Chapter 2

Quality Assurance Agency, Social work subject benchmark statement (Quality Assurance Agency) www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/benchmark/statements/socialwork08.asp - a full analysis of the standards to be achieved in social work education.

Code of Ethics of the British Association of Social Workers www.basw.co.uk - a comprehensive analysis of the standards of professional social work practice, including respect for human rights of service users, obligations to society, and issues concerning use of compulsory powers.

Stephen Nathanson, What Lawyers Do - A Problem Solving Approach to Legal Practice (Sweet & Maxwell, 1997) - if you want to look at the world through a lawyer's spectacles, this is readable and informative.

Jonathan Dickens, Risks and Responsibilities - The role of the Local Authority Lawyer in Child Care Cases [2004] CFLQ. This article discusses key sticking points in the relationship betweenlocal authority lawyers and social workers. It suggests awareness of each others multiple andcompeting responsibility will improve inter-professional relationships.

We recommend getting into the habit of looking at - and acquiring - the texts of the major pieces of legislation relevant to your area. All legislation likely to affect social workers is collected together in the looseleaf Encyclopedia of Social Services and Child Care Law (published by Sweet & Maxwell and updated regularly), together with rules, regulations, circulars, and text. We use it a lot and recommend it to you too.

The legal liability of local authorities for negligence

R. Bailey Harris and M. Harris, 'Local Authorities and Child Protection - The Mosaic of Accountability' [2002] CFLQ 117.

This article - although now a few years old - is particularly helpful in unravelling a difficult area of law. For a more up-to-date analysis see the New Law Journal 2007 pp. 1002–3 'Rights versus duty'.

View print version

Oxford University Press, Online Resource Centre, Chapter 2.

Chapter 2