In 2024, we marked Community Care’s 50th anniversary.

In many ways, this became an opportunity to celebrate social work’s enduring legacy and profound impact.

Since our first issue in April 1974, Community Care has spent 50 years witnessing and reporting on the evolution and trials of the sector – from legal reforms and social movements to public inquiries, media storms and seismic political shifts.

To commemorate that, we worked with Professor Ray Jones and Tim Spencer-Lane to create a timeline of the significant events that have shaped the social work profession in England and Wales over the past five decades.

Jones, whose career predates Community Care’s inception, then examined each decade through a closer lens, in a series of articles that shed light on some of these defining moments.

Photo by Ray Jones

He revisited the Maria Colwell case, the birth of the divide between the adults’ and children’s services in the 1980s, the 1990s disability movement, New Labour’s focus on performance during its 13-year reign, and the decade of austerity that began in 2010.

Revisiting figures that have shaped the sector

Pictured: Eileen Munro

However, social work’s history is not solely defined by governments and policies. It is largely about the people working tirelessly at the centre of it.

To acknowledge that, we interviewed influential figures who have guided the sector through its toughest times.

We spoke to Lord Laming, who led the inquiry into the death of Victoria Climbie, Eileen Munro, whose landmark 2011 review shaped child protection practice, and Marian Brandon, who spent 17 years reviewing serious case reviews in England and Wales.

The cohort also included Ruth Allen, Dame Moira Gibb, Gretchen Precey, and esteemed social work professors David Howe, June Thoburn, Brid Featherstone, and Ray Jones. 

Their stories allowed us to revisit a tapestry of triumphs and trials, hard-learned lessons, and moments of progress we hope will inspire professionals today.

The ‘brilliant’ social workers of today

However, while honouring the past, we wanted to take a moment to celebrate the social workers making a difference for vulnerable adults, children and families today.

Through our My Brilliant Colleague series, we invited practitioners to celebrate the colleagues who have inspired them throughout their careers.

And so we spent a year sharing stories of social workers, students, mentors, managers and practice educators whose passion, kindness and resilience have left an indelible mark on careers and lives.

These stories reminded us that, even amid challenging times, social work is a profession built on unwavering dedication, compassion and belief in rehabilitation.

We hope this project has served as a heartfelt tribute to the profession’s resilience and influence.

Social work’s history is not just a timeline of events, but a testament to a community of individuals who work tirelessly to improve lives and alter how society views and interacts with its most vulnerable members

We remain committed to continuing our work of providing trusted educational, careers and news content for the sector and being a platform for social workers to share their experiences and connect.

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At the start of this year, we launched our My Brilliant Colleague series, to enable social workers to champion the achievements of those they work with.

Amid the challenges the sector continues to face, we wanted to create a space for practitioners to celebrate one another; a series that would serve as a reminder that practitioners’ impact extends beyond those they support, to include those they work alongside with.

Through this series, we’ve shared stories of inspiring social work mentors and managers, practitioners who’ve gone above and beyond to support their colleagues, and practice educators whose kindness and guidance have shaped entire careers.

Here are some highlights from our 2024 cohort:

The social work mentor who ‘speaks truth to power’

Pictured: Tricia Pereira

Dear Tricia,

I really admire your passion for social work.

The way you mentor others is truly inspiring. Your leadership by example has been instrumental in my own development as a leader.

You have installed in me, and many others, a deep appreciation for diversity and the importance of respecting others’ beliefs.

Your ability to dedicate your time and attention to individuals, even amidst your busy schedule, is a testament to your compassion and commitment.

It’s clear that this genuine care for others is deeply rooted in your values.

I remember a situation at work when your unwavering commitment to fairness and professionalism led you to expose a serious issue, even when it meant facing isolation from senior management.

Your courage to confront injustice, despite potential backlash, is truly inspiring. You’ve demonstrated the importance of speaking truth to power.

Read the full letter here.

The social work assistant who became ‘the glue that holds the team together’

Pictured: Charlotte

Charlotte has been with the team for five years, employed as a social work assistant, and is now in the final year of her social work degree.

We would like to highlight her as a brilliant colleague, not only for the incredible person-centred work she completes with individuals, but also for being a source of fun and support for all members of the team.

In her time with us, Charlotte has successfully managed a number of complex cases. This has included a case of extreme self-neglect, where she deftly navigated difficult situations alongside the family and other professionals with charm and empathy.

Read the full letter here.

A social worker celebrates the life and influence of her late mentor

Photo by Nicola Silk

Pat,

It was almost 16 years to the day I met you.

Me, a newly qualified social worker at a time without protected caseloads or formal mentoring, and you, a strong-minded, opinionated and experienced child protection conference chair.

I was told to come to you for support in writing a conference report for a family whose social worker had been off sick. This started 16 years of mentorship, advice and friendship that moved out of the workplace and intertwined with our personal lives.

You welcomed me and my husband into your home and family, something I have valued over the years.

