About us

Camden is listening to everyone, including you. We’re giving a platform to people inside and outside our community. Because, we’re not just home to the UK’s fast-growing economy. We’re home to the most important conversations happening today. And we’re making radical social change a reality, so that nobody gets left behind. As a Permanence Social Worker, you’ll help provide permanent stable families for children who are not able to remain within the care of their family, and help create a happy future for the borough’s most vulnerable children.

The role

As a Permanence Social Worker, you’ll have the opportunity to work with professionals of every discipline. With a remit spanning the assessment and support (including training) of family and friends carers, special guardians and long term foster carers, you’re guaranteed different challenges every day. The role demands close collaboration and good working relationships across the integrated service and LAC team, CIN teams and 16+ service to deliver an integrated approach to child care planning. It will also involve working/liaising with colleagues within the North London Fostering and Permanence Consortium to ensure that we are providing a good level of support to Special Guardians across the Consortium. 

You will share and exercise the organisational practice ethos which places systemic practice at the heart of working with families. As a Permanence social worker you will assess, supervise and support carers to help them ensure the best quality care for children, working with the network to promote permanence and stability. You will use individual work, group work and deliver training to facilitate the development of carers ability to offer attuned care.

This post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act and will require an Enhanced DBS. About you

It is essential to the role that you hold a Diploma in social work, or equivalent qualification with a minimum of two years post-qualification experience as a social worker and you must be Social Work England registered.

You must have proven experience of undertaking assessments of individual needs and/or risk; of designing and implementing care/protection/SGO support plans; of monitoring and reviewing such plans over a period of time; preparing for and giving evidence in care proceedings. As well as experience of working with connected persons, special guardians and foster carers.

You will have the ability to investigate family circumstances and make assessments of a child or carer’s needs and risks to their wellbeing, as well as build and maintain effective working relationships at all levels internally and externally in order to influence and get things done. You will take responsibility for own work consistently achieving and delivering to time, and quality despite tight timescales and conflicting priorities. You will also have experience of developing and facilitating training to carers to support them to meet children’s needs appropriately.

To be successful in this role you will need great negotiation and influencing skills and ability to deal with conflict, hostility and vulnerability. Be an excellent communicator and be able to establish positive and effective working relationships with children, young people and families to ascertain their wishes and engage them in decision making processes.

Working for Camden

We’re ready to welcome your ideas, your views, and your rebellious spirit. Help us redefine how we’re supporting people, and we’ll redefine what a career can be. If that sounds good to you, we’d love to talk.

At Camden, you’ll receive a host of benefits as well as joining a flexible working employer. Click HERE to see full details of our benefits.

Additional information

To view the Job Profile, please click HERE

To apply for this job please follow the "Apply" link. In the ‘Why you?’ section of the application you will be required to demonstrate how you meet the essential criteria listed in the Job Profile.

To discover more about Camden and our commitment towards diversity, equality and safeguarding, please visit our recruitment website

Asking for Adjustments

Camden is committed to making our recruitment practices barrier-free and as accessible as possible for everyone. This includes making adjustments or changes for disabled people, neurodiverse people or people with long-term health conditions. If you would like us to do anything differently during the application, interview or assessment process, including providing information in an alternative format, please contact us on 020 7974 6655, at resourcing@camden.gov.uk or post to 5 Pancras Square, London, N1C 4AG,