the person as well as others until the issue is resolved. Perhaps this is why some mental health
service users placed a particular value on the old approved social worker (ASW), who might be part of a process of restricting their rights, but would desist from intervening medically to impose ‘treatment’ on them. Service users do not think in terms
They know from their own
experience that social workers can be most helpful when they know you and have formed a relationship
of ‘the reserved tasks’ of social work, as some policymakers and professionals have. They do not have a notion that there are some things that only social workers can do. Nor do they generally think that social workers should only be doing highly specialised things. They know from their own
Problem solving: working out solutions
with them or, when that is diffi cult, ways to cope. This could encompass housing issues, money diffi culties and debt repayment, applying for benefi ts, problems with family relationships, helping them with their children, or planning ahead; Safeguarding: social workers sometimes
need to confront diffi cult issues and situations of risk. Service users know this as well as anyone and will often welcome a professional who recognises when things are going wrong and reacts in an honest and sensitive way and will intervene to protect
experience that social workers can be most helpful when they know you and have formed a relationship – and the route to this is often through ordinary practical tasks that can form the basis for trust-building that can then lead to the sharing of confi dences and a more intimate understanding. Perhaps what service users most value about good social work is its inherently social approach. The whole point of social work is to understand the service user in their broader context and not in isolation, apportioning blame or ‘pathology’ accordingly. Mike Oliver, the disability activist and academic, is right to say that social work has still not adequately taken on the social model of disability. There is more to do, but at the heart of good practice still lies the social orientation that service users especially value and which brings something special to social work roles and tasks. SWM