Senior Social Worker - Safeguarding and Tier 4 lead

Senior Social Worker - Safeguarding and Tier 4 Lead

As a Senior Social Worker, you will act as the champion and leader of social care and safeguarding in both the Bedford and Dunstable addictions Hub.

You will be expected to give robust, consistent, and expert social care practice advice in partnership with specialist senior social care and health colleagues. You will promote high quality, recovery-focused and cost-effective social care services to service users and their carers, focused on the principles of choice, control and independence, as well as ensuring safety.

The Social Worker will work alongside the Social Care Lead to ensure delivery of the Local Authority delegated functions and statutory responsibilities within the section 75 Partnership Agreement, and in line with the Care Act 2014 and other relevant legislation.

The Social Worker will work alongside and support the P2R Social Care Lead and other key stakeholders. You will be the lead within the Safeguarding team which works across directorates bringing together best practice, supporting Social Care which is place-based, personalised and community focused.

The post holder will lead on the investigation of Care Act Enquiries and plan Tier 4 (detox rehad) process within the Specialist Addictions service and support in planning and providing one-to-one and group interventions for substance misuse.

• Lead across all aspects of Adult and Children's Safeguarding, leading Care Act Enquiries, assessing and managing risk, working with the Social Care Lead to ensure the service is delivered safely and effectively.
• Champion social care with a comprehensive understanding of legislation and statutory guidance.
• Assess service users for suitability and eligibility for detoxification and residential rehabilitation (Tier
  4).
• Lead the Specialist Intervention Team, directly managing up to 6 members of staff.
• Co‑ordinate the delivery of one-to-one and group interventions for substance misuse.
• Assess service users, identifying strengths and recovery capital and deliver interventions which support and empower the service user to make changes to their substance use.
• Work collaboratively with everyone involved in the service user’s care and support.
• Maintain regular links and attend meetings with the corporate Social Work Learning and Development Team, Safeguarding Team, and keep up to date with accurate, consistent, and robust social care, legal and practice advice, and support to locality staff.
• Undertake the most complex assessments and reviews for people who may present with a high risk, or those with significant interpersonal, social, legal and/or environmental complexities, ensuring people are assessed appropriately against social care eligibility criteria as defined by The Care Act 2014.

Our mission is to make a positive difference to people’s lives by improving the quality of life for all we serve. Our values are:
We Care, We Respect, We are Inclusive – we seek people who live and breathe these qualities when supporting service users and carers, and in their relationships with colleagues in the Trust and our partner organisations.

• Professional Qualification in Social Work
• Substance Misuse Training
• Care Act Training

• Experience of working in Health or Social Care
• Experience of working within a multi-disciplinary team.
• Experience of care planning and risk assessment

• Ability to empower service users to draw from their strengths and assets, and identify solutions.
• Understanding and commitment to the values and principles of Recovery and ability to apply them.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Bedford and Central Bedfordshire Boroughs