Social workers in Dublin, Kildare and Wicklow have voted for industrial action over staff shortages, resource constraints, and what they claim are unmanageable case-loads in child protection services.
Their union IMPACT says more than half of social work posts are vacant in some Dublin community care areas. As a result, over 2,000 vulnerable children in the region have not been allocated a social worker.
The worst affected care areas are understood to be in the Northern Health Board, followed by the South-West Health Board. The least affected areas appear to be in the East Coast Board, which has been actively recruiting social workers in Australia because of difficulty in recruiting and retraining local staff.
The industrial action, which comes after nine months of negotiation with management, will provide a full service for what are deemed "priority cases" but restricted services for other children.
All three health boards in the Eastern Regional Health Authority area will be affected by the action, which could begin before the end of the month.
IMPACT says social workers will refuse to work on child protection cases where no social worker has been allocated, except in emergency duty situations. This means social workers will not represent area health boards in court cases where no social worker has been allocated, will not provide care plans or reviews for children in care whose cases have not been allocated to a social worker and will not facilitate access visits for children in care whose cases have not been allocated to a social worker.
The union wants the Government and health boards "to publicly recognise the scale of the crisis and redouble efforts to recruit social workers".
Staff retention was now a critical problem, "scores" of social workers were leaving the region because of "the intolerable pressures of the job". IMPACT official Mr Gerry Dolan said: "Social workers have had enough of slick announcements of Government initiatives that are never followed through properly or backed up with sufficient resources.
"It is clear that a full service cannot be provided without a full complement of social workers and the most vulnerable children will suffer unless this is faced up to.
"Our proposals recognise the reality of staff shortages and seek to minimise risk and maximise quality within those constraints. We have been seeking an honest recognition by the Eastern Regional Health Authority and the Government of the very serious crisis situation in some areas of the city and the incredible pressure that social workers are working under in the eastern region."
A spokeswoman for the ERHA and its three area health boards said they were "extremely committed" to continuing discussions with IMPACT to find a practical solution to the social workers' concerns and needs.