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An Objective inquiry by Dr. Ignatius Gwanmesia into the blame

culture to social workers; Social workers angels or Villains?

Abstract

This discourse is a critical analysis into public and media tendency to indiscriminately
demonise social workers when even supposedly collective interventions go wrong.
Are social workers indecisive wimps who fail to protect children from death or
authoritarian bullies who unjustifiably snatch children from their parents?

Comments to Dr. Ignatius Gwanmesia at antichildtraffic@yahoo.co.uk

Tel. 07951 622135 United Kingdom.

How do you rate this analysis?

TABLE OF CONTENT

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Contents Page

Chapter One (introduction)

Introduction/ background ………………………………………………….. …....3 – 5

Chapter Two

Systematic Failures.......................... …………….…………………………….…....6 - 9

Chapter Three

The Question of credentialism in social work …….…………………..……….10 - 13

Chapter Four

Social workers and the media .......................….………………….……………14 – 17

Chapter Five

The role of empowerment in the blame culture………………………………18 - 19

Chapter Six

Can social workers ever be free from targeted blame……………....……....20 - 21

Chapter Seven

Unrealistic expectations …………………………………………………..............22 – 24

Chapter Eight

Can best practice ever be the norm in social work practice?........……………25 - 26

The way forward ……………………............................................………………. .26

Chapter Nine

Bibliography…………………………………………………………….………………28 - 29

Chapter One

Introduction and background

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In contemporary Britain, with an ever-increasing aging population; a comparatively

wide spread child poverty and social exclusions, and an ever-increasing ethnic
diversity; the nature and extent of reciprocal social problems vis-a-vis changing
dynamics has made the vital need for social work intervention more acute. Indeed,
the role of social workers has become increasingly vital in a modern society where
changing patterns of employment and an increase in marital breakdown means that
families have become removed from the traditional family structure and may be
geographically distanced from family support. Social workers work with some of the
most difficult people in our society and under some of the most challenging
circumstances; be it in mental health, disability, elderly care or child protection, there
is consensus that social workers passionately do the job others rather shunt away
from. In the United Kingdom, especially in child protection, this passionate work by
social workers is set against “the presumption in law that children are better looked
after with their families except and until it is proved that they are better off from them”
Russell, (2010). Additionally, as the underpinning principle of the Children Act 1989,
that apart from cases where there is an imminent risk of danger or significant harm,
that no executive state agency including their professionals such as social workers
have the right to disrupt the parent-child relationship. DOH, (2000, p. 24). It is in the
complex process of juggling and balancing the legal, ethical and personal codes of
practices, set within a society that is readily predispose to apportion blame
indiscriminately that the social worker has turn out to be the convenient object
vilification. In the words of George Pitcher of the Telegraph, when social workers are
unfortunate human-enough to make mistakes as has recurrently been the case in
Harringey, media-generated public hysteria ensures that, “we resemble not so much
a rescue squad for future vulnerable children than a vengeful lynch-mob for the
crimes of the immediate past.” Pitcher, (2008). While in Harringey; to lose Victoria
Climbié was a misfortune; to lose Baby P begins to look like inexcusable
carelessness. Like Baby P who died after suffering multiple fractures despite
concerted visits from health services and social workers; Victoria Climbié died aged
eight in 2000; having been beaten for months, had 128 injuries, and died from
malnutrition and hypothermia after being forced to sleep in a bath. In both high profile
cases, the social workers were accused of failing to prevent the tragedies despite
myriads of visits.

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The issue in question in this discourse is ‘how one starts to reconcile the concepts of
misfortune and carelessness’ in social work child projection, and the rather
indiscriminate tendency for the public in general and the media in particular to
perceive, label and castigate social workers as “as indecisive wimps who fail to
protect children from death, or as authoritarian bullies who unjustifiably snatch
children from their parent” Banks, (2001, p. 17) How rational or ill-conceived is
society’s tendency to readily blame social workers or otherwise for not being the
panacea for our social problems? The fulcrum for my analysis is that social workers
are agents of the state; as such, they are the obvious and convenient target of
vilification for those aggrieved by the system. Thus, prevalently, it is the office of
social work rather than the person in social work that is the object of culpability.

Prevalently, it is the professionalism of the social workers that has ensured that
children are protected within the family or “removed from danger and given a better
life with loving carers. But those cases don’t make headlines.” Arnold (2009). Why
does society tend to judge social workers by their failures? Worst of all are social
workers not operating between the devil and the deep blue sea; where damn if they
do, and damn if they don’t?

