Assessment and improvement of proposal

Assessing the evidence shows there will be direct and indirect impacts on consumers. The direct effect will be organisations/recipients subject to the outputs of the NSWA: new standards, reporting requirements or processes arising from workforce planning, professional learning and trauma responsive training. The potential indirect impacts identified are: creating a demand for professional development services, procurement changes, partnership opportunities, and decisions made by the NSWA influencing how social work services are provided to people who use services. 

While the evidence suggests that establishing the NSWA is likely to have positive impacts, analysis identified several areas where potential harm could occur, particularly during implementation. These include:

• disproportionate impacts on small and micro‑providers, who may face higher resource pressures when adopting new national standards or participating in national training
• risk of confusion for social workers and students if changes to standards or learning pathways are not communicated clearly
• variation in early implementation, which could inadvertently reinforce existing geographical inequalities in service experience

These risks were assessed through engagement feedback, BRIA analysis and evidence from trauma‑responsive training pilots. None were judged likely to create significant or sustained harm if mitigations are implemented. 

Consideration of the evidence has indicated how the NSWA will meet the objectives of the Consumer (Scotland) Act 2020: 

Reduce harm to consumers in Scotland

With its focus on improving the standards of social work services delivered, this should avert and negate any potential harm to consumers. Moreover, ongoing consultation with the social work profession, recipients of trauma training and those with lived experience of social work should ensure issues are addressed. 

Increasing confidence among consumers in Scotland in dealing with businesses that supply goods and services

By raising the standards of the social work profession, consumer confidence in the services delivered should improve. Similarly, the delivery of trauma responsive training by the NSWA is iterative in nature, seeking feedback and making ongoing changes as required.  

Promote sustainable consumption

The NSWA will encourage sharing of resources and platforms where possible to allow for sustainable choices to be made. For example, if holding a training session or engagement event requiring travel, this would ideally be completed in one session rather than multiple ones to save people having to travel multiple times. 

Advance inclusion, fairness, prosperity and other aspects of wellbeing in Scotland

The NSWA will develop and publish an Equalities Strategy documenting considerations for ways to promote inclusivity, fairness and equality. Part of this will involve building upon existing anti-racism work that has been undertaken. The wellbeing of the profession will also be at the forefront of the NSWA’s work. 

Engagement with stakeholders has flagged a number of actions to be taken: 

• ongoing dialogue with business, third sector organisations and other partners to ensure impacts are understood and mitigations put in place to address these
• ensuring compliance and enforcement mechanisms are proportionate and give adequate attention to the needs of small and micro businesses
• supporting understanding and implementation, drafting guidance and ensuring communication is clear
• flexibilities and exemptions can be considered where required, particularly for smaller organisations

Alternatives to the establishment of the NSWA as an executive agency were considered. The long-list included: 

• not establishing the NSWA 
• NDPB or a new Scottish Government directorate 
• merging OCSWA into another NDPB (e.g. the SSSC), a partnership with SWS 
• creating of a private company owned and funded by central and local government 

Criteria and sub-criteria were developed by the OCSWA and SWS and, thereafter, refined and agreed at a workshop with partners. The set of criteria consisted of: 

• professional advice
• power and authority
• influence on the procession
• deliverability
• shared accountability and partnership 

Scoring was undertaken at a workshop with partners, allowing the long list to be cut down to a short list. 

The 3 shortlisted options included: 

• establishment of an executive agency which would be accountable to Scottish Ministers
• creating a non-departmental public body, independent from the Scottish Government
• adopting a business as usual (BAU) approach, meaning current arrangements would remain 

Extensive interrogation of those options occurred, which included engagement with partners including those representing the social work profession, educational partners, third sector representatives and businesses. Alongside COSLA and Social Work Scotland.

MCDA ranking each of the options occurred. The conclusion reached was that the most cost-effective and strategically efficient option, satisfying every criteria element, was to establish the NSWA as an executive agency of the Scottish Government.

Overall, the analysis demonstrates that we have had regard to the impact of this strategic decision on consumers, the desirability of reducing harm, and the need for additional engagement as the policy develops. The NSWA model, alongside the mitigations and improvements identified, is judged to be the option most capable of improving outcomes for consumers while minimising risks.