How much unpaid overtime do social workers do?

Social workers’ strenuous workloads, especially in children’s services, have long been seen as undermining practice.
As of autumn 2022, 63% of council children’s social workers considered their workload too high, found a Department for Education (DfE) survey.
A comparable proportion (61%) said the number of hours they spent on each case had increased over the previous five years.
Practitioners listed the complexity of cases, public service cuts, paperwork and high vacancy rates