While I am in no way suggesting that all social workers are perfect, does not the
heavy focus on performance management risk giving the impression that social work
problems are mainly at the frontline? Following the tragic death of Baby P in
Haringey Council put out a statement saying that it "took immediate action and
sacked an agency social worker and disciplined two staffs after finding that about
1,000 referrals had not been dealt with” Brody, (2009). Rather than a systemic
affliction, the implication of the information provided Haringey's statement is that the
three frontline staff or social workers were at fault. So how can one rationalise the
habitual almost universal tendency to indiscriminately scapegoat social workers for
what are undoubtedly systemic failures? According to Tim Loughton (MP), these
“misconceptions are too often fuelled by stereotyped social worker characters as
they appear in the media, ranging from slightly alternative liberal busybodies to out-
and-out child snatchers.” Loughton, (2009). In a rare instance of cross-party
consensus, both the labour and Conservative leaders acknowledge the undeserving,
un-envious and dilemma-prone plight of social workers. In the former, the Prime
Minister Gordon Brown asserted that “such deaths must never happen again”, but
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the truth is that even if best practice were the norm, it would not be possible to
prevent all children dying from abuse. Similarly, Mr Cameroon for the opposition
noted that “Quite simply social workers are often identified as part of the problem
rather than an integral and helpful part of the solution. This situation has not been
helped by the relative lack of attention given to their professional development by the
Government compared to front line doctors and teachers, and the willingness of
some parts of the media to point a finger of blame when high profile cases go
wrong.” Conservative, (2007). In consensus, Dr. Gall, a social worker, noted that,
“The actual expectation of social worker’s’ role in the family is somewhat hazy and
many of their direct powers have been eroded over time, whilst personal
responsibility has increased”. CPCSW, (2007). Disempowered, lacking a strong
representation or trade union to safeguard their welfare, social workers have become
the soft target for blame.

As the example in California shows, not only is the vilification of society workers a
universal phenomenon, the charges are similar if not identical. However, unlike in
Britain where social workers are passive-enough to succumb to indiscriminate blame;
in California, nearly 100 Los Angeles County social workers were assertive and
empowered-enough to protest outside a county supervisors’ meeting in April 2009;
complaining that they had been unfairly blamed for the deaths the previous year of
14 children whom they had monitored. They arrived at the county office “toting
handmade signs that read so many children, so few social workers." Fiske, (2009).
Several spoke during the meeting about systemic problems with the child welfare
system that led to such deaths despite what they called their "heroic" efforts.”
Hennessy-Fiske, (2009). This could very well have been in the United Kingdom.
Indeed, akin to the case of Baby P in Britain, in Los Angeles, “the family of a boy who
died of multiple skull fractures had been reported 25 times to the Department of
Children and Family Services and the mother had a known history of
methamphetamine use” Fiske, (2009).

Chapter Two

Systemic failures

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As evident in the cases of Baby P and Victoria Climbié, tragic incidences of fatal child
abuse are routinely, followed by enquiries. Each time there is an investigation into
such failures, it produces pages of recommendations about improving services,
improving communications between agencies, setting up new systems to safeguard
children. The obvious question is ‘why these recommendations never achieve their
objective of safeguarding vulnerable children?

While the paths to these recommendations are paved with good intentions, needless
to say that the bureaucracy around child protection is becoming so unwieldy and
time-consuming that scare resources and time are wasted sitting at computers,
setting up and servicing the elaborate systems as oppose to focusing on the welfare
of vulnerable clients. Indeed the need for accountability and political correctness,
means that in the supposedly partnership collaboration in child protection, partners
are focusing more on the seamless working of the partnership framework than
actually addressing the real circumstances of service users. Despite the Children
Act 2004 making “it clear that all agencies are responsible for safeguarding minors”
Brandon, (2008). study by a team from University of East Anglia and the National
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children suggest that “it is partly due to
those squabbles over whether agency partners have met their criteria for services
that the child protection agenda are so woefully ineffective” Additionally, that where
social work practice has been compromised, research shows that, “what stops social
workers thinking and acting systematically is the triple pressure from families,
employers and bureaucratic demands. Work overload, a target- driven culture and
poor support make workers stressed and ill or paralyse them into inactivity.”
Brandon, (2008). Unfortunately for these overworked, unsupported and may be
inexperience frontline staff (social workers), such compromised practices have
developed into a recurrent and accepted pattern. Commonly referred to as ‘systemic
failures’, the lack of functional strategic structures and procedures to ensure that the
various components in the child protection framework serve their purpose have
consistently resulted in ineffective, inefficient and inappropriate action or inaction in
service deliveries. While the social worker cannot be solely blamed, they cannot be
completely exonerated. With risk assessment central in predicting the likelihood of
children suffering significant harm, it defies believe that despite over 60 visits to the
client, Maria Ward; Baby P’s social worker and the other partnership members
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consistently missed those tell-tell signs of neglect and abuse. While social workers
may not expect praises from the public and media, just as in any other profession,
they need to earn their epaulettes if they are to be complemented rather than
consistently demonised for practice failures.

So to what extent are systemic structures and strategies incentivising the prevalence
of child abuse? The obvious example is the British welfare benefit systems that
enable parents to use children as a means to an end in accessing benefit rather than
an end in itself. For example, apart from marginalisations associated with poverty,
policies that encourage the collapse of the conventional family structure have been
identified as partly responsible for creating the ideal environment for child neglect
and other social problems. While pointing out that in cases where children have
suffered fatal abuse none of the tragedies have involved families in a conventional
marriage situation, a commentator on the tragic death of Baby P questioned the
rational in encouraging lone parenthood or co-habitation; circumstances in which
“more stupid, infantile, drunk, drugged, dysfunctional morons breed unwanted,
unloved babies simply as a means to subsidised housing and welfare benefits.?”
Indeed, in United States as in Britain, Martin Guggenheim, a professor of law at
New York University noted that "Cases that lead to children coming into care or to
coming to the state's attention, even as potential cases for removal, commonly
involve a poor, single parent with limited resources, who sometimes [is] living in
inadequate conditions because that's what available."
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/fostercare/inside/guggenheim.html.
While social workers may get the system dramatically skewed in favour of
overprotection in readily taking children into care, there is no guarantee that such
indiscriminate and simplistic actions will not engender accusation of baby snatching
from campaigners of family preservation. Nevertheless, as would be expected of any
professionals, social workers must bare part or all of the blame if despite their
schooling their risk assessments fail to identify circumstances as in the case of
Victoria Climbié and Baby P where the signs of abuse could easily have been
spotted by the man on the street. For example in the former case, Climbié “had been
beaten for months, had 128 injuries, and died from malnutrition and hypothermia after being
forced to sleep in a bath. At the public enquiry, it emerged that Victoria could have been
saved on 12 separate occasions if the relevant services had intervened”

