Dear Scottish Executive, Water is wet. Now give me £50K. Love, a private firm (with no doubt as yet undiscovered links to somebody comissioning the study).

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25 October 2005
£57K FOR STATING BLEEDIN' OBVIOUS
Social work students 'want to be social workers'
By Magnus Gardham
A £57,000 survey paid for by taxpayers found that students take social work degrees - because they want to be social workers.
The Scottish Executive used a private market research firm to conduct the survey of 300 social work students.
But yesterday it was branded a waste of money as it emerged 75 per cent of those questioned said they took their degree because it was their ambition to become social workers.
Tory MSP Bill Aitken hit out: "What on earth did we think students were taking social work degrees for? Because they wanted to be trapeze artists?"
"Only in Scotland could we spend £57,000 to find out what is blindingly obvious."
The86-pagestudyconcluded: "The research found that both undergraduate and postgraduate students chose the course largely because it was the entry route into the social work profession."
Other students said they took social work because they wanted a "respectable professional qualification" or because it would provide valuable transferable skills.
Ministers are desperate to recruit more students to ease a shortage of social workers. But the report suggests an incentive scheme to encourage people to take up the career has failed.
The scheme, brought in two years ago, offers a £9000 grant over two years for social workers who take "hard to fill" posts.
But the report said less than half the students quizzed had heard of the grant, and only one in 10 knew how much cash was on offer. Only four per cent said they would not have studied social work without the grants. And only one per cent said grants were important.
An Executive spokeswoman said yesterday the incentive scheme was to be scrapped but the decision to axe it was taken before the report came out.
She defended the £57,000 price tag for the study as value for money, adding: "It's important we evaluate what we're doing. We need to find out what's working."
The Executive have often been accused of squandering public cash. Earlier this year, there was anger over their £338,000 taxi bill.

And the most famous drain on finances was the Holyrood building, which cost 10 times its original £40million estimate.

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=16289188%26method=full%26siteid=66633%26headline=%2d57k%2dfor%2dstating%2dbleedin%2d%2dobvious-name_page.html

Not that I thought I'd ever being C&Ping from the Record here.

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 10:15 (twenty years ago)

cost 10 times its original £40million estimate.

it cost £400m???

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 10:18 (twenty years ago)

£431m, to be exact. Although I think this is still a target cost.

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 10:19 (twenty years ago)

Tory MSP Bill Aitken hit out: "What on earth did we think students were taking social work degrees for? Because they wanted to be trapeze artists?"

NO BECAUSE THEY WANT AN EASY COP-OUT DEGREE SO THEY CAN COME OUT WITH A DEGREE AND THEN ACTUALLY GET A JOB IN I.T., OR STATISTICS. duh

but yeah you don't really need a survey to find that out!

― ken c (ken c), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 10:20 (twenty years ago)

is that like £100 from every scottish taxpayer or what?

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 10:21 (twenty years ago)

That article is double roffle.

Tory MSP Bill Aitken hit out: "What on earth did we think students were taking social work degrees for? Because they wanted to be trapeze artists?"

"Only in Scotland could we spend £57,000 to find out what is blindingly obvious."

― salexander / sofia (salexander), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 10:22 (twenty years ago)

This is just the Record twisting the story around to make it more interesing for the reader to get worked up about. The question as to why they were doing the degree seems like only one question that was asked and not the focus of the report which was on the incentives that were being offered to do social work and whether they were being effective which it seems reasonable for them to be investigating.

― mms (mms), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 10:36 (twenty years ago)

So, did they do any followup questions like, 'why do you want to be a social worker?' ? College students are like not ya know like known for like giving thorough sort of answers or whatever.

― when something smacks of something (dave225.3), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 10:59 (twenty years ago)

mms OTM. Bad report writing mostly to blame it sounds, padding something out by giving the obvious conclusions as well as the interesting ones.

― Tom (Groke), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 11:26 (twenty years ago)

It's not surprising for a red top to spin it in terms of BIG HEADLINES surely?

I'm most intrigued that the Executive withdrew the scheme before the report gave them any basis to do so, bringing into question why it was done at all (if the intention was to measure the effect of the scheme).

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:03 (twenty years ago)

There is a complete dearth of field workers in Social Work in Scotland at the moment, which is seeing greater numbers of children being accomodated by local authorities. This costs a lot of money. The Executive is trying to find ways to make it a more appealing profession to young people, cos we need them to. Knowing some recent entrants into the profession, 'do you really want to be a social worker?' seems to me like a relevant question, cos many do field work for a year or two then bugger off to other, less important (and less stressful) positions.

― scotstvo (scotstvo), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:13 (twenty years ago)

I agree with your description of the state of Social Work, but I strongly suspect most, if not all, of the recent entrants would still answer 'yes' at the time of the study (when they were still students) before buggering off as you suggest.

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:22 (twenty years ago)

I'd hate to think, as has been mentioned already, that the questionaire only had that question on it. I'm no apologist for the executive, but it's vitally important that a way is found to attract better people to the job, and if it costs £57k to do that then that's fine by me. It's sounds a lot, but that's more or less the price of looking after one child in care for a year.

― scotstvo (scotstvo), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:30 (twenty years ago)

"cost 10 times its original £40million estimate."

Why wasn't this more of a scandal? Cos it's not in London, I suppose.

― Hello Sunshine (Hello Sunshine), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:30 (twenty years ago)

It was up against the even bigger scandal that was the Millennium Dome?

― Markelby (Mark C), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:33 (twenty years ago)

The Dome, in relative terms, was a bargain — a mere 1.4 times over budget in one of the most expensive cities on earth.

Plus it was the seond most popular paid-for visitor attraction in Europe in 2000, with 6.2 million people through the turnstiles.

― Hello Sunshine (Hello Sunshine), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:39 (twenty years ago)

yeah i doubt the millennium dome cost £400 mil.

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:41 (twenty years ago)

Why wasn't this more of a scandal?

Well, it was a very big scandal, with a public inquiry and everything. It just wasn't reported in the British press.

― Forest Pines (ForestPines), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:42 (twenty years ago)

english

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:43 (twenty years ago)

Dome budget was £399 million in Lottery cash, total Lottery spend was £578 million.

― Hello Sunshine (Hello Sunshine), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:43 (twenty years ago)

This is getting a wee bit off-topic, but anyway?

How much would the Palace of Westminster cost to build nowadays?

― scotstvo (scotstvo), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:46 (twenty years ago)

fucking hell @ dome!!!!

"How much would the Palace of Westminster cost to build nowadays?"

mmm, dunno, but we didn't have income tax in them days, so...

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:48 (twenty years ago)

Here's some over-budget things:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/911317.stm

― Hello Sunshine (Hello Sunshine), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:55 (twenty years ago)

my flat probably costs about £400m in london nowadays.

― ken c (ken c), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 12:55 (twenty years ago)

The point is a seat of government really should have a bit of style. Otherwise, why not hold parliament in a big portakabin? It'd be much more cost-effective.

― scotstvo (scotstvo), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 13:09 (twenty years ago)

er, well if it's my money paying for these larded-up poindexters, you're damn right i want value for money. why should i give a fuck if they are in a portakabin?

― Theorry Henry (Enrique), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 13:14 (twenty years ago)

The £40M estimate was assuming the parliament would be at the Royal High School. After this was deemed to be too small the estimate for a new building was £110M. So it was 'only' about 4 times over budget.

The square blob that is Portcullis House in Westminster cost £250M. To rebuild the Palace Of Westminster might be a shade higher.

― Onimo (GerryNemo), Tuesday, 25 October 2005 13:15 (twenty years ago)

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