I have never taken for granted your wisdom, in fact I have more than once called you my social work inspiration. Over the years, whenever I sought your advice, you were always keen to listen, tease out my thoughts and help me come to a solution. I know this is what you did for many.

Read the full letter here.

The social worker who went the extra mile for his colleague’s son

My fantastic colleague and lifelong friend, Eric, driven by compassion and dedication, generously sacrificed his precious free time to audit a crucial file for my son’s PTSD claim.

He researched, meticulously, into the complexities of the case, scrutinising and examining every document and piece of evidence. Despite the demanding nature of the task, he approached it with unwavering commitment and professionalism.

He skillfully navigated through the intricacies of my son’s file. His thorough analysis uncovered critical information that strengthened the case, providing invaluable support in my son’s journey towards receiving assistance and care.

Even after scrutinising the file, Eric went above and beyond by writing a comprehensive report, drawing upon his wealth of knowledge and experience and leaving no stone unturned.

Read the full letter here.

A former child in care remembers her social worker

Her name is Charlotte Stacey and from the day I met her she helped me in all aspects throughout my time in care.

She became my social worker when I was 14/15 until I turned 18. She has supported me in many ways – from helping me reduce my hospital admissions to actually finding a place in a children’s home that was right for me, where I could thrive.

She has always gone the extra mile for me, making sure that my care plans were all up to date and supporting me to get out of my deprivation of liberty safeguarding order by helping me manage potential risks when living within a house and a community.

Read the full letter here.

The supervisor who made every supervision session ‘feel like a gift’

To Sharon,

I want you to know just how much you mean to me and to everyone in our team. Your contributions to the social work community are nothing short of extraordinary.

You bring so much compassion and warmth to everything you do, and your positive spirit makes it a joy to come to work each day. Even on the hardest days, you lift us up and inspire us to keep going.

As your supervisee, I feel so incredibly lucky to have you as my guide. When I joined early help in October 2023, as a nervous, newly qualified social worker, I didn’t know what to expect. In just a year, you’ve given me so much more than just knowledge. You’ve helped me grow my confidence and find my voice.

Read the full letter here.

The social worker affectionately known as ‘the Oracle’

Carol Jones has been dedicated to the families of Swansea for over 20 years.

First as a social worker and now as a team manager in supported care planning, she works tirelessly to support her team so that they can be the best that they can be for the children and families they work with.

Carol is affectionately known as ‘The Oracle’ for her incredible knowledge and memory, and her energy is infectious. Her fair and balanced approach is hugely valued, and she is a tremendous advocate for children, never failing to keep them at the front and centre of every conversation she has.

Everyone in the office has utter confidence in her judgment and recognises that she always goes above and beyond for her colleagues. When describing her, some words used are  ‘knowledgeable’, ‘reliable’, ‘amazing’, ’empathetic’, ‘exemplary’ and ‘supportive’.

Read the full letter here.

Nominate your colleagues in 2025

Photo by Daniel Laflor/peopleimages.com/ AdobeStock

You can nominate anyone who has inspired you in your career – whether current or former colleagues, managers, students, lecturers, mentors or prominent past and present sector figures whom you have admired from afar.

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

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.

It’s that time of year! And to celebrate, we recorded a Christmas special for The Social Work Community Podcast.

The social work sector and the face of Community Care have both changed a lot over the past 50 years. As it is Community Care’s 50th birthday year, we got some of the longest-standing members of the our team together for this one-off special.

For this episode, I sat down with three colleagues, who, together, have been at Community Care for a whopping 80-plus years!

All three were fairly resistant to the idea of recording an episode, but with some sweet-talking I managed to persuade Mithran Samuel, editor of Community Care, Natalie Valios, senior content editor on Inform Adults, and Nicky Davies, head of partnerships and events, to come to our London office one morning for a chat.

About the guests

Mithran started at Community Care 20 years ago as chief reporter, and has since moved up the ranks to his current role as editor. Mithran writes the majority of news stories on the site as well as bearing overall responsibility for the Community Care websute.

Natalie started over 30 years ago, in 1993, as a sub-editor, and worked in different editorial roles. She left Community Care in 2009 for a brief hiatus and then came back –  she simply could not stay away!

Nicky joined in the late 80s in a sales job and has since progressed to her current role, overseeing a rewarding career of 36 years.

Listen now for a real “behind the scenes” episode:

Listen to “Christmas special ” on Spreaker.

Read the transcript here.

Sign up to the Social Work Community to be among the first to catch each episode and to connect with fellow practitioners in a safe space.

Otherwise, check out the Social Work Community Podcast on the following:

• Spotify
• Apple Podcasts
• Spreaker
• Audible (Amazon)

Click ‘follow’ or ‘subscribe’ on your podcast app so you know when a new episode is published.

And don’t forget to follow us on Instagram.

In 1974, around twenty young people began a four-year course at the University of Bradford, combining a BA in applied social studies with a certificate of qualification in social work (CQSW).