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2008/nov/11/child-protection-climbie-babyp. Akin
to Baby P, Victoria had been seen by dozens of social workers, nurses, doctors and police
officers but they failed to spot and stop the abuse. The irony in the latter case is that despite
recommendation by the Laming enquiry to address issues of systemic failures in Harringey
social service child protection; identical factors were responsible for the death of Baby P.
While scapegoating the social workers for tragedies that were due to collective failures may
seem unfair and on the extreme, their role or contribution in the tragedy cannot be
overlooked.

If the welfare of the child is as legally paramount as mandated in the Children’s Act
1989, then rather than under-protection (living children at risk of significant harm with
their parents), social workers should opt for over-protection where there is reason to
believe that parents actually pose a danger to the welfare of a child. Yes, this may be
in direct breach of the founding principle of the Children Act 1989 which rather that
children be brought up in their families. While some social workers may use such
legislations to justify the omission of duties as in the case of Baby P where the victim
was left with the parents with fatal consequences; the reality is that such laws are
relative and not absolute. Reflective social work intervention means that frontline
practitioners need to be competent-enough to take necessary actions based on their
assessment of presenting circumstances. At times, what are called systemic failures
in child protection, flourish not because the system cannot be change, but merely
because social workers and other professionals have accepted and become
socialised into the status quo. While social workers may feel scapegoat in most
cases of tragic child abuses, there are circumstantial evidence to argue that,
excessive workload, lack of supervision or inexperience are not reason-enough not
to spot blatantly obvious risk factors in circumstances where children are being
abused. Additionally, although it would be damn irrational to expect social workers to
eradicate child abuse, their central role and responsibility as purposely trained
professionals in safeguarding the welfare of vulnerable children should ensure that
critical rather than simple assessment are operationalised in circumstances where
the lifestyle of parents are risk-associated as in substance abuse. It is such
consistent and methodical approach to interventions in child protection that would go
a long way towards enhancing the reputation of the social worker. Indeed, such
professionalism would also empower the social workers to be offensive rather

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consistently defensive when things do go wrong. In attempts to shift blame to the

system, social workers and relevant critics need to understand that the system is not
an end in itself but the means to an end which can be changed, and should be
changed.

Chapter Three

The Question of credentialism in social work

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Within professional echelons, the lack of recognition of social work as a profession or

the similar lack of recognition of social workers as professionals, have hitherto
deprived social work and its practitioners of the respect, and prestige accorded to
professionals like doctors and lawyers. In my previous article about the conflict in the
power relationship between social workers and doctors in the British National Health
Service, I critically analysed the conflict between the empathetic social work model
and the rather sympathetic medical models in working with clients. The synthesis
was that despite the gross advantage of the social worker model compared to the
medical model, the professionalism of the medics always ensures that their opinions
prevail in most cases of child protection decision-makings. Thus within the context
where credentialism in law and medicine has empowered doctors and lawyer with
authority to the extent of autocracy, social workers with their diminished power status
are deprived of the privileged to even justify their practice. It is this and similarly lack
of professional recognition or acceptance that might be contributing to society’s
tendency to discriminate and denigrate social workers. Indeed, looking at the
amalgamation of modules in the social work curriculum, one starts to question
whether on graduation the social worker is meant to be a lawyer, educationalist,
psychologist, policy analyst or a medic. To some observers, it is the case of ‘jack of
all trades and a master of none.’ In deed compared to lawyers or doctors, in practice,
the roles of social workers seem very ill-defined. Apart from the academic
qualification, there is doubt as to the precise distinction between a social worker and
a support worker (careers). Compared to professions like medicine and law that
draw a clear demarcation about their fields and have defendable boundaries, “social
work appears not so much a definite field as an aspect of work in many fields”
Flexner, (1915, p. 161). Indeed social work seems too polymorphously perverse to
be defendable. Consequently, while doctors who fulfil similar but not identical role as
social workers are prevalently commended and venerated as virtuous, social worker
may undeservedly bear the scourge of society as typical of the current blame culture.
Nowhere have professionalism and credentialism undermine the ethics and values of
social work as in the partnership framework in child protection. Here, the autocratic
and dogmatic relationship between doctors, police and social workers, has resulted in
passivity of the latter in the supposedly democratic decision-making processes. Indeed,
Limbery, M. (1998), has identified a number of inter-organisational and inter-professional
problems with social workers attached to a GP practice based on varying systems of
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accountability and remuneration. There is social consensus that doctors perceive

