The old Scottish ballad - Will ye no come back again?- is a pleasing melody.
Likewise, the English Come Back to Social Work scheme
sounds very easy on the ear. It is simply a good idea to offer social workers retraining
and assistance to return to social work after a career break.
You can read more about the initiative in a
recent article in Community Care.
One thing I don’t understand is why it is
necessary to be so cautious about launching this scheme. For example, there are
currently only 100 places available and only social workers who have left the
profession in the last five years are eligible. Why?
Given that the shortage of experienced
social workers is now reaching (or even exceeding) crisis point I can see no
reason why the doors should not be flung open to returnees and every effort and
resource put into re-recruiting as many as possible.
