Loyalty payments offered to keep social workers in Walsall

New data shows that the percentage of staff turnover, vacancy rate and use of costly agency staff has reduced significantly in the past two years.

Members of Walsall Council’s children’s services overview and scrutiny committee were told keeping social workers in the borough has been difficult for some time.

And, while the authority was heading in the right direction, there was still more work to do to improve further.

At Thursday’s meeting Antony Schaffarczyk, principal social worker, said a raft of new initiatives had been introduced to improve the offer in Walsall.

This included a new retention payment scheme to reward those who stay with the authority over a number of years.

Other measures include developing a wellbeing policy to support staff, mapping out clear career structures and providing enhanced training to help them develop.

A report to the committee showed staff turnover had reduced to 15.8 per cent in 2020 – almost half of what the figure was in 2018.

Vacancy rates have also been cut by 12.7 per cent in 12 months to 13.3 per cent in 2020. Staff absence rates have also fallen to an average of 2.1 days per member in 2020 from 3.7 in 2019.

And the percentage of Walsall’s current social worker team brought in from agencies has fallen by 12.2 per cent to 15.1 per cent from 2018 to 2020.

Walsall Council’s portfolio holder for children’s services Tim Wilson said: “Recruitment and retention has been an issue for this council and across the country for years.

“Our strategy is critical because clearly our staff are our biggest asset and work extremely hard.

“This is a national issue and I’m pleased with the progress that we have made but there is still a lot of work to do.”