Children's Social Worker – Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub

Cambridge County Council; Huntingdon; Hybrid; GBP 32,000 - 42,000; Full time

Job summary

A local government authority in the UK seeks an experienced Social Worker to join their Child Protection Services team. The role is based in Huntingdon and involves extensive collaboration with multi-agency teams. Candidates must possess strong communication skills and a solid understanding of safeguarding legislation. This hybrid role offers opportunities for continuous professional development and a comprehensive wellbeing package, with benefits including a relocation package and protected time for development.

Benefits

Comprehensive wellbeing package

6 days of protected time for development

Relocation package up to £8,000

Pay progression scheme

Refer a Friend Scheme

Support from the Cambridgeshire Academy for Reaching Excellence

Qualifications

• Experience in completing child and family assessments and S47 investigations.
• Familiarity with Child Protection planning and Child in Need plans.
• Understanding of adverse childhood experiences, domestic abuse, and neglect.

Responsibilities

• Analyse risk levels to ensure effective safeguarding measures are in place.
• Forge empowering relationships with children, families and professionals.
• Conduct assessments and respond to needs, leading to clear outcomes.

Skills

Exceptional verbal and written communication skills

Ability to identify levels of risk and need

Knowledge of child protection policies and procedures

Education

Qualified Social Worker with Social Work England registration

Job description

We are looking for a Social Worker with extensive experience in Child Protection Services.

At the MASH, we are a dynamic and energetic team dedicated to providing timely and appropriate services to children, young people, and families in our community. Our work is diverse and engaging, involving extensive multi‑agency collaboration, often under tight deadlines. We focus on making swift, informed decisions to safeguard children and young people, ensuring their welfare needs are met in accordance with the Working Together guidelines. The nature of our work allows us to witness positive outcomes for children quickly.

You will be joining a highly effective and supportive team which is made up of both social care qualified and alternatively qualified staff. We are co‑located with Health, Police, Adult Social Care, Early Help and Education colleagues, as well as a number of virtual partners. The Multi‑Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH) is based at the Police Headquarters, Hinchingbrooke, Huntingdon.

We pride ourselves on providing all workers in the MASH with a friendly, safe, and supportive environment to work in. This is a hybrid post with required days in the office and other days working from home.

Call Nathalie on 01223 475920 or email [e-mail].

This is a rolling campaign and we check applications daily, don't wait to apply!

Appointment to this post will be subject to the outcome of an Enhanced Disclosure obtained through the Disclosure and Barring Service. The Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

This role will be required to work from a police building and therefore this post will be subject to the outcome of a Police vetting check.

Our benefits

• A comprehensive wellbeing package to cover all aspects of wellbeing, both in and out of work, which can also be accessed by your family
• 6 days of protected time each year to support in maintaining your Continuous Professional Development
• A relocation package of up to £8,000 (eligibility applies)
• A pay progression scheme to enable you to accelerate through the pay grade as you gain experience and skills
• A Refer a Friend Scheme where if you refer another Social Worker to us who is subsequently employed by us as a result of that introduction, we'll pay you an introduction fee of £350
• Access to our Cambridgeshire Academy for Reaching Excellence (CARE) who will support your development, enabling you to become the best practitioner you can be

For more information and to see our other benefits, take a look at the benefits brochure attached to this advert.

What will you be doing?

A MASH Social Worker must have exceptional verbal and written communication skills to connect with families, partner agencies and internal colleagues. You will be able to identify levels of risk and need against the threshold document to determine right services at the right time. You will analyse risk levels daily, ensuring swift and effective safeguarding measures are put in place for children and young people, in line with child protection policies and procedures, swiftly escalating concerns to management when necessary. Your assessments will identify and respond to needs, building on family strengths and leading to clear outcomes through SMART planning. You'll forge empowering relationships with age‑appropriate young people, their families and professionals linked with them to facilitate change and improved outcomes for children and young people.

About you

You will demonstrate your expertise in all aspects of safeguarding children in accordance with statutory legislation, with a solid understanding of threshold application. Your experience will include completing child and family assessments, S47 investigations, ICPC reports, court reports, and conducting joint safeguarding work with police and other professionals. You will have been involved in Child Protection planning, Child in Need plans, and childcare plans.

Additionally, you will possess a thorough knowledge of the impact of adverse childhood experiences, domestic abuse, exploitation, missing children, homelessness, neglect, and all forms of harm.

Requirements:

• Be a qualified Social Worker with a Social Work England registration
• Have the ability to work from a variety of locations and travel countywide independently

Please note we are not accepting applications from candidates living overseas who require sponsorship to move to the UK.

About us

Cambridgeshire is a great place to work and live with a diverse population, an urban centre in Cambridge, historic Isle of Ely, Huntingdon and St Ives as well as more rural landscapes.

Our four values are central to our culture, driving everything we do.

We are proud to serve the diverse communities of Cambridgeshire and want our workforce to be reflective of this diversity, which we firmly believe benefits our colleagues, the organisation and our communities. If you don't meet every single requirement in the job role but think this could be you, please don't be put off. We are committed to building a workplace that is compassionate and inclusive as well as diverse, so if you think you could be a good candidate for this role please consider applying and speak to the recruiting manager if you have any questions.

Our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy, along with our employee network 'IDEAL' and self‑organised peer support groups, help us to foster an inclusive, supportive and safe working environment where people feel valued, respected, and empowered. We collect relevant diversity data for monitoring as part of the recruitment process to understand the diversity of our applicants and monitor any trends throughout the recruitment processes so that we can take meaningful action.

We are proud to be a Disability Confident Leader. We fully support providing reasonable adjustments throughout our recruitment process, as well as when you join us, and we encourage candidates to contact the Hiring Manager to discuss any adjustment needs. Through a Guaranteed Interview Scheme, we will offer an interview to all applicants who disclose a disability and meet the essential criteria for a job vacancy. On your application form you can indicate you are disabled. Some examples of reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process could include additional time to complete an assessment or printing a document on pastel coloured paper with larger font size and line spacing. We would value talking about what might be possible to enable you to join us and thrive, so if there is something that would help you to do your best during your journey with us, please get in touch.

Visit our jobs and careers section to find out more about our wide range of learning and development opportunities; apprenticeships; our wellbeing package; staff benefits; our commitment to equality, diversity and Inclusion.

http://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/council/jobs-and-careers