About this role
| Salary £ £47,665 - £53,051 Per annum | Permanent, Full Time, 37 hours per week | Family Safeguarding | Fylde & Wyre
Consultant Social Worker
Family Safeguarding Service
Ready to Take the Next Step in Your Social Work Career?
Are you an experienced social worker looking to progress your career while remaining close to practice with children and families?
Lancashire County Council's Family Safeguarding Service is seeking passionate, ambitious and highly skilled practitioners to join us as Consultant Social Worker. This is an exciting opportunity to combine advanced social work practice with mentoring, professional development and leadership responsibilities within a supportive and innovative service.
As a Consultant Social Worker, you will play a key role in shaping excellent practice, supporting colleagues to develop their skills, and ensuring children and families receive the highest quality interventions and support.
Why Join Lancashire?
At Lancashire County Council, we've developed a progressive Family Safeguarding model that places relationships, collaboration and strengths-based practice at its heart.
You'll benefit from:
- A reduced caseload to allow time for mentoring and practice leadership
- Opportunities to influence and improve social work practice across the service
- Strong management support and professional supervision
- Multi-disciplinary working with specialist adult practitioners
- A culture focused on learning, development and reflective practice
- The opportunity to help shape the future of Family Safeguarding in Lancashire
Working in Family Safeguarding
Our Family Safeguarding teams bring together a range of specialists who work alongside social workers, including:
- Domestic Abuse Practitioners
- Mental Health Practitioners
- Substance Misuse Specialists
- Child and Family Practitioners
Together, we support families through collaborative, evidence-informed interventions designed to create sustainable change and improve outcomes for children.
We use a strengths-based approach underpinned by Motivational Interviewing, empowering families to identify solutions and build resilience.
About the Role
As a Consultant Social Worker, you will:
- Hold a small but complex caseload, approximately 60% of a full caseload
- Co-work and support complex cases requiring advanced professional expertise
- Mentor and support social workers, ASYEs and students
- Lead on developing high-quality assessments and care planning
- Support group supervision and reflective practice activities
- Help embed Motivational Interviewing and Family Safeguarding practice across the team
- Champion learning and continuous professional development
- Chair multi-agency meetings and contribute to service development
- Provide oversight and support to specialist adult workers and Child & Family Practitioners
- Deputise for the Team Manager when required
- Work collaboratively with partners including health, education, police and probation services
This is an ideal opportunity for an experienced practitioner who enjoys developing others whilst continuing to work directly with children and families.
About You
We're looking for qualified social workers who:
- Have at least three years post-qualification experience
- Demonstrate consistently high standards of social work practice
- Have significant experience in child protection, court work and care planning
- Can confidently manage complex and high-risk cases
- Are passionate about mentoring and developing others
- Thrive in multi-disciplinary environments
- Are reflective, innovative and committed to continuous improvement
- Build strong relationships with children, families and partner agencies
What We Offer
We recognise that supporting our workforce is essential to supporting children and families.
Our benefits include:
- 26 days annual leave, rising to 32 days plus bank holidays
- Option to purchase up to 20 additional days leave
- Local Government Pension Scheme
- Employee Assistance Programme
- Salary sacrifice schemes and staff discounts
- A supportive and inclusive working environment
Apply Today
Closing Date: 02 nd November 2026
Interviews: TBC
To apply, please complete the application form and complete the below task in preparation for your interview;
Task:
Please create a direct work tool that can be used with children and young people in relation to sexual abuse within the family. The tool needs to be created, utilising research. You will need to explain how to use it, and how you would support less experienced social workers to use it.
For an informal and confidential discussion about the role, contact:
Meredith Jenkins; Team Manager 01253 897153
The post you are applying for is covered by the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (as amended in 2013) . If successful you will be required to apply to the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) for a 'disclosure'. Further information can be found on the 'Our Recruitment Process' tab.
In return Lancashire County Council offers a range of benefits, which can be found on LCC Vacancies website.
We reserve the right to close down a vacancy early, before the closing date, if we receive sufficient applications.
Local Government Reorganisation
The Government has confirmed that local government across Lancashire will be reorganised, with the current 15 councils being replaced by four new unitary councils covering North, South, East and West Lancashire from April 2028.
If you are successful in your application, you will initially join Lancashire County Council. However, as part of the planned transition, your employment will transfer to one of the new unitary councils from April 2028, subject to the implementation of the reorganisation and relevant employment legislation.
Throughout this period, our focus remains on delivering excellent services to our communities. By joining us now, you'll play an important role in shaping the future of local government and helping to build a strong new organisation that will serve residents for years to come.
Job Description and Person Specification