Many people have been instrumental in enabling me to write this book, including around 40 social workers and social work educators whom I formally interviewed over the past 12 years (either directly for this book in 2018, or as participants in various research projects). I have consciously included a range of workers, male and female, some of whom were working in front-line practice, some in management and some involved in social work education when they were interviewed; nearly all the social work educators had previously worked directly in practice. Some were very recently qualified, while others had been social workers for several years, with more than 30 years’ experience in a few cases. Some informants were also keen researchers, and two were professors. Three were dual qualified (in nursing and social work). Some had additional specialist education/training, for example, in psychotherapy or legal work. A majority had trained as social workers and worked in England, but some had been trained abroad and subsequently worked in England (‘transnationals’). Some of my informants had trained in Europe and continue to work there.

Whether quoting directly from this recent interview material or from other projects, I have taken steps to ensure that the person gave written consent to being interviewed according to current ethical good practice (see Miller and Bell, 2012). I and my research colleagues were granted formal research ethics approval from a university and/ or local authorities as appropriate for specific projects that I discuss, including the recent set of informant interviews from 2018. I have anonymised any quotes as far as possible and allowed recent informants to see which quotes from their interviews I am using in the book wherever feasible.

My intention throughout this book has been to allow some UK and European-based social workers to express their views about the current prognosis for social work and the issues it currently has to address, as well as discussing their own experiences, looking back as far as the late 1980s/1990s. I also interweave my own experiences and thoughts about social work from the 1990s onwards. This is intended to help identify practices and underpinning values emerging from interviews and other research material.