Wishing all our members, friends and allies a happy festive season and New Year

As we come to the end of 2022, we want to start by wishing you a happy and peaceful festive period, and thanking every member and everyone who has contributed to the work and sustainability of BASW over the last year for your extraordinary support.

BASW exists to support you individually and collectively as a body of social workers so members can make a difference to practice, to society and to knowledge. We do this together, as a community of social workers – and this year, that community feels stronger and more important than ever.

Our community keeps us – and we hope you too – optimistic in the face of the unprecedented professional and social challenges of the last few years. Social workers’ values, commitment to fellow human beings and to making the world a better place are an energy and a power that no multinational company can exploit.

A year ago, we still faced a lot of uncertainty about Covid – whether there would be another big wave, whether we could return to being together in real life, whether the economy would recover quickly.

Since that time, we have seen inflation soar and real incomes fall – along with two UK prime ministers and countless Westminster politicians. There is a massive war in Europe and many other conflicts around the world are causing untold pain and hardships. We now face different political, social and economic uncertainties and challenges while Covid remains a lurking and very real risk.

Social workers make a difference to these challenges at micro and macro levels every single day – and we must hold on to this even in tough times. Every day this year, we have heard about tenacious social workers stepping up and responding to difficulties and finding solutions.

Here are just a few great examples from across the UK:

Social workers using the legal system to help people caught in the increasingly hostile UK immigration system;
Social workers speaking out for a clearer and better role for social work in the huge reform of care services underway in Scotland;
Social workers winning the fight for better social work student bursaries in Wales/Cymru;
Social workers developing and powerfully promoting the role of social workers and the need for better legislation to protect victims in the wake of disasters and emergencies in England;
Social workers standing up and speaking out for reform and a stronger social work identity in the review of children’s social work in Northern Ireland.

Cost of living strains and poverty have come closer to home for many of us this year, increasingly impacting social workers and social care colleagues. Across the UK, BASW and our partners are focusing our campaign energy in 2023 on the utter unacceptability of more than a decade of rising poverty

In these tough times, we need each other more than ever and BASW will be here for you every step of the way in 2023.

Best wishes and take care.

You might also be interested in: BASW recently launched an anti-poverty campaign- Social Work Stands Against Poverty- calling out the unacceptability of rising poverty in the UK. This will be a UK-wide campaign focus going into 2023.