SNATCHING DEFEAT FROM THE JAWS OF VICTORY

By Mickey Skidmore, AMHSW, ACSW, FAASW

When I completed my MSW in 1986, certification, licensure or registration for the Social Work profession had not yet been realised in the United States. I began my professional practice by engaging in grass roots community organisation to promote this. Eventually, state by state this was accomplished and all of North America came to recognise the value of licensure for Social Workers. (I could tell many more anecdotes about this — perhaps in the future; however, I want the focus of this editorial to highlight the Australian context).

Australia stubbornly remains one of the few countries that have yet to legally register Social Workers. I believe as a direct result of my previous experience in this regard, I was appointed to the National Registration Task Force in early 2014 to support the AASW registration campaign effort. 

While I had shared the process of how this was successfully accomplished in North Carolina; the initial goals of the AASW Task Force at the time was to push for Social Work inclusion in APRHA. The first attempt failed miserably. Based on feedback and learning from the first attempt, some inroads were made during the second attempt, but the outcome was unsuccessful yet again. A theme emerged from this effort justifying the decision to not include Social Workers in APRHA — the evidence was lacking that Social Workers were contributing harm to the community. What I took away from this experience was that there was clearly no political appetite to legal recognise the Social Work profession in Australia. This is perhaps is further complicated by the lack of agreement on this issue within AASW’s own membership.

As the Task Force was lamenting yet another defeat, it was clear that an alternate strategy was called for. I circled back to my experience, suggesting again the way to work around the APRHA approach was for such an effort to be codified into law. I noted that by doing so the profession is legally defined; the scope of practice, methods, and many practice related concepts (aligned with both the code of conduct and the code of ethics) were spelled out in the law. In so doing, NGO’s, hospitals, mental health clinics and other organisations could no longer advance there own terminology, definitions or version of what they thought Social Work was. As I explained this to the Task Force members, the secretary/note taker confirmed that she was able to to pull up the North Carolina certification law online (from the internet) — outlining precisely what I had suggested.

Although there was never a formal decree bringing closure to the Task Force, it fizzled out following these events with activity declining to effective non-existence. At AASW’s National Conference in Adelaide (2019) I caught wind from some of the past members that a plan was developing for such an effort to pass legislation in SA, triggered politically by a child protection related  fatality. In order for this to be realised the first challenge was establishing a separate and independent registration board or authority (as the courts deemed it a conflict of interest for AASW to serve in both capacities). After several years of effort, the stars finally aligned and SA was the first state in Australia to pass legislation for the registration of Social Workers. The thought process around this was that if one state passed legislation, eventually, other states would follow suit.

Despite passing several years ago, efforts to implement this legislation have stalled however. While some speculation regarding this is suggestive that the additional fee structure has not been well thought through; larger speculation has centred around AASW asserting itself into the process advocating for a national registration thereby interfering with the implementation of this law moving forward. 

While I agree with some of the advantages of a national plan (transportability of registration for Social Workers who wish to relocate) along with universal and consistent recognition; it ignores the reality that there is still little to no political appetite for this to happen on a national scale. Disregarding the success of this strategy and attempting to revisit a strategy that has been unsuccessful many times seems to parallel the definition of insanity (doing the same thing over and over — yet expecting different results).

Given the recent internal discord and upheaval of the AASW (resulting in the longstanding CEO resignation) it is unclear what the real motivations for this turn around may be. One wonders if this is a manoeuvre for the AASW to assert and maintain power and control of the process? 

Regardless of AASW’s position on this, its leadership seems to be misaligned with its constituents. As the largest non-registered professional organisation in Australia the fee structure is already considerably more costly than APHRA professions. Moreover, the primary tangible benefit from membership is indemnity (malpractice) insurance (which is ironic given that we are not registered, and lacking evidence of harming the community). The pursuit of the AMHSW credential enables practitioners to access and participate in the Medicare scheme.  Beyond this, the benefits for many are rather limited. Furthermore, especially since the COVID pandemic, AASW seems to have shifted towards being largely an online or digital enterprise.

Having devoted more than 40 years to the Social Work profession, I find it rather puzzling that the  protection of the “Social Work” title and the related frameworks and application of our work is not overseen legislatively. It is also unclear why AASW would seemingly undermine the only successful incremental advancement towards this effort in decades. Considering how long previous, unsuccessful efforts have taken thus far, suggesting “it will take too long” for each state to get on board and follow suit seems to be a rather shallow argument. In fact, there is no evidence of success of the AASW’s national position in decades and decades. Doing the same thing over and over will not increase the likelihood of the desired outcome. Rather it suggests a disconnect, where the AASW seems blind to reality that there is little political capital or desire for the realisation of their plan.