Children and family social workers
Children and family social workers are social workers registered with Social Work England (SWE) working in a local authority in a children’s services department or, if working in an authority where the services are joined up, a social worker that works primarily on children and families work. Children and family social workers are employed and paid directly by the local authority.
Agency workers
Agency workers are children and family social workers not directly paid by the local authority. These may be social workers who are paid by an agency rather than the local authority or who are self-employed.
Headcount
Headcount is a count of all individual children and family social workers regardless of their working pattern. In instances where a social worker holds more than one post, only one post (the more senior role where applicable) is counted to avoid duplication.
For headcount at 30 September of the reporting year, duplicates are removed based on local authority, SWE identifier, date of birth, gender and ethnicity. This provides a count of the number of individual social workers regardless of their working pattern.
For starters and leavers during the year duplicates are removed based on local authority, SWE identifier, date of birth, gender, ethnicity and start or leaving date.
Duplicate records for agency workers are not removed, with each record regarded as a separate individual.
Full-time equivalent
Duplicates are not removed from full-time equivalent (FTE) figures. FTEs are derived by aggregating the total number of hours that staff are contracted to work and dividing by the standard hours for their grade. In this way, part-time staff are converted into an equivalent number of ‘full-time’ staff. This allows for meaningful comparisons of measures such as caseload across local authorities.
FTE figures exclude records for social workers whose FTE was recorded as zero; this was 0.5% of records for children and family social workers in post at 30 September 2023, compared to 0.7% in 2022 and 1.0% in 2017.
Starters
Starters are social workers who joined a vacant children and family social worker post at a local authority in the year ending 30 September.
The following are included in the social worker starters figures:
- those joining from the same local authority, but from a non-children and family social work position.
- those joining from a children and family social work position in another local authority in England.
- those joining from an agency children and family social work position.
The following are not included in the social worker starters figures:
- those moving or being promoted from one children and family social work position to another within the same local authority.
- those returning from maternity or sick leave.
- those who started and left in the same reporting year.
Refer to the data quality section for details of data quality issues regarding this measure.
Leavers
Leavers are social workers who left a children and family social worker post at a local authority in the year ending 30 September.
The following are included in the social worker leavers figures:
- those who are staying at the same local authority, but are moving to a non-children and family social work position, for example moving to adult social care.
- those moving to a children and family social work position in a different local authority in England.
- those moving to an agency children and family social work position.
- those who have begun a career break.
- those seconded out of an organisation.
- those leaving the profession altogether.
The following are not included in the social worker leavers figures
- those moving or being promoted from one children and family social work position to another within the same local authority.
- those who have started maternity or sick leave.
- those who started and left in the same reporting year.
Movers between local authorities
Movers between local authorities refers to FTE children and family social worker leavers (as above) who have moved to a children and family social work position in a different local authority in England (and were identified as such on 30 September of the reporting year).
Agency attrition
Agency attrition refers to FTE children and family social worker leavers now working as an agency children and family social worker, either in the same or a different local authority in England (and were identified as such on 30 September of the reporting year).
Full attrition
Full attrition refers to FTE children and family social worker leavers who were not identified as a children and family social worker or agency children and family social worker within any local authority in England (on 30 September of the reporting year).
Cases
A case is defined as any person allocated to a named social worker, where the work involves child and family social work. This may include:
- an individual child allocated to a social worker (for example, a family of three siblings where each child is allocated to a social worker counts as three individual cases) including those on a child protection plan, children in need, fostering and adoption cases and care leavers
- a carer or carers allocated to a social worker for the purposes of fostering or adoption.
Cases may be held by social workers regardless of their role in the organisation and not just those specifically in a ‘case holder’ role.
The number of cases held is typically smaller than the number of children in need at 31 March. This may be explained by a number of factors, including different count dates for the data collections and variance in the interpretation of the department’s guidance.
Some local authorities have raised issues around reporting the ‘number of cases held at 30 September’ data item and linking cases to social workers at an individual level.
The above issues should be taken into consideration when interpreting caseload figures.
Sickness absence
Sickness absence is the number of working days missed due to sickness absence during the year ending 30 September. It is possible that this measure of sickness absence did not give a full picture of capacity shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic; for example, workers may have been working from home whilst shielding and unable to carry out face to face work.
The Vulnerable children and young people survey (opens in a new tab) collected information on social workers unavailable to work due to coronavirus (COVID-19).
Vacancies
The number of FTE vacancies within the local authority at 30 September. This is an aggregate (local authority-level) number collected by the local authority.
Age and gender
Age and gender breakdowns are provided on both an FTE and headcount basis for:
- Social workers in post at 30 September
- Starters
- Leavers
For children and family social workers in post at 30 September (including those who started during the reporting year), age is derived from the date of birth recorded in the census and is their age at 30 September of the reporting year.
The age of leavers is the age of the child and family social worker when they left their post at the local authority.
Gender is taken from the 'gender' data item collected in the census.
Ethnicity
Ethnicity groups are based on the ethnic origin data item collected in the census and are provided on both an FTE and headcount basis. FTE has been provided for the first time in the 2023 statistics (covering all years from 2017 to 2023). Of the ethnic groupings:
- White comprises white British, white Irish, or any other white background.
- Mixed comprises white and black Caribbean, white and black African, white and Asian, or any other mixed background.
- Asian or Asian British comprises Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Chinese or any other Asian background.
- Black or Black British comprises black Caribbean, black African or any other black background.
Time in service at local authority
Time in service is derived from ‘Role Start Date’, which is collected in the census. Time in service is a measure of the total time in years that a social worker has been employed continuously in any children and family social worker role at their current local authority, rather than only the time they have spent in their current children and family social worker role.
Time in service breakdowns are provided for both FTE and headcount for:
- Social workers in post at 30 September
- Leavers