offers a fair, above inflation and strong settlement for all of our employees,” said COSLA resources spokesperson, Katie Hagmann. “It is at the absolute limit of affordability in the extremely challenging financial context we face.”

She said the decision to implement the deal, which will be backdated to April 2024, had been influenced by representations from Unite and GMB.

“Leaders have fully considered the views of our three trade unions, including the concerns expressed by GMB and Unite about the cost of living and financial pressures which continue to affect many across our workforce, and their desire for the offer to be implemented as soon as possible,” Hagmann added.

‘Staff forced to strike’

However, UNISON Perth and Kinross branch secretary Stuart Hope said: “A fair pay deal should have been in place from 1 April, but six months later it’s still not been agreed.

Instead, the employer has imposed a wage rise rejected by a majority of the workers UNISON represents. Yet again local government staff are being forced to strike to simply get fair pay.”

The two-week strike starts on 21 October and UNISON said it would lead to the closure of schools and early centres in Perth and Kinross.

COSLA said councils would implement the pay offer, and pay staff backpay from April 2024, in line with their local payroll processes.