Role: Assessing Social Worker – Fostering Recruitment & Assessment Team
Division: Supporting Families Division
Salary: Grade I-K - £44,430 - £55,710 plus travel allowance of £1,280 per annum
Contract: 12-Month Secondment/Fixed Term Contract
Location: LBTH Town Hall, 106 Whitechapel Road, London E1 1BJ
About Us
We believe that the best place for children is to be raised within their own families, immediate or wider, wherever it is safe and appropriate to do so. In Tower Hamlets we are committed to building relationships and strengthening families by working with people in a compassionate and understanding way.
We are ambitious for Tower Hamlets children and families and endeavour for every child and young person to be healthy, safe and successful.
Tower Hamlets is a progressive, ambitious and diverse place to work. We place children and families at the heart of everything that we do and are relentless in our pursuit of positive outcomes for all.
Our Better Together Practice Framework is based on the ideas and concepts which underpin Restorative Practice and draws from other strength-based approaches, such as Systemic and Trauma Informed Practice
Our C-Change approach: Connect, Curious, Community, Co-Produce, Collaborate, Check, sets out “6 Cs ” for our work with children, young people their parents and carers, and each other.
About the Role
We are recruiting two experienced social workers for our Fostering Recruitment & Assessment Team.
If you are passionate about building relationships with children and families working towards positive outcomes for children and have at least 1 year of post-qualifying experience in a statutory Children’s Social Care team, we would love you to apply.
Fostering Recruitment & Assessment Team (FRAT) - You will work as part of a small team consisting of a team manager, 3 social workers, a family finding coordinator, and a community worker, working together to recruit and assess prospective foster carers. We are also responsible for the assessment of family and friends foster carers, and private foster carers.
You will be actively involved in recruiting and supporting prospective carers through the assessment process, up to Panel and/or the court process.
About You
We are looking for motivated social work practitioners, passionate about fostering and kinship and providing quality care for children who have experienced trauma.
The role will involve supporting the Team at targeted recruitment and information events, undertaking initial visits/viability assessments of prospective foster carers, private foster carers and kinship carers, including Social Guardians and those seeking to apply for Child Arrangement Orders.
You will:
Our Benefits
We've been working hard to make Tower Hamlets a great place to practice social work. We will help you to develop excellent social work practice, leading to career advancement at your own pace. We are committed to developing excellent practitioners and making Tower Hamlets an employer of choice.
We offer a competitive salary - £44,430 - £55,710 plus travel allowance of £1,280 per annum.
We offer brand new state-of-the-art offices in the heart of the east end with great transport connections. We have fantastic transport links – Tower Hamlets town hall is directly opposite Whitechapel Station, putting all of London within easy reach of the town hall.
Our employees are put on the Local Government Pension Scheme. This is a career average salary scheme, so your pension benefits are guaranteed and do not depend on how investments perform. We pay into the fund on your behalf.
We have a generous annual leave entitlement starting at 29 working days, rising to 33 days with 5+ years' service, in addition to bank holidays and an additional 3 days at Christmas.
We positively encourage flexible working and work life balance aimed at supporting individual employee requirements within the context of meeting service needs.
We have a number of money-saving schemes, including a rent deposit scheme (which offers staff an interest free loan to help pay rent deposits) and season ticket loan scheme (interest-free loans to help staff when purchasing travel season tickets).
You will also benefit from:
How to Apply
We have simplified our application process, please complete a short application on our online application system and upload your CV.
Closing date: This role is closing for applications on the 26th March 2025
Interviews: If successful you will then be invited for a panel interview on the 8th or 11th of April 2025.
Please keep these dates free
For further information regarding the role, please contact: Fostering Recruitment & Assessment – Paula Lyttle atpaula.lyttle@towerhamlets.gov.uk
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This post is exempted under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and as such appointment to this post will be conditional upon the receipt of a satisfactory response to a check of police records via Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS). The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) helps employers make safer recruitment decisions and prevent unsuitable people from working with vulnerable groups, including children. It replaces the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) and Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA).
Tower Hamlets Councils are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people/vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.
Additional Details
Tower Hamlets vision for our borough is that: people are aspirational, independent and have equal access to opportunities; we are a borough that our residents are proud of and love to live in; and we are a dynamic, outcomes-based council using digital innovation and partnership working to respond to the changing needs of our borough. We want people who aspire to our TOWER values: Together; Open; Willing; Excellent; Respect.
Tower Hamlets has a zero-tolerance approach to, and works to eradicate, all forms of discrimination on the basis of race, sex, disability, age, religion or belief, sexual orientation, gender reassignment, marital status, status as a civil partner, gender, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy and maternity and looks to employ a diverse workforce representative of those groups. We recognise that people can also be disadvantaged by their social and economic circumstances, so we will work to eliminate discrimination and disadvantage caused by social class.
We are a Disability Confident Employer, which means applicants who declare a disability and meet the essential criteria for the post are guaranteed an interview. Care experience has also been adopted by the Council as an additional protected characteristic.
We welcome applicants interested in flexible working arrangements and also applicants who live in the borough.
Tower Hamlets offers the best of London in one borough.
We believe the best place for children is to be raised within their own families, immediate or wider, wherever it is safe and appropriate to do so. Social Workers are at the core of our work with children and families. Our approach is about enabling social workers to build relationships and strengthen families by working with people in a compassionate and understanding way.
We are determined to continue our journey of improvement and deliver outstanding services for children and families of Tower Hamlets, and our offer to staff includes:
The opportunity to work in a richly diverse, challenging and supportive inner London Borough
Competitive remuneration package
Investing in the workforce with end-to-end career support
A manageable and diverse caseload and good quality reflective supervision
Steps to Success, coaching, and bespoke learning and development support from the Learning Academy to develop your practice, with a clear framework for career development and progression into leadership.
Travel card/season ticket loan, Cycle to Work scheme, Local Government Pension Scheme
Opportunities for agile/flexible working
Discounted gym membership, access to free eye test, rent deposit scheme and & You at Work discounts as well as many other benefits
Generous annual leave package and wellbeing service
Smarter Working with new modern technology
If you have any questions about applying for this role, please contact Saima Tahsin, Project Officer at Saima.Tahsin@towerhamlets.gov.uk. For an informal discussion about working in Supporting Families at Tower Hamlets please contact Sam Nair, our Principal Social Worker at Sam.Nair@towerhamets.gov.uk