Help us shape future plans by telling us what matters to you.
We’re updating our Social work workforce plan, creating a new Children’s residential care workforce development plan, and gathering insights from Practice Educators.
By working together we can shape clear, practical actions that support the future of the social care workforce in Wales.
People working in social care play a vital role in supporting individuals, families, and communities across Wales.
To make sure the workforce feels supported now and in the future, we’re updating our plans to support the national Health and Social Care Workforce Strategy. This strategy sets out what’s needed to help the social care workforce feel valued, well trained, and able to do their best work.
As part of this, we’re updating our Social work workforce plan and creating a new Children’s residential care workforce plan. These plans will help turn the long-term goals of the strategy into clear actions that reflect what’s happening in the sector today.
We’re also gathering insight from Practice Educators to understand how student social workers are supported in their placements. This helps build a fuller picture of the workforce and makes sure that the final plans recognise everyone involved in developing future professionals.
By listening to people across the sector our plans will be grounded in real workforce needs to help shape a stronger, more supported social care workforce for the future.
If you would like to help shape this work, please take part in our short questionnaire.
It should take no longer than 15 minutes per workstream, and your views will help us build a clear picture of what matters to people working in social care.
We’ll be working with the Institute of Public Care (IPC) on this work. Their role is to help make sure we hear from a wide range of voices.
IPC will be leading the engagement activities and speaking with people across the sector to gather your views and experiences.
This is to make sure that our final workforce plans genuinely reflect what matters to you - the people who know the work best.
Stage 1: Workforce development and Practice Educator forms (early 2026)
We’ll start by asking people working in social care to share their views through a series of short forms. This helps us build an early picture of what’s working well and where things could be improved.
Stage 2: Workshops and engagement (mid-2026)
Next, IPC will run workshops and speak with people across the sector to explore the key themes in more depth. These conversations will help shape the actions in both workforce plans and give us a clearer understanding of the Practice Educator landscape.
Stage 3 – Draft reports (Summer 2026)
We’ll then bring everything together into draft workforce plans and a summary of the Practice Educator findings. These drafts will be reviewed and refined before the final versions are published in June 2026.
If you have any questions or would like to find out more, you can contact us by e-mailing workforcedevelopmentproject@socialcare.wales.