Many of us have kept in touch and most meet every few years as a group.

Although mostly retired now, we have all had long careers in health and social care, working in the public, charity and private sector, and with the full range of client groups. Some of us have focused on frontline social work, while others have diversified into other fields, such as counselling and research, become managers or taken on very senior roles at a local or national level.

We share a deep sense of commitment to the work we’ve done and a belief that it’s been a job worth doing.

This year, it is 50 years since we started the course, and between us, we have clocked up around a thousand years of employment. In the spirit of passing on something of our collective experience to the next generation of social workers, we share some of our reflections here.

Positive changes in social work

Although we acknowledge there is further to go, we have seen marked improvements in various aspects of health and social care provision. For example:

Diversity, equity and inclusion

Across the board, there is better ethnic and cultural diversity in the workforce. As a social work course, we were 100% white British and we then practised in settings where there were few staff from black, Asian or minority ethnic groups.

Thankfully, this has changed and multi ethnic teams have transformed practice and enabled meaningful links to be built with diverse communities.

Linked with this, we have seen anti-racist practice (again, hardly on the agenda when we trained) and diversity, equity and inclusion become core values in all social work sectors.

It is normal, now, to see women in management roles – in marked contrast to the beginning of our careers, when men were heavily advantaged in terms of promotion, often taking senior roles within two or three years of qualification.

Professionalisation

We have become properly regulated and there are improved career pathways for practitioners to remain in practice and share their experience with new staff.

Social worker safety

Thankfully, there is also greater attention to personal safety for social workers. At the beginning of our careers, there were no mobile phones, and it was common to do solo evening visits to unknown households.

One of us remembers being pinned against the wall by somebody with a knife and threatened in an interview room with a gun. The tragic case of Isabel Schwarz, murdered by a service user in 1984, focused attention on this issue and improved conditions for us all.

The introduction of specialist teams  

It is hard to believe that when we set out to practice in 1978, we were qualified as ‘generic’ social workers.  Typical caseloads included managing older people’s care accommodation alongside family support and the full range of statutory child care services.

After minimal additional training, we received ‘authorised worker’ status, allowing us to undertake mental health assessments, sometimes leading to compulsory hospital admission of adults displaying a range of distressed behaviours. We were ill equipped for this, and some of us recall operating alone, feeling inadequate, and at times, fearful for our own safety.

For the most part, therefore, we welcomed the introduction of ‘specialist teams’ through the 1980s and 1990s and the development of knowledge and skills that went alongside it.

But there were losses too, including the broader and more radical vision for social work that had inspired many of us during our training. This was referred to by the Seebohm Committee as ‘a wider conception of social service, directed to the well-being of the whole community and not only to social casualties, and seeing the community it serves as the basis of its authority, resources and effectiveness’ (Seebohm Report, 1968, p147).

Safeguarding

It is easy to underestimate the improvements in the safeguarding of children, young people and adults. The sexual abuse of children was barely on the agenda before the 1980s and systems to protect children and adults from harm were limited.

Enhanced recognition and understanding are now widespread across agencies, communities and organisations.

Redressing power imbalances

Although we acknowledge the power imbalances inherent in our profession, it is also important to recognise that there have been significant changes which have mitigated these, hopefully forming a foundation for ongoing progress.  Some examples are:

• The Children Act 1989: one cohesive act encompassing both private and public law and, for the first time, focusing our minds on partnership with parents, greater interagency collaboration and involving children in agreed plans. It was the first piece of legislation to place a specific duty on local authorities to address children’s need in terms of race, culture, religion and language, and to state that at all times the welfare of the child was the paramount concern. It followed that the court process became more professional for us and more empowering for children and their families.
• Similarly groundbreaking in adult services, the NHS and Community Care Act 1990 and Care Act 2014 shifted the dial in terms of conversations with vulnerable people about meeting their needs and how they would like this to happen. Similarly, we have seen a tremendous change in how we view people who experience dementia. We have moved away from the ‘senile dementia’ of the medical model, to a concern for the individual’s ‘personhood’ and the dignity and respect that comes with this. We know now that this approach to people who live with dementia will improve their wellbeing.
• The introduction of the independent reviewing system and the role of the children’s guardian, both of which introduced independent scrutiny of services for children and enhanced the voice of the child. The expectation that the case manager could impartially chair children’s reviews or that the child had no independent representation in court now seems absurd and dangerous.
• Vast improvements in services for young people leaving care (how sad to remember that these were virtually non-existent when we began our careers) and a stronger platform for young people through organisations such as Coram Voice and The Black Care Experience.

