Social Work in Newham is underpinned by a culture of Systemic and Restorative practice with high quality relationships at the heart of our approach. Our Children in Care teams provide statutory services to children who are in our care and their families and support networks.
Social Workers in Children in Care provide Circles of Support around children to ensure their happiness and safety when Council is acting in its role as a corporate parent - working restoratively and using systemic tools and ideas and drive the development of a team culture where good practice can flourish to the benefit of all.
Working as a Children in Care Social Worker at Newham provides a unique development opportunity as the service handles the majority of court work relating to care proceedings. You will be fully supported in this by senior colleagues, an Assistant Team Manager and Team Manager in each team, Practice Development Social Workers, a comprehensive CP Chair service and our Clinical Team of experienced qualified Family Therapists.
We welcome applications from qualified social workers of varying experience levels; though we do expect applicants to have completed their ASYE and have gained some experience working on cases with looked after children. A firm understanding of working with children in care and their families and support networks is essential and needs to be demonstrated in application and at interview. Applicants must have a valid registration with Social Work England.
We’re looking for social workers who have a genuine interest in a restorative, relationship based practice model drawing on systemic thinking to inform your approach to building effective relationships with children, young people and their families. More complex cases in CiC involve court work so an interest in this area is encouraged - we try to allocated the most complex cases to our Senior Social Workers, but we welcome social workers who are looking to progress in their careers and learn.
We want to meet energetic, empathetic practitioners that are keen to reach positive outcomes for children and families whilst taking full advantage of the learning, support and personal development that Newham offers. We’re big on career development and our focus on developing internal talent has made internal progression a realistic possibility for many – we promoted 30 qualified social work professionals in 2023 alone and are already into double figures for promotions in 2024.
We’re a vibrant, dynamic, culturally rich London Borough with a young population and limitless potential. We’re a challenging yet rewarding place for social work practise to flourish and we are steadfastly committed to our workforce being representative of the families that we work with. We are taking coordinated, meaningful and focused action to develop an inclusive culture because we believe this is at the heart of enabling diversity in all respects, including diversity of thought. We are taking positive actions to challenge all forms of discrimination and injustice to help make Newham a fairer and more equitable place for children and families to live, learn and thrive.
We’re building a fairer Newham through investment, co-production and by continuously developing our 'Circles of Support' practice model; centring on systemic and restorative practice and a specialist support offer for our practitioners. Ofsted described Newham as having a positive culture of learning and development and we always try to develop talent in-house. We promoted 30 internal colleagues in 2023 alone, and have put more than 47 practitioners through further education since 2020. We value your development and at Newham career progression is a reality for many of our colleagues.
We understand that social work can be a challenging yet ultimately very rewarding profession that makes demands of you personally and professionally. In Newham we value your wellbeing and we aim to ensure that you have a better work/life balance through a remote working offer when you are not visiting children and families, a modern office space for when you’re on site, a flexible working policy where all requests are considered, and a clinical offer to support you to do your best work.
We’ve been working hard to make Newham a great place to practise social work:
