SASW’s response to SSSC Six-Monthly Workforce Report Published 17 December 25
Key Concerns
Whilst the overall workforce has increased since December 2021, the recent drop of 1.2% is concerning, although the data in the previous report was incomplete, with almost a third of Local Authorities not providing data.
More worrying, the 6.6% drop in senior social workers during these six months represents a significant loss of experience, practice wisdom and leadership at precisely the moment when Scotland requires stable, experienced supervision of newly qualified practitioners during a period of significant change.
The vacancy rate of 551 WTE (8.9%) has been stubbornly high for years now and demands urgent attention, particularly given that 19 of 26 responding local authorities identified vacancies as hard to fill. The consistent finding, from multiple 6-monthly reports, of a lack of experienced applicants points to a systemic challenge in workforce development and retention, rather than simply recruitment volumes, as well as geographical challenges in some areas.
While the overall vacancy rate of 8.9% is concerning, in some areas this rises to over 20%, which will significantly increase pressures on existing staff.
Areas Requiring Strategic Response
Children's Services Crisis: The 11.3% vacancy rate for main grade posts in children's teams is unsustainable, especially with pressures from national priorities for change and increasingly complex child protection demands. This cannot be resolved through recruitment alone when authorities report insufficient experienced candidates. We need to consider how we can make social work a profession where people spend years training to enter, a place where they want stay.
Senior Practitioner Shortage: The exodus of senior social workers threatens the mentoring, supervision and practice quality essential for supporting less experienced staff. This creates a cycle where lack of supervision, support and understanding contributes to retention problems amongst main grade workers.
Geographic Variation: We need to analyse the data to understand what the most acute challenges are geographically to enable targeted strategic interventions as part of a coordinated national approach to tackling long-term vacancies.
SASW's Position
SASW maintains that these figures evidence the need for:
- Improved Working Conditions: Social work needs to be a sustainable and fulfilling career for those who choose to enter the profession. Terms and conditions need to support professional integrity, good practice and a sustainable work-life balance.
- Protected Supervision Time: Guaranteed, protected supervision for all practitioners as a workforce quality and retention measure.
- Career Development Pathways: Clear progression routes that help to retain experienced practitioners in frontline practice, where they might choose to do so, rather than a linear path into management and away from practice, or indeed away from the profession entirely.
- Workload Management: Recognition that vacancy rates of 8.9% place unsustainable pressure on existing staff, risking further attrition. National maximum caseloads, along with a recognition of the increasing complexity of work is urgently needed.
- National Social Work Agency: These figures reinforce the urgency of establishing the National Social Work Agency with a genuine capacity to address systemic workforce planning challenges beyond individual employer approaches.
The workforce data demonstrates that Scotland has made progress in overall numbers, but faces an experience and sustainability crisis in its social work workforce. Addressing the terms and conditions emergency in Scottish social work, which is driving vacancy rates, must be central to the National Social Work Agency's initial priorities and to local authority workforce strategies. Successful wholesale reform of practice and systems is likely not to succeed in the current working environment.