Negative changes

We are of one voice when it comes to the negative changes we have witnessed and the areas where we feel much-needed progress has failed to materialize. We list them briefly here in the knowledge that most of them remain problematic in the profession, and in the hope that they will be addressed in the near future:

• Too much emphasis on tick box and pro forma assessments. These rarely encapsulate what is actually happening for a child or adult and may mean that important information is lost.
• Unmanageable caseloads. This is not only a dangerous situation for service users but also for staff who can easily ‘burn out’ or leave the profession.
• The introduction of ‘care management’. This downgraded much social work activity to assembling packages of care and overseeing their delivery. The importance of establishing a relationship with the people we worked with was downgraded and the profession became more managerialised and bureaucratised.
• The erosion of services for older people. At the start of our careers, we had a range of flexible resources at our disposal, allowing us to support older people in their homes or to help them make partial or complete moves into local residential care. The present paucity of state resources is shameful, and we have witnessed political cowardice in not creating and implementing a long-term plan for social care.
• The pervasive damage of austerity. It was clear from the outset that the pressure to disinvest from preventative services in order to maintain statutory responsibilities on reduced budgets would have long lasting and damaging impact. Sadly, this proved to be the case, setting back services, undermining social work practice and causing incalculable harm to many, many people.
• The demonisation of social workers in the press. Public concern about the death and serious injury of children and carefully conducted enquiries are to be expected and managed. However, the feeding frenzy of press blame and harassment of social workers has been extremely damaging. More thoughtful reporting in recent years has led to a better balanced and nuanced appreciation of the dilemmas facing social workers and others making decisions in the lives of children in particular.
• The marginalisation of fathers. We recall that the majority of our involvement with families did not include engaging with the father, and we see only a small amount of progress in this, with fathers often absent from key meetings and decision making, and maternity services and parenting debates mostly centring around the mother.

Messages to our younger colleagues

We have reflected on what has sustained us through our careers and what we have learned along the way. We have distilled some key messages, hoping that some of them will resonate and be helpful to younger colleagues:

• Look for diversity in what you do and don’t avoid challenges, but don’t stay for too long in a field of work or an organisation that drains your confidence or stifles your curiosity.  Explore options for working as a social worker in different sectors, or for a change of direction: you have many transferable skills!
• Realise that a successful career is not defined by a particular role or level. Rather it is about doing and achieving what works for you and will make you look back and feel you are glad you did it. You, not others, define your career success.
• Be a good listener and tune in to the world as others see and experience it. This applies at all levels, with service users, colleagues and other agencies, and within teams. Look for opportunities to agree/have common ground.
• Be your authentic self – you will be happier, and your work will be better.
• Working alongside vulnerable people can take a personal toll. It is essential that you feel supported by your manager and the organisation. Help to create a positive work culture and make time for fun and team spirit.
• Nurture your personal life and outside interests. Set boundaries between work and non-work time. Take your leave. Take time to recognise your successes and find ways to celebrate them.
• Be aware of the power that you carry. Use it responsibly and find ways of mitigating it where possible. Stay grounded in the ethics and values underpinning the job.
• We cannot always ‘put it right’ for people. Recognise your mistakes and learn from them, but accept that sometimes, despite your best endeavours, there will be negative outcomes.
• When you have concerns, stand up for your views in a positive way and don’t be worried about speaking truth to power. Important changes often begin through this route.

And finally – we are heartened to see talented and committed young people entering social work. It is a multi-faceted and interesting career, and few of us would have wanted anything different.

But there will always be challenges along the way. As one of us commented: “You will need the literary skills of Charles Dickens, the heart of an angel and the hide of a rhinoceros!!”

This article involved contributions from Philip Sands, Gabrielle Jerome, Alison O’Sullivan, Rosie Benaim, John Allot, Anne Cherry, Shirley Cramer, David Behan, Debbie Olley and Mary Beek, all of whom studied on the University of Bradford applied social studies course from 1974-78,

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For Community Care’s 50th anniversary, our My Brilliant Colleague series invites you to celebrate anyone who has inspired you in your career.

In this entry, student social worker Louis Peakes writes a letter addressing his cohort at the University of Hertfordshire, who have been a source of inspiration and support for him during his social work journey.

To my fellow level six cohort studying Social Work BSc (Hons) at the University of Hertfordshire.

I want to thank you all for being part of this journey that can often feel lonely (especially when writing assignments!). I am privileged to have shared the room with such a diverse group of people, all with their individual talents and expertise, that I’m sure will go on to do great things.

A special thanks to our lecturers for giving us their time, sharing their years of knowledge and wisdom, and, most importantly, for putting up with us!

You have all shaped me into a better person and a better professional.

It feels like we have so far to go, but we are nearly there. We can do this. The world needs us, so never give up.

When entering the world of social work, you can sometimes feel like you’re a drop of water in a vast ocean.

On that note, I finish with the wise words of Samuel L Jackson:

“Take a stand for what’s right. Raise a ruckus and make a change. You may not always be popular, but you’ll be part of something larger and greater than yourself. Besides, making history is extremely cool.”

How to nominate a colleague

For our 50th anniversary, we’re expanding our series My Brilliant Colleague to include anyone who has inspired you in your career – 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 either:

• Filling in our nominations form with a letter or a few paragraphs (100-250 words) explaining how and why the person has inspired you.
• Or sending a voice note of up to 90 seconds to +447887865218, including your and the nominee’s names and roles.

