Care Officer ICAST

This is a Full Time Permanent Position averaging 148 hours per month and will include long shifts and sleep in shifts. Hours will exceed 20 hours per week due to the rota.

The immediate care team within Hull City Council is pivotal in ensuring operational excellence, child-centred care, and collaborative practice across multiple homes. This position involves providing immediate and urgent placement setups and mobilising temporary environments for children who need it, while maintaining safe and nurturing spaces that meet their emotional and developmental needs.

The Care Officer role within the Immediate Care Team will be working with a collective bespoke team that is designed to set up homes in a timely manner whilst working closely with other homes and responding to children’s needs to keep them safe whilst working with a range of other professionals to consider their potential transitions and next steps to independence.

You will be expected to work closely with social workers, educators, health professionals, and families to support holistic care planning. You will continue to work within Hull City Councils policies, procedures and code of conduct whilst ensuring compliance with Ofsted standards and supporting the development of care plans and safeguarding protocols.

You will work directly under a Deputy Manager who will guide and support you in creating an environment that will meet the needs of each unique child you care for at each temporary environment until this is no longer required and they have transitioned into their next stage of care or support.

The role has a strong emphasis on trauma-informed and therapeutic approaches and should champion the voice of the child in all decisions. You will work within the “all day rota” 7am – sleep – 7am finish and where there is no need for a temporary care provision, you will be expected to work within any of our existing homes throughout the city or even provide respite care during your working hours to children who require this care package.

Further to this should a young person require a circuit breaker and have the need to be out of town, this will also be an expectation of the role to meet the young person’s needs based on their specific plan. Because of this requirement, we must stress the importance of flexibility and the ability to work at various locations throughout the city and your ability to get to each existing, or new location.

Your team will work closely together in a timely manner, potential changes to places of work could happen several times throughout the working hours of your shift if there are no immediate care provisions currently open and you would be working fluidly throughout these hours supporting other homes and children within Hull City Council care.

You will also be expected to work from other locations to formulate plans with your Deputy Manager such as Kenworthy House, Brunswick House, Lowgate etc.

We require all Care Officers to have:

• A level 3 Diploma in Residential Childcare or equivalent, or the ability to complete this within two years of appointment
• Experience working with vulnerable adults or children in a safeguarding or care setting
• A strong motivation to work with Children and Young People and ability to form and maintain appropriate relationships
• An ability to work within relevant framework when assessing situations in order to make decisions and recommendations
• You must be experienced, skilled and confident to lead on all elements of care, and be able to guide and support others.

ROLE AND PURPOSE:

To provide a range of support to children and young people who are unable to live within their own family and require short term or long term residential care. To provide a safe and stimulating environment, ensuring high quality provision and maximising life chances of children looked after. In line with relevant legislation and corporate parenting levels of responsibility.

PRINCIPAL ACCOUNTABILITIES:

1. To promote and safeguard the welfare of children, young people and/or vulnerable adults. Within the context of individual care plans or instructions from the Line Manager to assess the needs of children in need and children looked after in order to provide care which is responsive to their individual needs.
2. Statutory Obligations – As per statutory requirements as specified in the Children’s Homes Regulations and Quality Standards.
3. To use systemic practices to prepare, implement and review effective programmes for individual children and families/carers to ensure that their needs for development and/or independence are met. Work in partnership to assess needs and in consultation with Senior Care Officers, Children’s Home Manager, Social Workers and other Managers, plan appropriate packages of support.
4. Under delegation/supervision assume responsibility for specific issues i.e. for the health and safety of colleagues and children by identifying areas for improvement and responding to deficiencies in the workplace to ensure a safe working environment or for Quality Assurance to enhance the performance and effectiveness of service delivery. With a requirement to have the ability to stay calm when faced with confrontational situations.
5. Acts as a nominated ‘Shift Leader’ as required responding to the need of the service.
6. Provides an efficient and responsive service to children for their admission into and discharge from residential care to ensure their needs are met during these transition periods.
7. Assist children with a range of tasks including primary care and, where necessary, carries out tasks on their behalf whilst at the same time promoting independence within individual’s capabilities.
8. Acts as a designated worker in respect of individual children, including attending meetings/case conferences and dispensing medication as required, to ensure their safety, well being and quality of life.
9. Contributes to an efficient administrative system by preparing information for the Children’s Home Manager and quality assurance systems to ensure effective communication. Provides accurate reports and where appropriate, assessments to inform packages of support and care with special consideration to the transition period of admission and discharge.
10. Participates in budgetary tasks i.e. pocket money, purchasing of groceries, clothing, stationery etc, to ensure value for money within budget provisions.
11. Assist children to deal with complex needs or particular vulnerabilities to ensure their physical and emotional well being which will include implementing Therapeutic Crisis Intervention techniques.
12. To work and liaise with voluntary services, statutory organisations and colleagues within other parts of the Local Authority with the focus of providing up to date knowledge and working practices for intervention and service delivery to children in need and their families.
13. Works flexibly to meet the assessed needs of children and their families, by offering support to families and carers, sometimes in their own homes. Assist in providing day care and outreach as required, and work in partnership with schools and alternative educational provision to support and maintain an educational placement.
14. Refers to Line Management upon any concerns, suspicion, evidence or allegation in relation to child protection in accordance with the Safeguarding Board guidelines to ensure the safety and welfare of the children.
15. To be aware of and participate in own personal development by attending and contributing to supervision sessions, training courses and other departmental forums. To keep abreast of development with the profession.
16. In the absence of a Senior Care Officer, makes decisions relating to the safeguarding and care of children as well as responding to the needs of families and staff on duty.
17. Under supervision uses professional judgement to determine the needs of children balanced against risk to children and staff.
18. Under supervision, makes day to day decisions around the implementation of policy and procedures of the Department.
19. The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and associated legislation places responsibilities for health and safety on Hull City Council, as your employer and you as an employee of the council. In addition to the Councils overall duties, the post holder has personal responsibility for their own health & safety and that of other employees; additional and more specific responsibilities are identified in the Council’s Corporate H&S policy.

GENERAL:

The above principal accountabilities are not exhaustive and may vary without changing the character of the job or level of responsibility. The postholder must be flexible to ensure the operational needs of the Council are met. This includes the undertaking of duties of a similar nature and responsibility as and when required, throughout the various work places in the Council.

Benefits of Working of Hull City Council:

• A competitive salary
• An excellent pension through the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)
• Initially 23 days annual leave depending on length of service. You will also get eight public holidays per year, and three additional days off, one in May/August and one during the Christmas/New year period
• Career development and learning experiences from a range of training courses and learning methods
• Supportive and forward-thinking culture
• Great career development opportunities

Please ensure that you complete and submit your application by midnight prior to the closing date. We are committed to increasing the diversity, equality, and inclusion within our workforce to represent the people we serve and build an environment in which everyone can feel like they belong. We encourage people from all backgrounds to apply.

The Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults and expects all employees and volunteers to share this commitment.