themselves as occupying a higher professional hierarchy. Beyond the partnership with
medics, the effectiveness of the multiagency approach in social work intervention is
compromised by the reality that “professionals who historically worked in a highly
individualised and non-collaborative culture may find effective accommodation of the
ideology of partnership and empowerment problematic” North et al, (1999); Callaghan et al,
(2000). While this hierarchical relationship “may be antithetical to the very concept of
teamship especially in child protection, the irony is that liabilities for collective failures within
such environment plagued by power differentials are disproportionately borne by the social
workers. Elsewhere, as when faced with skewed reporting from the media, compared
to other professionals who seem predisposed to fight for their rights at the sign of
such bias, social worker have visibly been passive in either fighting for their rights or
being assertive-enough to defend themselves or their profession.

Further attempts and opinions to rationalise this chronic passivity are highly
polarised; ranging from feminist arguments to the rejection of social worker as a
distinct profession. Where social work is accepted as a profession especially in child
protection, critical scrutiny suggest that the seeds of incompetence or inefficiency in
British social work interventions or processes in child protection are sown at the very
formation of social workers where the emphasis is on family support rather than child
protection. Similarly, The National Children’s Bureau (NCB), in consensus with
Professor Harriet Ward (Director of the Centre for Child and Family Research
Loughborough University) noted that “social work training has focused too much on
the acquisition of skills, and too little on the acquisition of knowledge. Thus within the
collaborative partnership working in child protection where veteran partners are able
to skilfully articulate their arguments; social workers may be left in a limbo; unable to
either defend their practice, promote their profession or critically debates policy
issues. In life you don’t just jump from passing your test in automatic cars to excel in
debating thesis with professors on driving manual cars. Yet society indiscriminately
expects disempowered and inexperienced social workers to exude competence in
deliberating matters of practice and policies in parity with veterans and academics
like doctors and similar autocrats. Such gross disproportional power or academic
differentials are bound to impact negatively, not only on the confidence and self-
worth of the social workers, but the way they are perceived and treated. As such

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scapegoating social workers when things go wrong may be directly or indirectly

linked to professional power differentials.

Pertaining to the rejection of social work as a profession, if being professional in its

broadest significance simply denotes the opposite of the word amateur, then social
workers are professionals since “they devote they entire time on practice as opposed
to amateur who is only transiently or provisionally so engaged” Flexner, (1915). The
current “level and duration of training of social workers is now similar to that of
teachers and nurses, and its content (combining values, knowledge and practice
skills) similar to that of doctors and psychologists with whom social workers work
closely. Although this intensive training will never give the social work equal
professional credentials to medics or lawyers, it may change the low image of the
social profession and give the social worker the parity in pay and status which at
present, according to Skills for Care, are among the lowest of the professional
occupations. Within the context where social work was inextricably associated with
caring; and where caring is perceived as work for women, there is logical reason to
suggest that, in a patriarchal society that is institutionally sexist, social workers may
be victims of inherent sexual segregation. Compared to professionals like nursing
with strong unions, the lack of representation or strong voice in debates shaping the
role and future development of social work means that the media will always only
portray the profession through sensationalised misrepresentations. As such, social
work is in desperate need of a strong organisation or trade union body responsible
for public relationship that would help minimise the current blame culture. Indeed,
within the current social work climate of managerialism, the profession needs to
market its good practices; making sure these are appropriately represented to the
media. Without a concerted and effective framework to communicate the
achievements of social work to the media or to the general public, the
misrepresentation and vilification of social workers will remain the norm.

Regarding accountability in social work, the consistent and indiscriminate vilification

of social workers when things go wrong within a multiagency partnership suggest
either a lack of equality in the power relationship or compromised accountability
framework to ensure that blame for failures are apportion to the responsible
individual or agency. While the Children Act 2004 stipulates that each children’s

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service authority in England must establish a Local Safeguarding Children Board for
their area with representatives from the authority and all relevant partners of the
authority such as, health authority, the Children and Family Court Advisory, police,
probation and Support Service and secure training establishments; the NSPCC
makes it succinctly clear that child protection is the duty of each and every one of us.
Yet when things go wrong, blaming social worker becomes the ultimate convenient
option in our selfish tendency to shift and apportion. To safeguard against the
demonisation of individuals as was the fate of Arthurworrey in the Climbié saga, ‘Lord
Laming emphasised the need for a clear lines of accountability. Specific in the
prevention of the scapegoating of social workers, there is vital need for the public as
well as the media to comprehend “the balance between doing everything possible to
prevent child abuse, and the reality that it is not possible to eliminate it”
http://www.scie-socialcareonline.org.uk/profile.asp?guid=91af6f7b-c5b6-482e-9942-
d2e0b2a082c3. More importantly, society needs to move away from the culture
which assumes that there must be someone to be culpable when tragedies occur.
While the Director of Children’s Services currently holds the ultimate safeguarding
responsibility and the statutory lead member on the council accountability framework,
the effectiveness of this set up to provide support for social workers is ill-defined. As
such when things do go wrong anarchy supersedes strategic accountability. The
result is systemic failures or is it?

Chapter Four

Social workers and the media

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As the case of Baby P has shown, social workers often receive a disproportionate
share of blame in highly publicised cases even though a team of professionals from
health, education and police is usually involved, and major decisions about children
can only be made by the courts. How many times has the press engendered public
hysteria simply because social workers dare to be human-enough to make mistakes?
What did they think they were doing? How could they have made such blunders?
Why does it go on happening are spiteful chorus of that routinely follow omission of
duty by social workers. While some critics and media proponents may argue that
audiences “are complicated filter mechanism that are selective in their interpretation
and application of mass media messages.” Fiske, (1986). Allen (1994, p. 6), the
public hysteria engendered by the media coverage of Baby P tragedy despite
obvious bias, is suggestive of public gullibility in its consumption of media messages.
From a semiotic and structural perspective, despite the fact that mass media
information are “partial, motivated, conventional and biased” Allen, (1994, p. 38), the
Sun Newspaper’s coverage of the Baby P’s tragic death is evidence that the public
prevalently perceive media messages as “pure information, as an unmediated
signifier”. While this tendency and the lack of media literacy may collude and
reinforce “the power-wielding ability of the press to instigate public hysteria”, Banks,
(2001, p. 17); Trowler, (2001), the correlate between the mass media messages and
their knowledge of social practice is open to conjecture. With television and the
newspapers as typologies, the medical model perceives the mass media as the
syringe, the message as what is injected and the audience as the patient.
Accordingly, the influence of the media on social attitude to social workers or the
social work profession is a factor of dosage, (the quantity, frequency and extent of
exposure to mass media socialisation), and the resilience, (audience’s selective
ability rather than passive attitude to media messages) Allen, (1994, p. 37). As was
typical of the Sun’s concerted campaign for the dismissal of Maria Ward (social
worker to Baby P), irrespective of public resilience, prolonged exposure to biased
media message will eventually impact significantly on our response to cases of
seemingly preventable child abuse. Akin to the media treatment of Arthurworrey in
the tragic death of Victoria Climbié, the Sun’s resolute blaming of Maria Ward
following the sadistic death of Baby P was sensationalised with hysteria-engendering
headlines including; 'Blood on their hands'; with the unequivocal inference that

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without any vestige of doubt, the social workers were solely guilty. Having achieved
its objective of being the judge and jury, the Sun then launched a crusade; calling for
every worker “who had been involved in the case to be sacked and prevented from
working with children again” http://www.journalism.co.uk/6/articles/533768.php. Nor
did it end there; in complete disregard for confidentiality, the paper encouraged
readers to contact the newspaper if they knew any of the social workers involved.
Despite the awareness of subjective reporting by the Sun and the rest of mass
media, the resulting lynch-mob attitude towards Ward, gives credence to the
assertion that, “the hypnotic power of the mass media deprives us of the capacity for
critical thought.” Marcuse, (1972).

As an analyst, I never seek to be judgemental or partisan but to provide different

perspectives to controversial issues to enable people arrive at more objective
conclusions. In this analysis, I am in no way seeking to exonerate the Social workers
of those omissions of duties that ended in the preventable lost of priceless life; but to
ascertain whether the devil is as black as painted. Simplistically, the conviction of
Baby P’s parents was testimony of “Blood on their hands” not the professionals who
are alleged to have made the mistakes. Within certain context would not the Sun
have been charged with attempting to pervert the cause of justice or liable? Spitefully
unfortunate for the social worker Maria Ward, she was no super star to instigate the
time and cost-intensive legal action for deformation of character or liable. As
predominantly passive consumers of the media message, needless to say the public
had already sold out their ability for objectivity or selective consumption of messages
visibly infused with bias and vested interest. The fact that as a fallible human being,
some omission of duty by the social worker added to the general lack of collaborative
partnership with the police and medical services in the protection of Baby P is
reason-enough not to accord the social worker the angelic status. On the other hand
it does not also provide cause for indiscriminate and subjective vilification. At its most
extreme, the Sun’s attack on Ward was extended to make authorities question her
mental health state. If as in the latter instance the system was so incapable and
gullible-enough as to put a lunatic in charge of the asylum, why blame and demonise
the lunatic for the resulting chaos and tragedies? Mind you I am in no way
consenting to the subjective and irrational equating of social workers with
psychopaths. Nevertheless, in a society where medical conditions like mental illness
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are being criminalised, associating the social worker with mental illness was
synonymous with prejudging and convicting the social worker with criminal offence.
Similarly, cognisant of the fact that the police officer involved in the case scarcely
received any blame, while the mention of the doctors in the media was routinely
balanced by acknowledgement of the complexity of their job; social workers must feel
that they “are fair game when it comes to media witch hunts in a way that other
public servants, such as police officers, teachers or nurses are not.”
http://www.journalism.co.uk/6/articles/533768.php. Although, ever since the Laming
report child protection became a multidisciplinary process involving health
professionals and police officers as well as social workers, the media’s singling out of
social workers for vilification suggests that the media are either ignorant of the
partnership structures in child protection or they are intentionally selective as to
where they apportion blame. From a credentialism perspective, compared to the
doctors involved in both the Baby P and Climbié cases, the low status and less
articulate social workers were isolated and vilified, thanks to media-audience
manipulation.