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.

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This article is part of a series of profiles of key figures who have shaped social work over the past five decades, to mark Community Care’s 50th anniversary. Previous interviewees include Brid Featherstone, David Howe, June Thoburn, Eileen Munro and Herbert Laming.

Dame Moira Gibb’s calling to leadership was evident even when she vehemently resisted the step-up to management.

Just three years after qualifying, she walked out alongside her colleagues in Newcastle protesting the pressure to move into management – and ended up a leading figure in the strike.

It was one of the longest organised strikes in social work history. From August 1978 to May 1979, over 2,500 social workers in 15 local authorities walked out over staff turnover, pay, and a push for practitioners to take on managerial roles due to vacancies.

“We thought we were in the right,” says Gibb now.

“We were campaigning about the ability to stay in practice and not have to move into management to gain a higher salary. How do you not have the front line served by your least experienced people?”

Gibb was selected to give a speech on the first rally, her candour and passion quickly ‘catapulting’ her to being a spokesperson for the strike.

“I ended up going around to other councils making speeches about why they should pursue the same approach.”

Still, despite cherishing memories of solidarity and camaraderie from that time, Gibb calls striking “terrible” for social work.

“It felt very bad to be walking away from your clients. Some people contacted them and tried to support them, but it’s a terrible waste of resources and, in social work, we ought to be able to negotiate and understand the perspectives of both sides.”

Listening to frontline staff

At the root of the strike, she says, was a disconnect between management and frontline staff that she has tried to address throughout her career – both as director of social services at Kensington and Chelsea from 1990 to 2003 and later as chair of the 2009 Social Work Task Force.

As a director, she tailored her service based on feedback from frontline staff and those who used social services, helping make Kensington and Chelsea one of the top-rated social services authorities in the country according to inspectors.

Her words are layered thick with pride as she talks of that time.

“They said we were one of two best in the country,” says Gibb.

“And it was simple things, like people not having to give their details three times because they met three different practitioners, approving new services that made sense to young people, and talking to them before making decisions that would affect them. But also listening as an organisation to design the service, instead of relying on the frontline [to do that].”

Senior managers – Gibb included – were also required to spend at least two weeks every year working with cases to stay connected to the profession and their staff.

“How do we know what is needed if there is no touch with the frontline and the clients?”

Even today, when looking at the future of social work, the first thing that springs to Gibb’s mind is the relationship between management and their practitioners.

“It is my hope that senior managers understand what the life of a frontline social worker is and what they need to make a difference for families.”

Forming the Social Work Task Force

Pictured: Moira Gibb

Even after becoming distanced from social work, after being appointed chief executive of Camden council in 2003, Gibb remained passionate about frontline practice.

That passion led her to chair the Social Work Task Force in 2009.

In December 2008, in the midst of the media storm that marked the Peter Connelly (Baby P) case, then children’s secretary Ed Balls fired Haringey’s director of children’s services, Sharon Shoesmith, on live television.

The same month, Gibb received a phone call from Balls’ office to form the taskforce.

It was to be a group of 18  experts who would review frontline practice in England and help improve recruitment, training and the overall quality and status of social work.

“My theory was [Balls] thought he’d gone too far in his response with Sharon and wanted to demonstrate that he was a friend of social work,” says Gibb.

‘We wanted to reinforce a sense of professional identity’

When they went around England talking to social workers, what they found, says Gibb, was struggling departments over-relying on frontline practitioners to resolve their running issues.

“They were not understanding the consequences of what they were asking practitioners to do,” she says. “Practitioners thought what they were doing was social work, but they were also doing bits of welfare, bits of what the department needed from them – we needed to reinforce a sense of professional task and identity. There seemed to be no space for relationships.

“We wanted practitioners to feel they could say, ‘You can’t ask me to do that because it would be against my professional standards’.”

Their final report, published in November 2009, found that people supported by social workers were “not getting the consistently high quality of service they deserve” because of weaknesses in recruitment, retention, resourcing, training and leadership.

It also identified a dangerously poor public understanding of the profession.

The taskforce presented 15 recommendations, some of which remain in place today, including: increased entry standards for social work degrees, the assessed and supported year in employment (ASYE) to improve early career support, and the standards for employers of social workers in England, to enhance organisations’ support for their staff.

Unfortunately, similarly to Eileen Munro and Lord Laming’s reviews on child protection in the same period, the taskforce’s recommendations came at a time of change for England. Within a year, a new government came into office and implemented a programme of public sector austerity.

‘Our last recommendation was to have a reform board to coordinate the changes so they didn’t have to be done all at once. Then the Coalition came. They supported the work for a year, but then took away the funding and closed down the board,” says Gibb.

“I still think, if implemented in full, the recommendations would have made a big difference.”

Munro echoed this sentiment in an interview on her 2010-11 review earlier this year.

