Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of providing guidelines to social workers for parents with autism.

Social workers involved in an autistic person’s care have a duty to promote their human rights, safety and wellbeing, assess their needs and help facilitate access to the right services.

The regulator for the social work profession, Social Work England, sets the professional standards. These are standards all social workers must meet. The professional standards include that social workers must be able to provide, or support people to access, advice and services tailored to meet their needs.

Social workers complete initial education and training, for which training providers must meet Social Work England’s Education and Training Standards. These standards require training providers to ensure that the course is continually updated because of developments in research, legislation, Government policy and best practice.

Additionally, under the Health and Care Act 2022, Care Quality Commission-registered providers are required to ensure their staff receive specific training on learning disability and autism appropriate to their role. This will help to ensure that staff, including social workers, have the right knowledge and skills to provide safe and informed care.

To support this, we have been rolling out the Oliver McGowan Mandatory Training on Learning Disability and Autism. Over two million people have already completed the e-learning package which is the first part of this training.