Senior Social Worker

Brighton & Hove City Council; Brighton; On-site; GBP 46,000 - 49,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Wellbeing benefits

Job summary

Brighton & Hove City Council is seeking an experienced Senior Social Worker to join our Family Help Pods as part of the Family First transformation. You will hold a complex caseload, undertake assessments, deliver targeted interventions and provide support across Child in Need, Child Protection, court proceedings and Looked After Children, while mentoring colleagues and contributing to service development.

This permanent, full-time role offers a salary of £45,529 to £48,738 plus a 12.5% market

Qualifications

• Qualified Social Worker registered with Social Work England.
• Substantial post-qualifying experience with children and families.
• Experience across Child in Need, Child Protection, court work and care planning.
• Ability to manage complexity, risk and uncertainty.
• Willingness to mentor students and newly qualified workers.

Responsibilities

• Hold and manage a complex caseload across the Family Help pathway.
• Undertake high-quality assessments and create effective plans with families.
• Deliver interventions that build on family strengths and sustain change.
• Lead on complex child protection, court and care planning work.
• Develop strong relationships with children, families and partner agencies.

Skills

Assessment skills

Intervention skills

Analytical skills

Mentoring colleagues

Relationship-based practice

Education

Registered Social Worker (SW England)

Job description

Senior Social Worker

Tarner Family Hub, Ivory Place, Brighton, BN2 9QE

Job details

• Salary £45,529 - ££48,738 plus 12.5% market supplement
• Contractual hours 37
• Package We are pleased to offer a wide range of benefits to support you and your wellbeing. You can read about them on our Why work for us pages.
• Job category/type Social Work - Children
• Closing Date: 15 November 2026
• Interviews to be held: 19th November 2026

Job description

We are looking for an experienced and committed Senior Social Worker to join one of our new Family Help Pods as part of our Family First transformation programme.

This is an exciting opportunity to be part of a service that is committed to providing the right support at the right time, working alongside families earlier to build on strengths, prevent escalation, and improve outcomes for children and young people.

Contract type: permanent

Closing Date: 15 November 2026

Interviews to be held: 19th November 2026

Please contact Julie Dreher, Head of Service, Family Help & Protection, at email [e-mail]

About the role

As a Senior Social Worker, you will work directly with children, young people and their families, holding case responsibility and providing assessment, intervention and support across the continuum of need, including:

• Targeted Early Help
• Child in Need
• Child Protection
• Public Law Outline and Court Proceedings
• Looked After Children

This unique role offers the opportunity to remain alongside families for longer, reducing the need for multiple transfers between teams and creating the conditions for strong, trusting relationships to develop.

You will manage a varied caseload and lead on more complex and high-risk cases, using professional curiosity, analysis and evidence-informed practice to achieve lasting change for children and families.

As a Senior Social Worker you will:

• Hold and manage a complex caseload across the Family Help pathway.
• Undertake high-quality assessments and create effective plans with families.
• Deliver purposeful interventions that build on family strengths and promote sustainable change.
• Lead on complex child protection, court and care planning work.
• Develop and maintain strong relationships with children, families and partner agencies.
• Support social work students, newly qualified social workers and less experienced colleagues.
• Share expertise, modelling high-quality practice and contributing to a learning culture.
• Deputise for the Pod Manager when required, supporting day-to-day operational oversight and decision making.
• Contribute to service development and the continued implementation of Family First transformation.

About you

We are looking for a skilled and reflective practitioner who:

• Is a qualified Social Worker registered with Social Work England.
• Has substantial post-qualifying experience working with children and families.
• Demonstrates strong assessment, intervention and analytical skills.
• Has experience of working across Child in Need, Child Protection, court work and care planning.
• Is confident managing complexity, risk and uncertainty.
• Can support and mentor colleagues, students and newly qualified social workers.
• Is committed to achieving excellent outcomes for children through relationship-based practice.

Most importantly, we are looking for someone who:

• Works in a trauma-informed way, recognising the impact of adversity and helping families to build resilience.
• Believes in the power of relationships to create positive change.
• Is committed to anti-oppressive, anti-discriminatory and anti-racist practice.
• Shares our ambition to provide support earlier and prevent children and families from requiring more intensive statutory intervention wherever possible.

What we offer

• The opportunity to help shape an innovative Family Help Hub model.
• Strong management support and reflective supervision.
• Opportunities for professional development and career progression.
• A collaborative, supportive and learning-focused culture.
• The chance to make a lasting difference for children, young people and families.

Encouraging a diverse workforce

Our city is known and loved for its diversity. Not only is the mixture of people, culture and skills vital to the economic and social development of the city, it's what makes Brighton & Hove such a great place to live, work and visit. We are committed to developing and retaining a workforce that is representative of the diverse communities we serve so we welcome applications from individuals from all backgrounds. In order to achieve our aims of proportionate representation, we particularly encourage applicants from a BME or White Other background as well as those who identify as disabled, male or trans.

Find out more about our commitment to being a fair and inclusive place to work where everyone can achieve their potential by reading about our fair and inclusive actions, our anti-racism strategy and the work we are doing to encourage a diverse workforce (brighton-hove.gov.uk).

Why work for us?

• be connected
• be confident
• be innovative and creative
• be diverse and inclusive
• be healthy and psychologically safe

We are also aware that your starting salary will be pro rata if the above position is less than 37 hours or term-time only.

We are a workplace that supports flexibility and employee wellbeing in the way we work whilst providing the best service for our customers. Team and service working arrangements are designed to support both employee work life balance and team collaboration. These would be part of your individual working arrangements alongside any personal preference agreed with your manager in advance of joining. Your contractual location will be the designated council office for your team and travel to and from your contractual location would be at your own expense.

Please note that this post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974, and is subject to a Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) Check.