Guidance published for registration for providers of social work services

From Wednesday 13 November 2013, local authorities may enter into contracts to delegate certain statutory functions to private and voluntary social work providers (SWPs). This is under Part 1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 2008, which the Department for Education is commencing from 13 November.

These SWPs must be registered as agencies with Ofsted – they are required to apply to register under the Care Standards Act 2000.

Ofsted will not inspect or report on SWPs. Our inspections of local authorities will include any functions they may have delegated to an SWP.

During October we consulted on how we will regulate SWPs and managers of SWPs, as well as how we intend to manage the relationship between their registration and the inspection of the functions they have delegated to them by local authorities.

We have now published:

• the details of our arrangements for the regulation of SWPs and the inspection of the statutory functions delegated to them by local authorities
• the outcomes of our October consultation on the regulation of SWPs.

The Department for Education has written to those local authorities who are currently delegating these functions as part of a pilot. Any local authority who will continue to delegate these functions from 13 November must confirm this to Ofsted by emailing socialcare@ofsted.gov.uk.