The College of Social Work

Gibb calls the Baby P case one of social work’s ‘low points’ – a time when practitioners were hounded by the media with no voice to defend themselves.

The taskforce’s solution was the College of Social Work, a professional body that would be a strong, social work-led voice in public debate and policy development, and raise standards for the profession.

“We looked at what other professions did and thought social workers needed something to give them a sense of identity that wasn’t defined by their employer. That’s what makes a profession, we thought,” says Gibb.

“Managers are very important and can make a big difference, but they shouldn’t be able to call all the shots about what’s quality social work. The standards for lawyers aren’t set by the government. They have input themselves into what is appropriate.”

The College was established in 2012, but closed down in 2015 when the government pulled its funding after it failed to become financially independent due to a shortage of fee-paying members.

“It ran out of steam,” says Gibb. “It didn’t have the traction I would have liked it to. But it had a positive impact on the morale of social workers, I would claim that.

“A sense of, yes, somebody is speaking about the profession in positive terms, and not just about the failures.”

‘Telling social work’s story’

Gibb hasn’t worked for or within the sector in a while, but – in her own words – her love for it hasn’t faded.

“I think my passion for the frontline and for social workers to tell their story better are two things that could go on my tombstone,” she jokes.

Her taskforce pushed for improving the public understanding of the profession by fostering relationships between social workers and local media, establishing clear protocols for managing breaking stories involving social work, and maintaining a repository of success stories to showcase good practice.

As part of that, Gibb invited The Sun editor Deidre Sanders to be among the 18 experts comprising the team, which included social work leaders and academics.

Her choice was regarded as polarising following The Sun’s vitriol against the social workers involved in the Baby P case. But she was determined to tell practitioners’ stories to the outlets that were, she says, read by and representing the average citizen.

She describes Sanders as “a great supporter”, one who accepted criticism when it came and defended it when she thought it was right.

Opening social work’s doors to the media

There is a lot to be said – and feared – about social care services opening their doors to the media. Trauma and history lie heavy between the two, even when not accounting for the profession’s innately sensitive and private nature.

But Gibb is a firm believer in the value exposure can bring to the sector.

“We want people to say they want to become social workers so we’ve got talent to recruit from, we want people to seek intervention from social services at the right time, and government to give resources to something that matters to their citizens,” she says.

“But if the citizens never think about it, they’re not going to say that’s a good idea. Media exposure cannot keep being at the bottom of the pile.”

Her decades of experience have taught her that when local and national reporters are invited in, they’re often left impressed with “how different it was from what they thought and from how it is portrayed”.

“We should be braver,” she reaffirms.

She praises Coventry council’s 2023 documentary with Channel 4, Kids, about six young people about to leave care, as a successful example of social care services opening their doors to the cameras.

The feature led to the local authority recruiting six experienced practitioners shortly after the third episode aired.

“Lots of local authorities genuinely say, well, somebody else can do it because we were so small or because this and that,” says Gibb.

“Social workers have to be willing to expose themselves, to feel confident enough in their professional practice to be observed. It could make a world of a difference.”

For Community Care’s 50th anniversary, our My Brilliant Colleague series invites you to celebrate anyone who has inspired you in your career.

In this entry, principal social worker Wioletta Lewandowska celebrates her mentor, Tricia Pereira, a former PSW herself, for her leadership and courage “to confront injustice, despite potential backlash”.

Dear Tricia,

I really admire your passion for social work.

The way you mentor others is truly inspiring. Your leadership by example has been instrumental in my own development as a leader.

You have installed in me, and many others, a deep appreciation for diversity and the importance of respecting others’ beliefs.

Your ability to dedicate your time and attention to individuals, even amidst your busy schedule, is a testament to your compassion and commitment.

It’s clear that this genuine care for others is deeply rooted in your values.

I remember a situation at work when your unwavering commitment to fairness and professionalism led you to expose a serious issue, even when it meant facing isolation from senior management.

Your courage to confront injustice, despite potential backlash, is truly inspiring. You’ve demonstrated the importance of speaking truth to power.

On a more personal level, I will never forget the time when I was preparing for my first leadership role. Your guidance and support during that intense period were invaluable.

It was a true testament to your character and your dedication to helping others. I feel so lucky to have you as a mentor and friend. You’ve made a huge difference in my professional life and I hope others have the same opportunity to learn from your wisdom and kindness.

Thank you, Tricia.

How to nominate a colleague

For our 50th anniversary, we’re expanding our series My Brilliant Colleague to include anyone who has inspired you in your career – 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 either:

• Filling in our nominations form with a letter or a few paragraphs (100-250 words) explaining how and why the person has inspired you.
• Or sending a voice note of up to 90 seconds to +447887865218, including your and the nominee’s names and roles.

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.

For Community Care’s 50th anniversary, our My Brilliant Colleague series invites you to celebrate anyone who has inspired you in your career.

In this entry, the deputy team manager of a learning disabilities team, Jahan Aslam, celebrates her former supervisor and now team manager, who once stayed with her throughout an assessment in a complex case, to ensure she had sufficient support.

