National Care Service: Justice Social Work research

2. Ethos and approach of Justice Social Work

Key points

• JSW entails a dual remit, balancing “care and control” and straddling “justice” and “social work” services. Both are seen as central to JSW professional identity and there is an interaction between them in many JSW activities.
• At the same time, there was a perception that, in recent years, resourcing pressures have led to practitioners needing to prioritise regulation, risk management and governance in recent years over more rehabilitative and desistance-focused work.
• Core professional values include: a focus on relationships; a commitment to partnership working; and a trauma-informed and holistic approach. While these reflect core ‘social work’ values, the delivery of JSW as a specialism was also seen as a key strength.
• JSW professionals had mixed opinions on the degree to which their partners understand their role and remit. However, wider professional partners interviewed for this research were positive about JSW’s problem-solving and “can-do” approach.
• Overall, clients spoke very positively about JSW and appreciated their non-judgmental, person-centred approach. However, JSW’s dual role was associated with some tensions over how open clients felt they could be with their justice social worker.

JSW professionals did not feel the general public understood their role and expressed concerns about how JSW was represented in the media.

This chapter examines perceptions of the specific role and ethos of JSW. Understanding the extent to which there is a shared vision for JSW across the profession, their partners, clients and the wider public helps contextualise wider perspectives on management and leadership, partnership working and service delivery.

Justice Social Workers’ identity and values

As described in chapter 1, the role of JSW combines both supporting clients to achieve positive outcomes and managing risk in the community. JSW professionals were acutely aware of this dual “care and control” remit, which was seen as central to their professional identity:

“Care is really important, but we’re in a unique position that we have to manage that in relation to risk.” (Senior managers / team leaders interview 5)

In discussing this dual role, a distinction was sometimes drawn between JSW in Scotland and the Probation Service in England, with the latter seen to focus primarily on risk management at the expense of also pursuing client welfare and ‘social justice’ outcomes. However, while one view was that JSW remained strongly focused on client welfare, another was that in Scotland too, resourcing issues meant that in practice the balance had tilted further towards public protection / risk management and governance roles in recent years, leaving JSW with less time to undertake the kinds of activities that can support rehabilitation and desistance (see further discussion on resources in chapter 3).

A related element of JSW’s ‘dual identity’ is the way in which it straddles ‘justice’ and ‘social work’ services. JSW professionals felt that both aspects were important to their professional identity, although views on the balance between them varied – even sometimes within the same interview, as illustrated in the quote below:

“Justice first for me, I have worked with justice…I have been a justice social work assistant for 20 years, I have never done anything else, and to me I wouldn't, I couldn't see myself fitting into any other kind of role other than justice. So, yes, I would definitely say justice first. Social work is obviously the most important thing, because at the end of the day, we are dealing with welfare, we want to make sure the service users that we are working with are getting a really good service in particular.” (Paraprofessionals interview 2)

Other key professional values highlighted as being core to JSW included:

• A focus on developing strong positive relationships with clients, which was seen as essential to delivering outcomes
• A strong commitment to partnership working – as discussed in chapter 4, this was seen as integral to delivering on both public protection and client outcomes
• An understanding of trauma-informed practice and the link between offending and underlying mental health issues, addictions and trauma
• A holistic approach, understanding clients within their wider context.

While these values may reflect core ‘social work’ values, the fact that JSW is delivered as a specialism within social work (rather than by a generic social work service or a probation service) was also seen as a key strength. JSW professionals highlighted how they felt their skillset differed in certain respects to other social work services, for example carrying out different kinds of risk management and the specific statutory nature of their role.

“It is the values, it is the ethics, it is the social work lens that I think is really unique worldwide […] you've got a qualified social worker who is looking at welfare alongside public protection, and I think that is a huge strength.” (Senior managers / team leaders interview 1)

Overall, the strong ethos and commitment of the JSW workforce was described as a key strength by more senior managers and team leaders, who described their staff as “passionate”, “motivated”, and willing to “go the extra mile.”

Other stakeholders’ views of JSW

Professional partners

JSW professionals’ own perceptions of how JSW is viewed by other services varied both between different JSW professionals and depending on the other service in question. While one view was that JSW values and remit were reasonably well understood, another was that other services – including other branches of social work – did not fully understand their role. In particular, there was a perception that in some cases other justice services saw JSW as a “soft-touch” and more focused on welfare than on risk management:

“They [the police] see us as very social work, bleeding hearts.” (Justice social workers interview 2)

In one area in particular, there was a belief that other services were not aware of the degree of responsibility that justice social workers carried and that in discussions about risk, partners were not always willing to listen to their professional opinions, viewing them as less knowledgeable than, for example, medical professionals. Team managers also felt that there was a tendency for JSW to be blamed by other services when problems arose with case management. Specific challenges were also raised by paraprofessionals in another local authority, who commented that requests for information were dismissed because of their job title and that they have more success when asking a question as a “trainee social worker”. There was a general sense across local authorities that there is more to do to increase partners’ understanding of JSW.

The wider professional partners interviewed for this study (see p3 for a summary of these) generally felt they had a good understanding of JSW’s role. This included representatives from Police Scotland, who in contrast with the comment above generally perceived a close alignment between their aims and values and those of JSW. This is perhaps not surprising, since those interviewed were nominated by JSW service managers as key partners they work with on a regular basis – their views may not be representative of other partners who they work with less closely, or of Police in other roles, for example. Across the board, wider professional partners said they valued the problem-solving and “can-do” approach of JSW and their commitment to joint working.

Clients

Overall, clients interviewed for this research spoke very positively about the approach and ethos of the JSW professionals they were currently working with. Their comments emphasise the value they place on JSW taking a non-judgemental, person-centred approach:

“There is no judgement … I’ve always felt supported and not just listened to but actually heard.” (Client interview 7)

“It is not like you are another number” (Client interview 3)

However, at the same time as clients were generally very positive about the support they were receiving from JSW, it was also clear that they were aware of their dual role. In one group, clients discussed a perceived tension between feeling their justice social worker was “trustworthy” on the one hand, and being suspicious that they could use any information they share against them on the other. For example, it was suggested that being completely open about mental health problems could result in justice social workers "ticking a box" in their risk assessment which moved them to a higher risk category. While there was a recognition from clients that this monitoring element of JSW was important, even when it might feel "harsh" to them personally, they suggested that there could be greater transparency about what is and is not logged about clients’ conversations with JSW.

Clients interviewed for this study also observed that the extent to which JSW professionals were supportive and understanding as described above did vary between local authorities – discussed further in chapter 6, which considers consistency of services.

General public

JSW professionals felt that the general public is not generally aware of the work they do, and do not appreciate its value. One view was that JSW as a profession is not making sufficient effort to explain this and to increase public understanding of their role in both rehabilitation and public protection. A perception that JSW received a “bad press” in the media was a particular concern: it was suggested that negative public scrutiny contributes to staff leaving or dropping out from cases that they perceive to have a higher risk of becoming controversial. Suggested responses to negative media coverage are discussed in more detail in chapter 5.