This book explores issues of ‘race’, racism and anti-racist social work practice – with a particular focus on modern Britain. The dominant message from the media and politicians regarding social work is that it is dominated by ‘political correctness’ and focuses disproportionately on issues of class, ‘race’ and gender. In the training of social workers there is too much emphasis on what one Conservative minister in the 1990s termed ‘isms’ and ‘ologies’ (Castle 1992).

This view of social work resurfaced towards the end of November 2012 in a range of stories, where politicians and media commentators attacked social workers for removing three children of East European origin from foster carers who were members of the anti-immigration, anti-EU UKIP party – a party who have explicit policies against ‘multiculturalism’ (see Jenkins, Chapter Seven, this volume). The Observer quoted the Conservative Education Secretary Michael Gove as saying that social workers had made ‘the wrong decision in the wrong way for the wrong reasons’ (McVeigh 2012). The Sun claimed the decision had provoked ‘fury’ (Prynne 2012); while The Sunday Mirror quoted the UKIP party leader as saying that ‘heads must roll’ for the decision (Moss 2012). However, the complexities of any particular case are rarely considered – and, in this instance, there was no real debate regarding the suitability of members of an anti-immigration, anti-European, anti-multiculturalism party, to foster children from a migrant East European background.

On the same day The Mail on Sunday ran two further stories attacking ‘politically correct’ social workers who, in the first instance, the paper alleged, had ‘tried to prevent [a foster mum] … from adopting a black baby they placed in her care – because she was white’ (Douglas 2012), while in the second it was claimed that social workers at the voluntary sector organisation Barnardo's had prohibited a former UKIP party election candidate and district nurse from having a role with children leaving the care system because of her party's views on multiculturalism (Carlin et al 2012). Earlier in September 2012 social workers were attacked in the media for not addressing adequately the issue of Asian men's role in ‘grooming’ and sexual abuse cases (see Orr, Chapter Ten, this volume), with The Daily Mail apparently incredulous that ‘not a single social worker’ would be sacked for their ‘political correct’ failings (Doyle 2012a; 2012b).