Barnet

With 30 flourishing town centres and over 200 family-friendly parks, nature reserves and green spaces, Barnet is a brilliant place to live, study, work, and raise a family.

We are a a proudly diverse borough, where people feel welcomed and celebrated. A quarter of our population is made up of children, with more than half of our youngest residents speaking English as an additional language. We are also home to London’s largest Jewish community.

Barnet is well connected. The main council office in Colindale, NW9, is just a five-minute walk from Colindale Station on the Northern Line which links the borough to the rest of London alongside Thames Link and National Rail Services. Our borough has 13 tube stations and is is linked by road to the A10, M1, M25 and A406; there are also more than 850 bus stops and 245 cycle routes in the borough.

The borough is rich with heritage and culture; the magnificent ‘Totteridge Yew’ has grown in Barnet for 2,000 years, making it the oldest living tree in the whole of London. Also in the area is the Royal Air Force museum. Brent Cross Shopping Centre hosts over 120 shops and the surrounding regeneration in the area is one of the largest town centre developments in Europe.

Our multiagency partnership believes that every child has the right to a healthy, happy childhood. We are committed to ensuring all children living in Barnet have equal opportunities to learn, play, participate, and thrive, while protecting the most vulnerable.

To do this, we ensure that children benefit from whole-system support that is designed with and for them and their families. In our borough, services aim to be responsive to local needs and build upon the strengths of our excellent local schools, which are some of the best in the country, our richly diverse communities, and our impressive range of Early Help, Mental Health and youth services that work seamlessly together.

We use resilience-based approaches across our Early Help and Children’s Social Work Services to create opportunities for positive change by building on existing strengths and aspirations. Our practice model has four fundamental principles that aim to foster empowerment and self-determination, these are; systemic and strengths-based approaches, placing children at the heart of our purpose by involving and co-producing with them and their families and local communities in the development of our services, tackling inequalities and working in collaboration with key stakeholders so we provide the right support at the right time and in the right places.              

We want our Social Work practitioners to expand their repertoire of knowledge, skills and professional practice, as well develop their careers in the borough. We have an excellent children’s workforce development programme in which all of our Social Work practitioners are able to access Systemic Practice, Signs of Safety, AMBIT and trauma-informed training as part of our core offer, in addition to a hugely diverse range of wider internal and external training offer.

Social Work in Barnet is supported by well-established systems of support including integrated and co-located Clinical Practitioners, a highly-specialised Parenting Hub and integrated Domestic Abuse delivery. Managers are close to practice, providing a supportive learning culture, where expertise and responsibility is shared. Our ‘grow your own’ wrap around for Social Work Students and Newly Qualified Social Workers with a strong programme of support has allowed us to maintain impressive retention rates in the borough.

Our investment in the children’s workforce has enabled our practice to flourish which has improved services for children as reflected in our strong SEND and ‘Good’ Youth Justice and Children’s Services Inspection outcomes:

• Ofsted | London Borough of Barnet

• An inspection of youth offending services in Barnet (justiceinspectorates.gov.uk)

We are very proud of our the resilience shown by our children’s services workforce and we are looking to grow further. We are not complacent about our successes and we remain ambitious for the future; we welcome practitioners with creativity and a passion for child-centred practice.

If you choose to work with us in Barnet, you can expect:

• An embedded culture of child-centred practice

• Accessible and supportive leadership and management

• Opportunities to grow your career and your knowledge and skills

• Co-located Clinical Practitioners

• Co-located Independent Domestic Violence Advocates

• Systemic Practice Training

• Hybrid and Flexible working arrangements

• Bespoke Practice Development support

• Manageable Caseloads

• Ability to work in multiple settings across the Borough (including Early Help Hubs and Children’s Centres)

• Genuine Co-Production and Participation

As a member of Barnet children's services workforce, you will work in a nourishing environment rated 'GOOD' by Ofsted. We also offer a number of tangible benefits to our staff:

• Free Parking

• Competitive renumeration packages (including Barnet Flex – talk to us about this)

• Access to Pool Cars/Parking Permits

• 30 days annual leave, plus public and bank holidays

• Work-life balance options may include flexi-time, job-share, homeworking, part-time

• Generous Local Government Pension Scheme

• Excellent training and development opportunities 

• Interest-free season travel ticket loan

• Cycle to Work Scheme

• Relocation package of up to £8,000

• Enhanced maternity, adoption and paternity pay

• Childcare voucher scheme, salary sacrifice scheme

• Corporate rates for membership of Better Leisure

• Occupational Health advice/Health and Wellbeing Programme

• Employee Assistance Programme

• Modern purpose built offices based in the heart of our Community at Colindale, 5 minutes walk from the underground station.

If you think working in Barnet might be for you, then we would love to hear from you. You can arrange to come for a pre-interview visit or call us for an informal chat. You can also find out more about working in Barnet by watching the video below.

Our current vacancies and details on how to apply are here: www.barnet.gov.uk/beherejoinus

If you have any questions about applying for roles within children's social care at Barnet please contact our recruitment team FS.Recruitment@Barnet.gov.uk

If you are interested in having an informal discussion about working in children's social care in Barnet please contact:

• Tina McElligott, Director of Early Help & Children’s Social Care (Safeguarding): Tina.McElligott@Barnet.gov.uk 

• Brigitte Jordaan, Director of Children's Social Care (Corporate Parenting & Disability): Brigitte.Jordaan@Barnet.gov.uk

• Donna Swanberg, Head of Safeguarding, Quality Assurance & Workforce Development: Donna.Swanberg@Barnet.gov.uk