Social Workers Call on Government and GSCC to Stop Pandering to Media

We would like to thank all social workers who joined our campaign calling on GSCC to withdraw its invitation of Deidre Sanders (The Sun’s Agony Aunt) to GSCC annual conference. A total of 535 social workers signed the petition which reflected the great consensus for our cause.

This campaign was not against engagement with media or any specific person it was about social workers coming together and respecting themselves as professionals. We believe that social work will never be treated appropriately and with respect if social workers in the first place do not come together and respect and protect social work as a profession.

Protecting social work as a profession means unmasking the bad/poor practice of social work and the reasons and people behind it, as well as standing up for the profession to protect it from unscrupulous and generalised attacks and/or accusations by media or otherwise.

We believe that social workers should take responsibility for their profession and their future and therefore, are disgusted by the appointment of journalists such as Deidre Sanders to Social Work Taskforce and by GSCC’s invitation of Deidre Sanders to their annual conference.

Social work and anyone connected with and/or representing social work/social workers must maintain and uphold the highest standards of transparency, integrity and professional ethics. Toadying to the lowest journalistic sensationalisms and manipulations only aggravates the current difficulties and confounds an already complex situation.

We look forward to the formation of the college of social work to represent and regulate social work in the same manner the Royal College of Physicians represents and regulates medical doctors. The inefficiencies and short sighted politicisation of GSCC has led to a generalised culture of blame and fear in social work.

We await the unveiling of Social Work Taskforce’s final report and hope that there would be more than just a few cosmetic hints and the usual procedural and bureaucratic revisions/additions and some easy blame on the poor training of Newly Qualified Social Workers. We believe that the problems of this profession are much more serious and much more deeply rooted, and for as long as social work is not run by social workers there would be neither the courage nor the resolve to truly address the underlying causes of current problems.

We stand for a better understanding and greater equity through an open, sincere and transparent partnership, commitment and dialogue between the government, social workers and service users.

We wish to take this opportunity to thank all those who joined our petition and who share our concerns and hopes for a better social work and greater social justice.

Also we are enormously grateful to all those who through word of mouth, phone calls, or otherwise helped us disseminate this worthy message.