WHATS THE GAME PLAN?...CHILD AND YOUTH CARE IN SOUTH AFRICA

Time has come for this to be said straight out...alluding to it, suggesting it, implying it... no longer. There is strong evidence. Child and youth care is under threat. Pointers are that we may possibly be part of a strategy, a plan to reduce us. I don't want to say remove us, but we who remain to be an extension of the arm of other social service professionals. A lesser social service practice or to be replaced.

Let me set out the pattern experienced over time in our journey along in a time-line.which suggests a series of underlying strategies. 

The first professional Board for Child and Youth Care (PBCYCW} in 2005 set it's goal at having Ministerially approved gazetted regulations for the registration of child and youth care workers as professionals. The regulations require that the scope of practice of the professional at each level be very clearly articulated and set out. Every set of draft regulations got no further than the then Council. They were sent back time after time for review and redrafting. The main argument, lead by the then Minister's representative on Council , was that the scope of practice of child and youth care work and social worker overlapped with insufficient differences to allow for the registration of separate professions. I can't say exactly how many scope of practice workshops we attended. It was extensive. And so was the delay.

At the same time the then Minister of Social Development was under pressure to resolve what was called "the social work crisis"- a very real shortage of social workers. The issue was salaries. He had some ideas to resolve this. One of these was to have a generic worker. I can't remember the title given to it. It was then called "The Cuban Model". The Professional Board for Child and Youth Care Work rejected it.

Then came bursaries Social Work. Nothing for Child and Youth Care.

There followed a term when no election was organised/held for a Professional Board of Child and Youth Care Work. How and why that could happen can only be assumed. The South Africa Council for Social Service Professions requires it statutorily. On paper statutorily there was Board, but it was said that without warm bodies, the PBCYCW did not exist...non extant. 

The National Department of Social Development came to a form of rescue. It funded the idea of an interim Child and Youth Care Committee to continue the work of the Board unconnected fro Council. Everything needed to register child and youth care workers as professionals at two levels was completed at the time. Uninterrupted  we did our best work. It was at one of those meetings that a tame National Department lawyer said that we had been trapped because the Minister had been saying "No" to child and youth care workers, then "Yes" "You were on, then you were off. He frequently changed his mind". ......the story was out. We were played in a bigger game.

The 2011 term of office elections for a PBCYCW were duly organised and held. A Board was elected. But, the minutes and so the work of the interim Committee were not accepted as it was a disconnected, independent body.  Back to the new Board to have approved .... this time with a headstart. Amongst ourselves we had agreement on what the critical requirements for registration, scope of practice and code of ethics should be, but the backwards and forwards pattern continued. In all this time child and youth care workers were unregistered, unrecognised as professionals.

 At one time the thrust was that child and youth care workers should be registered at the Auxiliary level only. Professional level, it was said should wait an undisclosed period of time in years. This was the historic 16th draft of the regulations. The then Council sent this set of regulations to the Minister for signature unapproved by the Board.  The PBCYCW then demanded an interview with the then Minister.. It was suspended for a year. We met in private board rooms at our own cost,, kept minutes and forwarded them to the then Council. Again unaccepted as discussion or decision as in any way official. Connections of connections were used to halt the 16th draft. A meeting with the Minister was arranged, the 16th draft halted and the suspension lifted.

A bigger game plan over this period was obvious, but held by whom? Academics? or whom?

Now came what looks like a reprieve if seen outside a possible bigger National political plan. But I'll come to that.

The then Minister of Social Development made it very clear that she wanted child and youth care workers to be registered as professionals and that the delays were unacceptable.The 18th set of approved regulations were submitted for Ministerial approval. Done and dusted? Oh no they sat in the National Department without the minister's signature for 14 months. The story we got was....."awaiting the Minister". She later apologised and said directly to us that such a delay was unacceptable. In October of 2014 they were signed and gazetted. At the same time she undertook to train 10,000 child and youth care workers for and in the community based child and youth care setting of the Isibindi project in the more rural, outlying areas. This was rolled out...it happened. The National  Department then adopted the Isibindi project by agreeing inter alia to fund it Nationally and to pay the National Association of Child and Youth Care Workers, who had designed and developed the model, to undertake that training for a period of five years. It was a good growth period for child and youth care in South Africa.There were complaints however that the Department of Social Development were appointing auxiliary social workers in the positions of supervisors and project managers. The reason I heard directly in one Province was "We payed to train them. We must employ them". 

The contract  with the NACCW came to an end in March 2017. The State now owned the model, claimed it as a National model and went to tender for the training.

This was when the cracks started to show. I'll list them           (again)  But first, when the ground opened up and swallowed child and youth care workers many child and youth care workers took a look in the rear-view mirror. They say they saw then a bigger picture. The term of office of that Minister had ended. The glance backward raised concerns that the Isibindi adoption was initiated to meet a bigger National agenda. They feared they had been used again as little pieces (pawns) in a bigger board game. In the same way as the earlier social work crisis put child and youth care in the game, so did the 10,000 story. The speculation was/is that every Ministerial Department was under pressure to meet a job creation target because of the high rate of unemployment country wide.  The Isibindi 10,000 child and youth care workers on learners stipends seemingly did this for the Department of Social Development. There is a new Minister. In fact there have been two since.

This now is the now

There were delays in continuing training. They were told and experience the non availability of funds in what are called "dry seasons". Some have not been paid for 6 months or more. A move was made to get a National data base of unemployed social workers - there are unemployed child and youth care workers.National strategic plans were developed to advance the social work field. There is yet no such plan for child and youth care work. Community development work is being prioritised for professionalisation and funded... no prioritasation of child and youth care work. There are still no child and youth care workers in high level decision making positions at national level. Posts for child and youth care workers have been advertised and then frozen. Child and youth care workers are being paid learner stipends even if qualified. There are behaviour management problems in schools. The main drive is in most provinces to get social workers into schools. Quite right and good, but child and youth care workers are also need in schools right now. - no such impetus... no  political push. Government, even the President mentions Isibindi in high level speeches but do not in any way recognise the role of child and youth care workers in the model. The Deputy Minister angered child and youth care workers in July at the NACCW International Child  and Youth Care Work Conference by referring to them as support workers who should not complain of salaries or no pay.

It's like this. Child and youth care workers in South Africa are reading between the lines... and so, I must say, am I.  It's like this? If we have been played so often because of behind the scenes political agendas, considering the present signs .. is this happening again and what is  the agenda? The suspicion is that a new agenda underlies the current child and youth care situation. This time the excess bursary trained social workers are unemployed. Child and youth care workers in the field suspect that they are again being played to meet two prioritised objectives. One  -to employ social workers . Two - to again absorb ( subsume) them into the fold of a single social work profession. 

They are asking  "Are we again being used as small players in a bigger game? 

What's the game plan?