Family Practitioner (East Staffs & Tamworth)

A rare opportunity has arisen for a Family Practitioner within the Children’s Disability Service. 

Our Children’s Disability teams provide specialist services for children and young people with complex disabilities. You'll based in Burton, Staffordshire, covering East Staffs and Tamworth.

The work of our service is diverse across the breath of social work tasks and functions. This may include some occasional out of hours and weekend working. 

If you are confident and have the skills and experience to work within a busy Social Work team, then this is a fantastic opportunity for you to further your expertise.

Main Responsibilities

You'll assist in facilitating behaviour management work, practical support and undertaking direct work with children and their families and carers whilst underpinning our restorative approach.

You'll be expected to be creative and innovative with the ability to engage and communicate with disabled children and be committed to ensuring the children you support receive the best quality service.

You'll also:

• work collaboratively with social workers to support children in need, children on child protection plans and children in care. 
• develop, facilitate and organise family and professionals’ meetings, events and groups.
• provide transport and support to children and their families to a variety of situations including school, medical appointments, meetings and social activities working under the guidance of the allocated social worker.
• provide intensive support to children and families to enable them to remain together or where appropriate to support reunification of families.
• Work with children and families including contributing to assessments and providing practical support, this may include moving and handling, personal care, assistance with feeding, behaviour management and administration of medication (following training by a qualified professional and within guidance of an agreed care plan and risk assessment)
• be available outside of traditional working patterns including evening and weekends to provide support to children, families and carers when it is needed.

This role is currently subject to a review of weekend working arrangements, including any paid enhancements.

The Ideal Candidate

You will: 

• hold a Minimum standard of NVQ3 in respect of working with children and their families together with previous experience working with children with disabilities
• the ability to engage and communicate with disabled children and their parents/carers
• have the ability to build relationships and deliver interventions to children, families and carers as well as being able to work effectively in conflict situations
• have the ability to use IT systems and to write a good standard of records
• have the commitment and ability demonstrate restorative approaches to working with children and families.

Interview date will be confirmed

For more information about this role, please contact Natasha Davies, Team Manager, on natasha.davies@staffordshire.gov.uk

About Staffordshire County Council

We are no ordinary county council:

Our Values:

The core of who we are as an organisation. Just like we all have personal values that shape our thoughts and behaviour, organisational values drive how we think and act collectively.

Our values were created and shaped by colleague feedback and national best practice and they sit at the heart of People Strategy:

We have a real sense of community spirit that brings our people together. This feeling of belonging means we are all connected to what we do and take pride in the difference we make every day for Staffordshire people. We are ambitious and our sights are set firmly on a better future.

We look forward and race ahead - that goes for your career too. 

Our benefits:

We recognise that it is our employees that are central to everything we do. We aim to create a supportive working environment where employees can achieve their full potential and achieve a healthy work-life balance. 

In addition to your salary, as a member of staff, you will have access to Our rewards and benefits - Careers at Staffordshire

Our recruitment process:

As an Authority we are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people/vulnerable adults and expect all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.

Staffordshire County Council is an equal opportunities organisation and Disability Confident employer. We encourage applications from all background and communities

As part of our commitment as a Disability Confident employer, a Gold Award Armed Forces employer and our commitment to supporting care leavers - we offer a guaranteed interview as long as your application meets the minimum criteria for the post. 

As you’ll know safeguarding and promoting the welfare of our children and young people/vulnerable adults is important to us and that’s why this position is subject to a criminal record check from the Disclosure and Barring Service. If applicable you should disclose details of unspent and unfiltered spent reprimands, formal warnings, cautions and convictions in your application form.