IMPACT criticises shortage in social workers

IMPACT trade union, which represents social workers, has described the ongoing shortage of social workers in the midlands region as critical.

The union said that, despite not being subject to the recruitment moratorium, only 70 per cent of the required compliment of staff is employed in the midlands region. The union has also criticised the employment of agency staff in the region which it says is an expensive and unnecessary solution.

IMPACT official Denis Rohan explained, “We have a situation in this region where the provision of sufficient budget resources for child and family protection services is essentially being stalled. This is creating a very unsafe situation. Despite the fact that the public service recruitment moratorium does not apply to social workers, and despite the fact that we have a national panel of 300 social workers qualified for placement, absolutely nothing is happening.
Mr Rohan added, “We’ve seen some areas fall back on employing agency staff. This is an unnecessary and expensive solution to a problem which could be solved by ensuring the full deployment of staff.”

However, the HSE has defended the situation in the Midlands.

Mary Kenny, Service Director, Dublin Mid-Leinster Region, Children and Family Service, HSE, said: “The HSE has approved a number of social work posts for the Midlands region and these are currently in the process of being filled. Agency staff are deployed purely as an emergency response pending the filling of permanent posts and with the express purpose of addressing service pressures.”

Mr Rohan claimed that the employment of five agency workers in the midlands took place “without any prior consultation with staff representatives”.

“The government embargo on recruitment does not extend to the employment of social workers, so there should be no need to employ expensive agency solutions where social workers can be deployed from the national panel. The cost of employing agency staff is more than 20% above the cost of recruiting staff directly into the organisation. This is a dreadful waste of money particularly in the current economic climate.
“We have to provide resources to ensure the service is delivered. What is it going to take to achieve the deployment of the full resources? Will it take a major crisis? We can’t allow that to happen” he said.