Casual Advanced Social Worker

Casual Advanced Social Worker, Emergency Duty Service

Ref: RNR002952

Salary: £54,495 p.a. / £28.25 per hour, plus benefits

With a 30% night shift enhancement on hours worked between 10pm and 6am

Casual hours

Swindon Borough Council are on an exciting journey to transform service delivery. We want our town to be the best it can be. Our ambitious vision in the new Swindon Plan is supported by realistic transformation programmes, with the people of Swindon at their heart. Because that's who we're doing it for – the communities and businesses that make our town great. As part of the Council, you'll support a friendly local authority making decisions with real impact. It's all for better public services. Better processes. And a better quality of life, for everyone. Join us, and Swindon will be better with you.

About Us

We have now implemented the Family Safeguarding Model in 2022, a new multi-disciplinary approach that supports a whole system change to child protection for children up to adolescence, focusing on supporting the needs of children and adults so that children can safely remain within their families. This is a great opportunity to join us now and be part of this pioneering work as we continue to learn from multi agency family work and support more families to look after their children in their families and wider communities.

In addition, we have an established and growing our ASYE programme, linked to our Social Care & Leadership Academy, offering mentoring support, fostering a culture of learning and challenge, manageable caseloads and good quality supervision, as we commit and invest in growing our own talent, as well as our experienced social workers.

About the role

Swindon's Emergency Duty Service is the Local Authority's Out of Hours first point of contact for anyone who is concerned about the immediate safety and protection of a child, young person or vulnerable adult.

The team is responsible for delivering a high quality and responsive service to children, young people and vulnerable adults. EDS covers a wide spectrum of social work practice. They predominantly undertake a range of assessments and interventions. The majority of EDS work is Child Protection and urgent Mental Health Act assessments. The team works closely with our police and health protection partners, ensuring the provision of an effective comprehensive service.

In this role you will lead child protection investigations and assess/support children in need. In so doing, you will act immediately to secure the protection and safety of children including the placement of children in foster care.

You should have excellent assessment and prioritisation skills and use these to instigate timely interventions and promote positive outcomes in line with national standards. You will be required to prepare and submit emergency court applications out of hours and represent the Council to ensure the protection and welfare of all children and vulnerable adults.

It is essential that you are an experienced social worker with a minimum of two years post qualification experience in a Child Protection or Mental Health setting; you will need to have SWE registration and ideally hold an Approved Mental Health Professional award.

About You

Your aspirations should be limitless, and you will be as determined and passionate about Children's Services as we are. As a local authority, we continuously drive forward improvements in our services. We want our Social Workers to be part of our transformation, contribute to improving the safeguarding of our children, and we will make sure you have the full support network and training to do it.

Our teams are ambitious and proactive, and we are looking for people who will share that ambition and be a part of our journey.

Candidates must be fluent in the English language (as a requirement of Part 7 of the Immigration Act – for the effective performance of a customer-facing role).

Our commitment to your development

We are dedicated to ensuring that you can progress your continued professional development and access training and learning opportunities linked to the BASW competencies for career progression.

We have an established Social Work & Leadership Academy. The Academy aims to celebrate the best in professional practice in Social Work and Social Care Leadership. The Academy represents an opportunity for us to demonstrate how we support, develop and value the professional disciplines in Social Work and Social Care through a targeted framework of career development and learning opportunities.

Your next package

• Relocation allowance of up to £8,000 (eligibility criteria applies)
• Competitive salaries
• Free car parking at our central Swindon campus and easy commuter links to many locations

Please see our Rewards and Benefits offer for more details.

As an employee, you will receive a diverse and exciting environment in which to work, encouraging creativity and innovation whilst recognising the need to support ongoing personal development and a flexible work life balance.

For Swindon to thrive in the future, we need to lay the foundations now. It's why our regeneration and transformation programmes are already underway. So, you'll be joining us at an exciting time on our journey. We'll look to you to share your knowledge, influence decisions and drive real, positive change. With your contributions, we'll achieve our vision of a prosperous, re-vitalised Swindon together. And you'll be proud to say it was made better with you.

Please see our Vision and Values page for more details and our new Swindon Plan.

Your next steps

Please read the role profile, which is available in the documents section to the righthand side of the page. To submit an application for this role, select Quick Apply.

To be eligible for this role, you must be a qualified Social Worker with Social Work England registration.

As an inclusive employer, we welcome applications from a diverse range of communities, and in particular disabled people and people from ethnic minorities. Read our statement of commitment to equality & inclusion.

For further details and an informal discussion, please contact Nicki Mark, Team Manager, email

If you are experiencing technical issues submitting your application, please email