My former supervisor [now our team manager], Hannah Taylor-Rowe, has always been responsive to any question aimed at her, never shying away from a task.

No matter the challenge – or the frustration – she always manages to see the best in people and has become a nurturing influence, not only on me but on the entire team and the wider service.

She works tirelessly to get things right and will always go the extra mile to provide a resolution – a true inspiration and, as they say, the ‘glue’ that keeps our service together.

Once, when I was working on a complex legal case, she stayed and supported me throughout a comprehensive assessment to ‘hold my hand’, as she later revealed, through the challenges.

She is a rare gem – a team manager who always has our backs.

How to nominate a colleague

For our 50th anniversary, we’re expanding our series My Brilliant Colleague to include anyone who has inspired you in your career – 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 either:

• Filling in our nominations form with a letter or a few paragraphs (100-250 words) explaining how and why the person has inspired you.
• Or sending a voice note of up to 90 seconds to +447887865218, including your and the nominee’s names and roles.

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.

For Community Care’s 50th anniversary, our My Brilliant Colleague series invites you to celebrate anyone who has inspired you in your career.

In this entry, a former child in care remembers her social worker, Charlotte Stacey, whom she credits for supporting her while she was deprived of her liberty and throughout her time in care.

I am not working in social work, but I would like to nominate a practitioner that I had whilst being under the care of children’s services.

Her name is Charlotte Stacey and from the day I met her she helped me in all aspects throughout my time in care.

She became my social worker when I was 14/15 until I turned 18. She has supported me in many ways – from helping me reduce my hospital admissions to actually finding a place in a children’s home that was right for me, where I could thrive.

She has always gone the extra mile for me, making sure that my care plans were all up to date and supporting me to get out of my deprivation of liberty safeguarding order by helping me manage potential risks when living within a house and a community.

I believe that Charlotte should receive some sort of award because she has helped me in every possible way during my journey in care.

How to nominate a colleague

For our 50th anniversary, we’re expanding our series My Brilliant Colleague to include anyone who has inspired you in your career – 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 either:

• Filling in our nominations form with a letter or a few paragraphs (100-250 words) explaining how and why the person has inspired you.
• Or sending a voice note of up to 90 seconds to +447887865218, including your and the nominee’s names and roles.

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.

This article is part of a series of profiles of key figures who have shaped social work over the past five decades, to mark Community Care’s 50th anniversary. Previous interviewees include Brid Featherstone, David Howe, June Thoburn, Eileen Munro and Herbert Laming.

Marian Brandon’s social work journey began in a way familiar to most practitioners, with a desire to make a difference.

After graduating in law in the mid-1970s, she began working in a residential home for young people, her goal of joining a law firm soon shifting to a passion for child protection, leading her to qualify as a social worker in 1980.

It was in the 1990s that Brandon’s acclaimed research career began, under the mentorship of Professor June Thoburn, whom she still lathers with praise.

She has since contributed valuable insights on child protection, neglect, children’s views of abuse, domestic abuse and on working with fathers.

But perhaps her most famous role was directing national analyses of serious case reviews – now known as local child safeguarding practice reviews or child practice reviews – in England and Wales covering cases from the late 1990s up to 2017.

It was a project influenced by a curiosity over the child death enquiries that found national fame compared to those that got quickly forgotten.

Brandon embarked on a decade-long journey to note the patterns, pinpoint the lessons, find the outliers, and help the sector move forward in a meaningful way.

Speaking to Community Care seven years on from the final review that she analysed, Brandon touched on the legacy of her reviews, the lessons she tried to disseminate and the subtle complexity of neglect in child deaths.

How was your experience practising as a social worker in the 1980s compared to today?

I think had more autonomy than social workers do now. There was a child whose mother lived far away and wasn’t safe to look after him. I used to drive him to have contact with her regularly because I thought it was a great way to get to know him.

I also got to maintain contact with [the mum] and see how she was doing. I had the time to do that then but I’m not sure social workers would do so much now.

Practitioners are time and resource-poor, and so have become more distanced from families. To an extent, they have lost their sense of compassion and become more defensive.

That defensiveness and the anxiety around being unable to do the job properly can affect their attitude towards families. I have always stressed to students how important it is to approach families with kindness.

You might have to make difficult decisions the family disagrees with, but you should be kind and respectful. When people are under huge pressure that can get lost.

But the work is very emotionally difficult and workers don’t always get the support they should. Without fully staffed teams and [the resources and time] to do some preventative work, it’s very difficult to do the job properly and act with empathy, compassion and understanding.

How did your analyses of serious case reviews begin?

The headline reviews at the time – for example, for Jasmine Beckford and Maria Colwell – were about children aged five, six or seven. I thought, ‘Well, how typical are these big cases compared to others where things went wrong?’.

Previous analyses of serious case reviews were only on a small sample of cases. So when we got the first commission from the Department for Education and Skills (DfES), I was very keen to capture all the reviews to pinpoint the similarities, differences and outliers.