The public’s central role in the blame culture of social workers is evident within the
context where, despite obvious bias reporting; the Sun's Baby P coverage was
shortlisted for campaign of the year award. What does it say of our society in general
and our ability for objective consumption of media message when seemingly bias
media reporting, to the extent of a vendetta is upheld as the pinnacle of journalistic
achievement at the expense of those passionately willing and ready to come to our
help in our time of turmoil and tribulations? In rationalising the impact of the media as
a possible cause of social worker’s fallibility, I dare premise that, ‘the very fears of
media witch-hunts and professional infamy can lead to a heavy focus on blame
avoidance, with every step taken or decision taken with a glance over the shoulder
and a finger stuck fast in the rule book’. Similarly, in emphasising the demoralising
impact of negative press on the self esteem and confidence of social workers, family
court lawyer Helen pointed out that, “The media relies upon simplified and
generalised tabloid sensationalism to sell papers and grab audiences. The resulting
demonisation of individuals positively undermines the vocation and disincentivises
quality individuals from becoming involved’. http://www.fassit.co.uk/leaflets/No
%20More%20Blame%20Game%20%20The%20Future%20for%20Children's
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%20Social%20Workers.pdf. The problem with media-induced bias in our attitude to

social workers is that, we become comprehensively oblivious to the rudimentary
ethical reality that ‘protecting children is everyone’s responsibility, not only that of
Social workers.

As in most cases of tragic incidences in child protection, public stereotypical

perception of social workers “as indecisive wimps who fail to protect children from
death, or as authoritarian bullies who unjustifiably snatch children from their parent”
Banks, (2001, p. 17) persist today thanks to media influence. Ultimately, until a
herculean revolution is affected to change the way mass media messages are
encoded and disseminated, the demonisation of social workers will always
reciprocate and satisfy the mass media’s mind manipulation and socialisation
processes.

Chapter Five

The role of empowerment in the blame culture

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In social work interventions, user involvement or the empowerment of clients either

directly or indirectly through advocacy to actively participate in their own welfare
delivery has primarily been fostered by sociological approaches such as the system
or role theories. According to Payne, (1995, p.178) such theories emphasise the
importance of the social origin of many of the problems clients faced, they are not so
incline to emphasise clients personal incapabilities, and therefore lead to an
assumption of greater equality between the welfare client and social workers. To
date, the formal training of social workers is ensuring that service deliveries are not
only ethically and legally compliant, but that reflective practice empowers the clients
to be proactive participants in decisions affecting their lives. However the increasing
assault on social workers by clients and their families gives rise to the question
whether by empowering service users the system is creating Frankenstein’s to prey
on frontline staff? While social workers are being demonised for incompetence and
omission of duties, the experiences of staff working especially with mental health
patience give reasons-enough to be guarded in our seemingly simplistic or
indiscriminate judgements and criticism of social workers. Although the challenge to
mainstream social work services is to empathetically engage and work along all
marginalised and some of the most difficult clients to meet assessed needs, society
for yet unexplained reasons expect the duty of social workers to extend beyond
support and ‘enabling’ to ‘mothering’. Carr, (2004). Indeed, rather than empathy in
working alongside clients and their families to solve their problems, it is surprising
how society automatically want social workers to sympathise and mother service
users. Critical reviews of reactions to social work practice give plausible logic to
premise’ that, maybe it is the misperception of social practice as a mothering rather
than supporting or enabling profession that has engendered the indiscriminate
vilification of social workers for society’s failure. Forgive me if this premise seems far-
fetched; with parents in Britain being incarcerated for their children playing truancy;
despite the lack of direct involvement by those parents, blaming social workers for
crime or omission of duties beyond their control is not without precedent. Within the
current market-led system (managerailism) in which clients have become consumers
with the right to choice, social workers as managers are having to consistently
address issues of preferential unmet needs for clients and their families. Whether
due to resource or financial constraints, any inability to provide services based on the

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client’s choice is increasingly being met with antagonism and at times aggression.
This situation is being aggravated by the statutory requirement to empower to be
proactive participants in decisions on matters affecting their lives as a significant
index of quality assurance in social care. However, in the power equation relationship
between the client and social workers, any empowerment of the client equates to a
reciprocal loss of power by the social workers. While the relative loss of power by the
social worker does not deprive social workers of the responsibility to oversee and
manage practice interventions, the current climate of claiming for practice
shortcoming in intervention is preventing risk-taking in practice. Thus, rather than
incompetence, some social worker are operating on the side of caution. While social
workers may feel constrained working in partnership with empower client, the reality
is that, by the very nature of their vulnerability, client empowerment can never be so
comprehensive to deprive social workers from being in control. Thus any malpractice
or omission of duty will be isolated and glutted upon by the public and the media.

Chapter Six

Can social workers ever be free from targeted blame?

