Toolkit for social workers

Opportunities for intervention

Children and Family social workers have a range of opportunities available to them to better address the needs of children affected by parental drinking.

These include:

Advising other professional bodies about appropriate and inappropriate referrals to social services when parental alcohol misuse prompts contact with social services

Providing information on how other professionals can best proceed and signposting information, materials and other services which will be of help in cases of inappropriate referral or when a child is not considered in need

In accessing children referred to social service to better spot the effects of parental alcohol misuse and to properly assess its impact focusing on a child centred approach

To recommend appropriate action to reduce the likelihood of long term harm and provide/access support services in cases where either the child is not considered in need, or is in need but no child protection issues are identified (s47 assessment)

To prescribe interventions to assist a child where there are child protection concerns arising from the core assessment. This could form part of a child protection plan which either constitutes additional monitoring of the child and actions to be taken by a range of professionals to support the family or set up or confirm arrangements for the temporary (leading possibly to permanent) placement of the child.

Should it be possible to retain the child safely within a family, to advise parents appropriately on how they might deal with their own alcohol problems and make appropriate referral

Within the wider context of the role to promote the development of local services for children in need of support with this issue.

The material included in this toolkit attempts to provide information and tools to enable social workers to address these scenarios.