Social worker recruitment is so hard for Stoke-on-Trent City Council that it is now considering looking abroad for staff. The city authority has suffered a number of setbacks in its social care services which it believes have led, in part, to its difficulties in recruiting new staff. A report from the Directorate of Children and Young People's Services to the council's scrutiny and overview commission revealed the extent of the problem. It stated: ‘Stoke-on-Trent has experienced difficulty in recruiting and retaining qualified social workers and team managers for some time. ‘If more staff are not recruited, we risk a child coming to serious harm and the complete failure of the service.' Vacancy rates at the council have dropped following the creation of a recruitment and retention task force and are now running at 11.7% for social workers and 13.3% for team managers. But, despite a number of schemes, including a golden hello of £3,000, the taskforce has now been asked to look at overseas recruitment. Last November, the council was awarded just one star out of three in a government inspection of its adult social care services. Earlier the same month, children's services received the lowest marks possible in a similar government inspection. And now council leaders have been forced to hand over control of the department to a private company from March.