We had a real struggle getting all the reviews but we did get a lot. We had basic information on every review and then chose a sub-sample to study in depth.

Each review felt like an important tribute to the child as a person: [the opportunity] to see them individually, in their family context and not just as the big case that hits the national headlines.

I’ve always done this research as part of a team and researchers didn’t want to work on it full-time – it was too upsetting. We always ensured researchers were working together so we could talk to each other about what we’d just read.

Did it ever take a toll on you?

Towards the end, I found it harder to read and go through the reviews. That was when I decided to stop. So I think, yes, they did take a toll.

I remember one time, I was told by a civil servant that the records needed to be put in the shredder afterwards. And I was crying while I was shredding them.

I thought, ‘This is the last information about these children. No one else will come back and find out about their lives.’

What key lessons did you draw from analysing serious case reviews?

In the first serious case review study, for Wales, what came through was professionals not challenging [decisions] when they thought something was wrong.

But to do that, you’ve got to be confident that you’re not going to make things worse, which is tricky.

I have made a point of trying to challenge unsafe practice as a lecturer working with social work students on placement – for example, when a case was closed when risks of significant harm to a child were not resolved and families were no longer getting support.

However, this was possible because I had good enough relationships with the students and their supervisors and managers.

I could discuss my concerns and follow up what decisions were made subsequently without feeling that things would get worse. From the reviews, what came across was that workers felt able to do this when they had good relationships and were well supported and supervised.

So that was an abiding lesson that stuck with me, and that’s a theme that’s come through all of the reviews from the 1990s till 2017 [my last review].

Are there any other themes that persisted over the years?

The family [that ends up in the review] looks like other families on a social worker’s caseload. So how do you tell the difference between a family where things can go wrong and one where, it might not be perfect, but the child won’t be harmed?

That comes back to knowing the family well enough to see the signs. Because things often slip quite quickly.

Neglect was also a background factor in most of the cases but was rarely the primary cause of death or harm.

Interestingly, when practitioners classified a case as neglect they sometimes failed to see what else was happening.

In one case, there’d been numerous section 47 enquiries about physical abuse – and the child did die of physical assault – but it was thought of as a neglect case and so it was treated as one.

So we should be aware that neglect can be a flag for other things happening.

You ended up doing an analysis of neglect in serious case reviews from 2003 to 2011. What is something that struck you?

Dr Ruth Garner for the NSPCC was part of the team in the early studies and she came up with the term ‘start again syndrome’.

Looking at the cases, we often found that practitioners, in an attempt to think the best of the family, particularly when there was a new baby, would say, ‘Put away these big, fat files. We won’t look at those. We’ll just start again. This new baby gives the family a fresh start.’ And it was with the best intentions.

But you need to understand how the family has gotten here. Things might be assumed to be better now but they might not be. Assessments need to happen repeatedly and that could be forgotten about.

In one case, a young mother was a drug misuser but was desperate to be a good parent. She was pregnant and always turned up for her drug test – but most of them were positive. So the worker said, ‘She’s so co-operative, she wants to be a good mum. She really is trying her very hardest.’

But, sadly, she wasn’t succeeding. She wasn’t off the drugs and it was still dangerous.

They said they didn’t want to be judgmental but, as a social worker, you do have to judge whether this person is a safe enough parent. It’s about judging in a way that’s fair and compassionate to all sides.

You have previously talked about ‘the normalisation of neglect’. What are the repercussions of that?

I think neglect sometimes stops practitioners from understanding what’s going on because it seems to be everywhere. What we tried to do in our serious case review work was ask, ‘What kind of neglect is it?’.

Neglect muddles practitioners’ thinking. You need good supervision on neglect cases to try and disentangle what it means and what may hide behind it, and see things more clearly. How is the impact manifesting on the child?

I hope the legacy of our serious case review work is to remind practitioners to hold steady in confusing, overwhelming cases, and instead of just saying, ‘It’s everywhere,’ to ask themselves, ‘What’s it like in this family, in this case, for this child?’.

How effective are current safeguarding practice reviews in helping practitioners learn lessons?

I think it’s really hard to learn from the worst cases. Hard cases make bad laws and encourage fearfulness.

I think it would be better to learn from when things go well.

I remember asking a director of children’s services in an area that had consistently done well how they maintain this progress. She said, ‘We don’t make a huge fuss when things go wrong’. They did their learning from what works.

Safeguarding reviews are helpful when they provide recommendations that improve everyday practice. But I think they’re more efficient when shorter and more to the point, which is the current direction of local child safeguarding practice reviews.

What are your hopes for the future?

I do feel more hopeful than I would have, say, a year ago.

But I think social workers need to feel hopeful and they need to feel that they can do the work that they’re trained for, and carry on putting relationships at the heart of what they do.

Maltreatment is relationships gone wrong, so the best way to understand and help maltreatment is to understand relationships and use relationships to help people function better.