Maharey Steve: Social Workers Registration Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Maharey Steve: Social Workers Registration Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:607;Page:4850] 
Hon STEVE MAHAREY (Minister of Social Services and Employment) 
: 
 I move  
That the Social Workers Registration Bill be now read a second time 
. This bill provides a framework for the registration of social workers in New Zealand. It puts in place a number of measures designed to protect the safety and well-being of all New Zealanders who receive the services of a registered social worker. The regulation of social workers has been the subject of debate over a number of years. There has been concern about the lack of credibility of social work as a profession. There has also been a growing expectation from New Zealanders particularly those who use the social services that social workers should be more accountable for their work and that their work should be more transparent. In its 1999 manifesto the Labour Party pledged to establish a system of professional registration for social workers. This bill delivers on that commitment. 
The nature of social work requires social workers to assist individuals families and communities who have to cope with stressful life events and difficult circumstances. Because those circumstances often make people vulnerable New Zealanders need to be sure that they are protected from poor social work practice and the harm it can inflict. The proposed legislation addresses that need. The aims of the bill are firstly to protect the public by providing mechanisms to ensure that social workers are competent to practice and accountable for the way in which they practice secondly to create a framework for the registration of social workers thirdly to provide for a board to promote the benefits of registration and to administer the registration system and finally to enhance the professionalism of social workers. 
The bill stipulates that registration will be based on a person’s competence and fitness to practice social work. The entry criteria for registration will require an educational qualification and practice experience followed by an assessment of competence. The person must also be judged competent to practice social work with Maori and different ethnic and cultural groups in New Zealand. The bill proposes that only those people who have been through a competency process will have the right to use the title “registered social worker.” While other people will not be stopped from practising social work uncertified practitioners will not be able to give themselves that title. The bill also requires that registered social workers renew their registration after 5 years including the undertaking of a further assessment of their competence. Registered social workers will be made accountable for their practice through the establishment of a complaints and disciplinary process. 
The Social Services Committee received 37 submissions on the bill. The majority of those submissions—30 out of 37—supported the intent of the bill which is to provide public protection to improve the quality of social work services to scrutinise the fitness and competence of social workers and to ensure they are accountable for what they do. Those submitters saw that the bill would benefit the people who use social work services. A smaller number of submissions expressed reservations about the bill. In particular they questioned whether the bill would be able to achieve its purpose and offer enough protection to the public if registration was not mandatory. I know at least one speaker will raise that issue here in this debate. I would like therefore to address the issue of it being voluntary to become a registered social worker. 
As the select committee quite rightly noted it is not viable to introduce mandatory registration immediately. Although the specific criteria for registration have yet to be defined because that is a job of the Social Workers Registration Board it is likely that a significant proportion of the social workers who are currently practising would not immediately meet the criteria for registration. It would also be unrealistic to expect that employers and individual social workers would have the time and the money needed to gain registration immediately. Mandatory registration is not consistent with other forms of occupational regulation. Voluntary regulation regimes are the most common form of regulating other professions. For example they are used for accountants. As a result of considering that issue the select committee has recommended that as part of its regular review of the legislation the Social Workers Registration Board should specifically consider the extent to which the system of voluntary registration is achieving the purposes of the legislation. I of course support that. 
As a result of the submissions received on and of its own consideration of the bill the Social Services Committee has recommended a number of other changes which I support. I will just skip through them. Members of the committee were concerned to ensure that the registration framework is established as soon as possible after the bill is passed. To assist that they have recommended that the commencement clause of the bill be amended to require that the members of the Social Workers Registration Board must be appointed within 12 months of the bill receiving the royal assent. That is what we will do. The remaining provisions of the bill will come into effect by Order in Council and different dates may be appointed for different provisions. Those amendments enable the Social Workers Registration Board to be established as soon as possible but no later than 12 months after the enactment of the legislation. I of course support that change. 
The select committee saw merit in one submission that suggested that if a similar complaint against a registered social worker had previously been made and investigated then that information should be taken into account before a complaints assessment committee makes its assessment of the complaint it has received. The select committee has recommended amending the bill to allow that when assessing a complaint about a registered social worker a complaints assessment committee may have regard to any previous investigation or considerations and the consequences if any of those investigations. 
Another change that the select committee recommended which I fully support relates to the complaints procedures that are maintained by the employers of social workers. The Commissioner for Children suggested that the complaints and disciplinary tribunal should have a role in ensuring and promoting the establishment of complaints mechanisms within the agencies that employ social workers. Such mechanisms would assist the tribunal to better manage complaints that are likely to be referred to it. The committee agreed with that suggestion. The bill has been amended to include a new function for the Social Workers Registration Board which is to promote that process of complaining. I agree with that. It will certainly help with the policing of unprofessional activities by social workers in their employment. 
Finally the select committee recommended that a new penalty be included in the bill. The penalty would be against a person who holds an employee or a professional associate out as a registered social worker knowing that the employee or social worker is not registered or that his or her registration has been suspended. Again that amendment addresses submissions that expressed concern that the bill could take responsibility away from the employers of social workers. 
I would like to thank those organisations and members of the public who made submissions on this bill. In particular I would like to acknowledge the contribution of the Aotearoa New Zealand Association of Social Workers and what it has done in bringing this bill to fruition. That association is committed to professionalism—it has been for a long time—and it welcomes this bill. I would of course also like to thank the select committee for its work and for the changes that it has suggested and that we have made to the bill. 
I have circulated Supplementary Order Paper 73 which largely makes technical improvements that give more clarify to certain provisions within the bill. The most significant amendment made in that Supplementary Order Paper is to extend the time limit for provisional registration from 6 to 8 years. That will allow social workers who have been granted provisional registration within 3 months of the bill being passed more time to gain their qualifications. I suspect that qualification for registration will take up to 5 years to get because of the academic and professional components that will be required. Therefore that increased time is useful. 
The measures in this bill provide a process for the registration of all social workers in New Zealand. New Zealanders are entitled to know that social workers are competent and practice safely that poor social work will not be tolerated and that people will be held accountable in this profession. As I want to reflect in my third reading speech this is a profession that I have had a very close association with over a very long period of time. This bill has a 20 to 25-year history before it has come before Parliament today. I therefore thank all those who have worked hard on getting it this far and I look forward to its further progress.