Bradford Metropolitan District Council
Department of Children’s Services, Children’s Specialist Services
Children’s Social Work Service
COURT CONSULTANT SOCIAL WORKER
Band PO4: £37,107 - £39,961 pa
1 x 37 hours per week
Established
Based at Sir Henry Mitchell House, Bradford
The Code of Practice on the English language requirement for public sector workers, Part 7 of the Immigration Act 2016, requires that Councils ensure that all candidates applying for customer facing posts must be assessed in order to establish their fluency in English.
The criteria under special knowledge and experience on the job profile which is shown in this advert, outlines what level of fluency you will be expected to demonstrate. Therefore, it is essential that you provide examples in your application.
As a Court Consultant Social Worker you will be working within Bradford’s social work service and will ensure proper use of permanency planning processes to avoid delay for children.
This role will perform a critical function to help promote timely case management decisions in order to ensure appropriate planning and case direction during PLO, care proceedings and discharge proceedings.
You will support social work staff to develop confidence in giving evidence, timetabling Proceedings and challenging the quality of practice within that arena where necessary to ensure the best outcomes for children.
You will be required to support social workers to gather evidence, write statements and reports for Court, and quality assuring work undertaken alongside the legal representatives.
You will ensure that compliance with statutory and legislative requirements is adhered to.
The post holder will chair a range of meetings as appropriate to the role (complex case discussion, permanence planning meetings and permanence tracking meetings) and will be a member of Bradford’s Legal Gateway Panel and Permanence Panel.
As a Court Consultant Social Worker you will know what excellent social work practice looks like for children and families and be passionate to nurture this with our social workers. This is a great development opportunity for excellent practitioners who are looking to progress.
We have placed ourselves on the forefront of innovation in social work, rethinking our approach and processes in order to maximise the impact of the social work practice we provide. We are one of the authorities that have secured funding from the DfE to be part of the England Innovations Programme. We’ve looked far and wide for what we believe are the best models for care for children and young people. Our intention is to provide inspirational care, tailored to the individual needs of the children and young people.
Bradford is the 4th largest Local Authority with a population of 530,000 of which 150,000 are children and young people, making us one of the key cities with a young age group population. To ensure we achieve even better outcomes for children and young people. We are on a journey to excellence; ensuring children are at the heart of everything we do.
Bradford is a dynamic and forward thinking council which is reviewing how it delivers our services to our customers in order to improve educational outcomes, protect vulnerable children and young people in the district, and reduce the effects of childhood poverty.
We have high expectations from our teams and it is therefore essential that they feel that they have the proper support in place, making them confident in their actions and the decisions they make.
Our Court Consultant Social Workers will:
- Be Passionate about excellent social work practice.
- Hold a DipSW or equivalent qualification and are registered with the HCPC as a qualified social worker.
- Have at least 5 Years Social Work experience.
- Know what excellence looks like and champion best practice.
- Have a good working knowledge of Signs of Safety approach.
- Ability to support, develop and inspire others.
- Have excellent verbal and written communication skills and be able to make good decisions based on the information available, ensuring effective relationships with other professionals.
- What do we offer as a Council? We provide numerous Employee opportunities and benefits including:
- CPD opportunities, including opportunities to take part in our leadership development programme.
- Regular supervision and annual appraisal of practice, ensuring clarity of purpose and providing an opportunity to take stock, raise ideas and obtain valuable and constructive feedback.
- Excellent training and learning opportunities, including opportunities to develop practice based on interests and passions, through our practitioner led forums.
- A culturally diverse workforce reflecting our communities.
- What do some of our social workers say about working in Bradford Children’s Services?
Visit our website for more information: https://www.bradford.gov.uk/jobs/childrens-services/make-bradford-your-next-step-in-social-care/
“We are making differences to children’s lives by acting appropriately to risk”
“Workers support one another, as do the team managers and this helps us to keep the children as our focus”
What did the Ofsted JTAI (April 2017) inspectors say about Bradford?
- 'Leadership within children’s social care is effective and senior managers are creating a healthy environment in Bradford for effective social work to flourish’.
- Across partners there is commitment to continual improvement to offer a wide range of high quality services to meet the diverse needs of children and families.
As a local authority we also offer a variety of competitive employee benefits including generous leave entitlement, career average pension scheme with excellent benefits, access to a range of salary sacrifice schemes and discounts.
Relocation Package: A relocation package may be available for successful candidates who meet the criteria.
An enhanced disclosure check with the Disclosure and Barring Service will be undertaken for this post.
For further information please contact; David Stephens, Care Proceedings Manager on 01274 435600 or email david.stephens@bradford.gov.uk
The closing date: 25th February 2019
Please find attached the Job Profile: Court Consultant Social Worker JP.doc