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Just as the case of Baby P engender mass hysteria, so did those of Vitoria Clime,
Jasmine Beckford and the last not the least, Baby G. In the latter case in
Nottinghamshire; compared to baby P where the social workers were accused of not
rescuing the victim in time; “social workers were regularly being criticised in the press
for taking children away from their parents too readily.” The case of Baby G; “a
newborn baby removed from his 18-year-old mother despite no care order being in
place” Revans, (2008, p. 1) provided the ideal platform for critics and the mass media
to put down social workers and their seemingly irrational profession. In actions that
might have seemed cruel and inhumane, snatching away a baby by a social worker
seem to reinforce and confirms society’s negative perception of social workers as
“indecisive wimps and bullies, wielding too much power over individual and families”
Banks, (2001 p. 16) or are they? Assessed as potentially a liability to her unborn
baby by reason of her mental state, the decision to take Baby G into care was taken
prenatal. Unfortunately, the social workers actually exercised their duty of care
without obtaining the perquisite legal papers and were compelled by the court to
return the baby to the mother pending satisfaction of the legal requirements. Without
doubt the social workers made a grave procedural mistake and attracted the usual
vilification. Sensationalised headlines like, baby snatchers, Bullies adorned front
pages of the tabloid to demonise the social workers. With procedural slip-up rectified,
Baby G was eventually taken into care. Despite the indiscriminate denigration of
social workers in this case, a year latter “a court case revealed that those social
workers were absolutely right in their judgement after the mother was convicted of
child cruelty.” Brody, (2009). So what is the emerging picture?; take way Baby G too
early and the social worker is labelled a baby snatcher, leave the child with the
parents as was the case with Bay P and Climbié and the social worker is seen as
incompetent. In this climate of ‘do you damn and don’t you damn’ can the social
worker ever be right? As typical of a profession whose practitioners are perceived as
not deserving of compliments or pads on the back for jobs well-done, apart from the
Nottingham Post, not a single national paper dare to correct the damaging
impression given in the original stories in Baby G that social workers did indeed
'snatch' children without good reason. As Tim Loughton MP and Commission
Chairman and Shadow Minister for children noted, “rarely do we read in the tabloids
about the families who have been held together through the dedication and

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professionalism of social workers. But then no one is interested in hearing about the
plane that lands safely” Loughton, (2009). In an exceptional case; brought by X and Y
against Hounslow London Borough Council for negligence in failing to respond to a danger
by rehousing them and in which a family with learning disability suffered physical,
sexual, emotional abuse at the hands of local youths, the public and media
prejudged and found the social workers guilty of mal-practice. However, in passing
judgement, the judge actually renounced the press,; defended the social workers and
collectively charged the whole partnership of social workers and the local authority with
negligence, breach of the duty of care and communication failure.

Chapter Seven

Unrealistic expectations

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As consumers, services users have become major determinants of the shape of care
arrangement through their demand for choice, quality, and proactive participation in
decisions affecting their welfare. Particular to social work practice, the right to; and the
exercise of choice as a welfare consumer means that within the market system the
social worker as the manager and service coordination stands to blame irrespective
of the origin of compromised service delivery. Thus, to mitigate the presumed
indiscriminate tendency to be held to answer for failures or omission of duties, social
workers need to ensure that their practice is not only reflective, but legally and
ethically compliant. Although this will in no way completely eliminate the prevailing
stereotypical perception of the social worker as “indecisive wimps who fail to protect
children from death, or as authoritarian bullies who unjustifiably snatch children from
their parent” Banks, (2001, p. 17) any practice shortcoming will not only exacerbate
their vilification but may fuel, justify and sustain the victimisation of social workers.

In my quest to rationalise the scapegoating or hate game on social workers, I

discover that dissatisfaction and conflict can, and do often arise in social worker
practice due to conflicts in expectations. Social workers are not agents of benevolent
agencies, although their Kantian approach to empathetic practice may insinuate such
virtues. As agents of the state’s welfare system; whose laws and codes of practice
they must obey; or agents of organisations with particular operational strategies, the
effectiveness of the social worker’s practice is reflective of the particular agency
strategic and operational framework. As is often the case in frontline practice where
the right to choice is central to empowerment; but choice is a factor of resource
availability, it is inevitable that professionals and service-users will have conflicting
priorities. Indeed, the reality is that the public and service users are not
systematically sensitised to the precise nature of the rights of clients to services. For
example, ethics and sympathy aside, in community care, the legal entitlement vis-a-
vis the legal responsibility of the welfare system to meet identified needs is qualified
by the terms ‘duty’ or ‘power’. While the former is an obligation (absolute), the latter
is discretional (relative). Under the current climate of increasing demand on welfare
services vis-a-vis diminishing resources; and while the state is not immune to the
global financial crisis, it is astonishing how societies expectations from the social
work profession are not grounded and informed by these realties. Social workers,
irrespective of the constraints to their practice are unrealistically expected to be the

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panacea for societies’ problems. Until society becomes critically aware that social
workers are only agents of the welfare system rather than the system itself, efforts to
eradicate the scapegoating of social work professionals will be futile. Additionally,
services users and their families need to be aware of the limit to their service
expectation from services that are supposed to be supportive rather than mothering.
Client empowerment in social worker does not mean creating a monster of the once
vulnerable service-users and their families, but rather provide them with such choices
as would enable them resolve their problems themselves. In frontline practice, many
of the parents social workers deal with have been abused and neglected themselves,
so they are in some ways just as needy as the children social workers intervene to
protect. It is hard to focus on “the child” in situations where everyone including their
parents or carers exhibits childlike behaviour and the social worker is the only caring
figure around.

