Through those past nine complaints and the thousands of words and dozens of unanswered questions, I come to what I consider to be the most repugnant practice adopted by the Scottish Social Services Council - its psychological analysis of a worker.
Every single person employed in social services surely must adhere to the principle that you never make value judgements concerning service users. Or worse, you take an off-the-shelf judgement with no understanding of what it even means.
It is astonishing to believe that in 2019 that practice can exist; it is abhorrent to everything that social care stands for. And, perhaps even more importantly, it undermines the vital work being done by support groups regarding mental health.
And if you add in the fact that those psychological assessments are carried out without speaking to, or even meeting, the person being “assessed”, it is surprising SSSC registrants haven’t demanded their immediate end and every pretentious diagnosis redacted from its online archive of decisions.
While we all try to remove the stigma surrounding mental health, our profession permits ‘quacks’ to come forward with damning psychological indictments, presented as fact, then published on the web for the world to see and the media to trawl through and publish with total freedom.
You have no recourse. You have no challenge.You can ask no questions.
When a decision is published, you will, as they say in Scotland, “get your character”. That will not be flagged as subjective but as fact. It has the potential to stay with you for the rest of your life.
It is a disgusting, vile and humiliating practice, and yet we tolerate it. In a non-judgemental profession, we wouldn’t work beside a colleague who judged a service user, be that child, adult or family, never mind one who had never met or spoken to them.
It is a heinous act, yet we permit our governing body to do it to us.
In my case my pursuer was not just expert in all things gynaecological but also, apparently, psychological.
Granting a knowledge of search boxes on websites, one would imagine the SSSC wouldn’t take too long to establish that the most basic form of psychological assessments that began in China in 2000BC involved a process far more sophisticated than what happens at 11 Riverside Drive.
Fast forward 4000 years and see if you can find anyone who would support any formal or informal evaluation of a person’s personality or state of mind without speaking to them or meeting them.
What qualifications does your assessor have? Good luck finding that out. (My FOI request on the qualifications of SSSC investigators was refused under data protection).
In fact, good luck on finding any rationale or clinical authority.
It is all subjective hogwash, and yet every personal insight on every worker is accepted without question by the SSSC chief executive, every SSSC council member, every MSP, every Scottish Minister, every reporter, every editor and, sadly, it seems every SSSC registrant.
The same phrases and judgements are sprinkled through the SSSC online decisions, and they are presented as fact to the panels.
It is an ongoing scandal and, in itself, raises dozens of questions, but be careful of the nature and number you ask.
The response from SSSC chief executive Lorraine Gray is at the end of the complaint. Perhaps not surprisingly it suggests going to a higher court.
Complaint 10: Subjective and unsubstantiated psychological analysis in the SSSC final written decision
While I feel very strongly that my case was mishandled from start to conclusion and was a tailored prosecution by a single case handler, I wish to challenge the SSSC’s psychological evaluation of myself which is subjective, unsubstantiated and, I believe, put together without any training or professional validity, and carried out surreptitiously.
I am aware such psychological pretensions are commonplace in the SSSC’s ‘Notice of Decision’ issued to registrants. Given these are key to the final decision which can literally end a person’s career there are several areas I believe that the SSSC must explain.
A number of questions were submitted to the SSSC as FOIs but, again, all were deemed “vexatious”, however, while they may not fall within the remit of an FOI, I believe they remain valid questions that need answered by the SSSC in the interests of the public and all registrants.
1. Can the SSSC explain the structure and methodology behind its psychological assessments and the qualifications?
2. Why does the SSSC not highlight on its websites or within its investigation guidelines that workers are being psychologically assessed by an unknown medical individual or untrained individual?
3. What process does a worker require to go through to for him/her, his/her doctor, his/her legal representatives to have access to those psychological assessments?
4. Given the Scottish Social Services Council performs this psychological analysis of workers, undertaken without their knowledge or recourse, and without any disclosure of who is making such personal assessments, on what credible grounds does the SSSC justify their inclusion in any of its findings?
These questions are crucial and the fact that the SSSC does not highlight such processes are being undertaken then presented to a panel as fact does merit explanation.
As the SSSC declined to answer these questions under FOI requests, I can only assume, as it would be incredible if this was blanket policy, that these assessments are made after a number of face-to-face sessions with the psychological evaluator.
I do not know the rationale behind my case but I did not have a single face-to-face meeting with any SSSC representative prior to my hearing. Yet in the caseholder’s direction to the panel and subsequent Notice of Decision it is stated by the SSSC:
He {the case holder} observed that, whilst you had regretted your failings, there had been no meaningful reflection or insight by you to give confidence that events would not be repeated in the future.
Not being aware of any conversation on this matter, this was presented as absolute fact, not conjecture.
What is the Scottish Social Services Council’s definition of “meaningful reflection” and “insight”? What psychological tests were employed to determine that assessment. How do the Scottish Social Services Council medical and mental health experts gauge “meaningful reflection”? How does that department judge the levels of “meaningful reflection”, in terms of its absence and return? What are the criteria in assessing “meaningful reflection” and “insight”. At what point does the SSSC psychological expertise re-assess “meaningful reflection” and decree it has returned?
As I pointed out during the investigation, because of the length of time taken, I also encountered other, very distressing events in my personal life. By the time I attended the hearing some two years had passed since I left Aberlour, and some 27 months since the last alleged incident.
Reflection, insight, remorse, resilience all fluctuate with time and circumstance, and response to loss and grief is a process of adaptation which takes place, usually over an approximate two-year period. Any main grade social worker knows that - it is part of the essential theoretical underpinning to the work. The SSSC, it appears, may not.
The Notice of Decision continues:
You had not disputed the facts… nevertheless obliged the Panel to proceed to a full hearing, He {the case holder} submitted... your participation...as ‘critical and negative’ {and} demonstrated that you were focused on yourself rather than the broader public interest…
As the facts are not disputed then this must be a careful psychological evaluation by the Scottish Social Services Council, otherwise it is a personal viewpoint and totally subjective. Is this an individual expert conclusion or from a team of SSSC medical advisers?
Given no face-to-face session, what is the validity of this further statement in the Notice of Decision:
There was a lack of convincing reflection. Such limited insight as had been shown did not demonstrate any remedial steps that you had taken...if you were to return to work, there remained a risk to the public because your insight was limited
Other than contradictory communication from the SSSC, with an obvious lack of understanding of the social work processes I was involved in, I consider it my right to know who made those psychological evaluations of me, why I wasn’t told they were being made, and why the SSSC does not tell every single registrant he or she is being assessed by an unknown SSSC representative, with unknown qualifications, and one(s) you will not meet.
Response from Lorraine Gray, chief executive SSSC
Under this heading, you raise a complaint about how matters such as insight and remediation were determined by the Panel. The decision the Panel made in relation to these is a decision under our Rules. There is a statutory appeal right to the Sheriff Court.
As with a number of the previous parts of your complaint, the issues you have raised under this part of the complaint do not fall within our Complaints Handling Procedure and you should consider appealing the decision to the Sheriff Court.
Picture: John Hain
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