Innovating adult social work practice—learning from the Named Social Worker for adults with learning disabilities pilots

ABSTRACT

In 2016, following the publication of the vision for adult social work in England, the Chief Social Worker for Adults at the Department of Health in England announced the intention to pilot a new social work role—that being a Named Social Worker supporting people with learning disabilities. Phase 1 of the pilot has tested a reframing of the social work role as a relational practitioner with an expertise in human rights, freed from transacting the management of care. Phase 2 is now underway testing key knowledge and skills requirements for post-qualifying practice in the field of social work supporting adults with learning disabilities. Heuristic approaches are capturing outcomes from generative learning processes throughout the pilot. The insight emerging from this national pilot is that at its heart, named social work is about qualifying and on-going post-qualifying social work education which promotes and maintains practitioner reflexivity and connection to their social work values. We are finding that self-advocates may be a critical influencing factor, positively affecting the sources of resistance through making explicit the connection between social work values and lived experience of practice from the people social workers are there to serve.

KEYWORDS:

• Social work
• adult social care
• learning disability
• risk
• human rights
• intellectual disability
• deinstitutionalization
• professional practice
• threshold concepts

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Professor Chris Hatton for his advice and support throughout the pilot and to Nina, Shvonne, Ryan, Ian, Jack and Mark who piloted the role of Named Social Worker. We also wish to thank Emma Palmer for her kind comments on an earlier draft of this paper. Finally, we want to give particular thanks to Bradford Talking Media, Cumbria People First, Lead the Way and People First Bradford for their challenge, insight and contribution as experts by experience to the development of the Named Social Worker pilot.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Hannah Morgan is Director of the Centre for Disability Research (CeDR) at Lancaster University. Elaine James and Rob Mitchell are honorary members of staff at Lancaster University as well as members of the senior leadership team in pilot site 1 and subsequently in pilot site 2 which they moved to at the end of phase 1 of the pilot.

2. We acknowledge the outdated and medicalizing terminology here. ‘Mental handicap’ was commonly used in policy and practice in the 1970s.

3. LB is Connor Sparrowhawk, aka ‘Laughing Boy’, who died a preventable death while in the ‘care’ of Southern Health NHS Trust in 2013. http://justiceforlb.org.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Department of Health under the Named Social Worker pilot grant. The views of the authors do not necessarily those of the commissioners.

Notes on contributors

Elaine James

Elaine James is a honorary member of staff at Lancaster University as well as member of the senior leadership team in pilot site 1 and subsequently in pilot site 2.

Hannah Morgan

Hannah Morgan is Director of the Centre for Disability Research (CeDR) at Lancaster University.

Rob Mitchell

Rob Mitchell is a honorary member of staff at Lancaster University as well as member of the senior leadership team in pilot site 1 and subsequently in pilot site 2.