Balancing the Scales

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Balancing the scales

The challenges we face as social work practitioners are truly unacceptable.

We face a lot of racial abuse from service users. It seems the emotional well-being of practitioners is not taken seriously.

We know racial abuse is a crime and it should be reported to the Police. However, there is very little evidence that supports social workers are strongly supported by their employer.

The organisational protocols/policies are not clear in how they address this issue. Many social workers have raised issues around being racially abused by service users and not being supported by their employer.

What support can be offered to social workers who face racism when working?

Social work, like nursing, remains one of the professionals were people of black and ethnic minority constitute the highest population of the workforce.

However, looking at the organisation hierarchy, it seems the social workers from black, asian and ethnic minority are not well represented in the senior leadership hierarchy.

It would be interesting to find out that ratio of black, asian and ethnic minorities who are in senior positions.

Do not confuse my opinion, I am a firm believer that promotion should be awarded on a basis of merit. However it would be interesting to find out what the intelligence data states about the disparities. Let me know of your views and thoughts about this comment?

According to the ethnicity pay gaps completed in 2019; "Most of the minority ethnic groups analysed continue to earn less than White British employees but, in 2019, those in the Chinese, White Irish, White and Asian, and Indian ethnic groups all earned higher hourly pay than White British employees." This research finding invites me to ask the question in relation to how this pay scale gap impacts us as black, Asian, and ethnic minorities. What is being done to bridge this gap.

Food for thought.