In a society where the public seem to relish in apportioning blame as a matter of

convenience, we tend to obviate the reality that social workers are not robots but real
human beings akin to ourselves; inherently fallible, emotional susceptible to negative
and irrational criticism; but with the human tendency to self-improve when
complimented for good practice. In the latter context, it is astonishing how little
society attributes the reduction in most social problems to the central role of social
workers and their agencies. Needleless to say many may accuse me of vested
interest in seeming to stand for social workers. As earlier declared, this discourse is
in no way a hymn of praise to social worker practice, nor am I partisan, but rather an
attempt to sensitize society, especially those who indiscriminately associate social
workers with negativities to the realities of the dilemmas of a profession that hardly
receives the eulogy it deserves. It is mostly only when the ravages of society have
taken their toll on individuals and things might have fallen apart irredeemably that
social workers are expected to step in and pick up the pieces irrespective of the
irrationally that might be inherent in the circumstance. Yet when the miracle fails to
materialise, the supposedly miracle worker (the social worker) becomes the villain.
How often in life do we rationally blame the mechanic for failure to restore a car that
had been dragged in for repairs in complete state of dilapidation? Yet we feel justified
and willing to vilify social workers for not effectively, efficiently and appropriately
achieving the care miracle? Where is society’s Aristotelian or Kantian ethics in their
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victimisation of those who have chosen to do our dirty work? Where is our claim to
the power of independent thoughts and decision-making when we ourselves have
become victims of media subjective socialisation that has made us passive
consumers of biased opinions generated to serve particular vested interest? While
the stereotypical perception of social workers primarily as children snatchers owes a
lot to media misrepresentation and public socialisation, the Association of Directors
of Children’s Services (ADCS) reported that research has shown that “there is a
mismatch between the public perception of social workers and that of social work
service users who report high levels of satisfaction with the service they receive.”
Loughton, (20090). Thus, while social workers do not clamour or expect praises from
the media despite the unsocial nature of their task, “is a balanced coverage too much
to ask?

Chapter Eight

Can best practice ever be the norm in social work practice?

Although social workers are readily indiscriminately demonised, the fallibility of

human beings means that no amount of self-development and reflective practice can
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completely eradicate those factors that engender such public hysteria. For example,
it is only in a fantasy or utopian world that one can imagine an environment
comprehensively free from child abuse and child murder. Gordon Brown says deaths
such as that of Baby P must never happen again, but the truth is that even if best
practice were the norm, it would not be possible to prevent all children dying from
abuse. Even in cases where social workers are blamed for not foreseeing child
tragedies, studies carried out by a team from the University of East Anglia and the
National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, show that “the wealth of
factors which raise or lower the risk of harm to the child was in most cases too
complex for death or serious injury to have been predictable.” Brandon (2008).
Similarly, although many families live in great adversity, which increases the risk of
harm to children, it is important to remember that most children do not suffer serious
abuse in these circumstances. This lack of consistency in profiling potential abusers
significantly constrained the possibility of social workers predicting circumstances of
eminent child abuse. With hindsight, the death of Baby P, Climbié or Beckford might
have been preventable; especially as they were already the subjects of a multi-
agency protection plan and had been seen on numerous occasions. Within the
contestable and controversial circumstance where taking abuse victims into care
would have saved the lives of Baby P and Climbié, could it be that the threshold for
removing children who are suffering chronic neglect is set too high? As the case of
Baby G who was taken away by social workers immediately after birth from her
mentally-ill mother showed, even when social workers bring these cases to court the
effectiveness of their intervention becomes a factor of legal and bureaucratic
wrangling. Indeed, in their desperate quest to be ethically and politically correct in
practice, social workers are discovering that, the very partnership framework they
expect to enhance the safeguarding of children welfare can actually collude to
hinder their practices. The safe comfort zone in social work practice is the realisation
that social worker despite its central role in picking up the pieces when things seem
irredeemable is not synonymous with the hymns of typical with other professions.

The way forward

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Social work is a profession whose processes are continuously changing and

readapting its methodology vis-a-vis social dynamics. As such, the social worker, like
other professionals “should be allowed to make practice mistakes in a supportive
learning environment” Davies (2009) Guardian.co.uk. In a society that prides itself of
equal opportunity and the respect of human rights, it defies believe to image that
financial directors who almost brought down global finances through
mismanagement are subsequently rewarded with mouth-watering bonuses while
social workers like Arthurworrey have been condemned and force into a life of
reclusiveness for daring to falter in their high level of crisis intervention. Similarly,
adopting a ‘safety culture’ will ensure that potential failures in relation to
organisational issues are both understood and controlled. While the media is blamed
for demonising social workers, the social work profession need to change in tandem
with social dynamics and use the very power of the media to defend, promote and
sell itself. Why should the media seek to promote social workers when they rather sit
back and watch other professionals market and defend their profession? Additionally
rather than be socialised into the status quo’s climate of learned helplessness, social
workers should realise that they have a duty to challenge structures and governance
that constrain their ability to deliver best practice. At partnership level, credentialism
and professionalism should not be allowed to dictate policies at the expense of
equally-righted social workers. These, in combination with reflective practice are
bound to impact positively of the way social workers are perceived and treated by the
public in general and the media in particular. In social worker intervention, the reality
is that social problems including child abuse can be prevented but near eradicated.

Chapter Nine

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