Children’s social worker sues for £300,000

A “DEVOTED” social worker who says having to work excessive hours with violent and disruptive children forced her to retire through mental ill-health is claiming £300,000 damages from a council.

Mary Reynolds, 59, alleges that assaults by youngsters were an everyday occurrence in a home run by North Lanarkshire Council, and that she was off work for a year because of anxiety and depression.

She was moved to a different home but, she claims, the council reneged on an agreement that her working conditions would be better, and she suffered a relapse after only a few months.

Lawyers for Ms Reynolds told a judge she had lost the enjoyment and fulfilment of a job to which she had devoted her life.

They added: “She had, for many years prior to being seconded to Mitchell Street Home, Airdrie, been a conscientious and competent social worker and had devoted many years of her working life to helping disturbed youngsters.”

North Lanarkshire Council denies Ms Reynolds’s allegations and has asked Lord Brailsford at the Court of Session in Edinburgh to dismiss her case. The judge will give his decision next week.

Ms Reynolds, of Airdrie, had been appointed depute manager of the 12-bed Mitchell Street home for children with “significant behavioural problems” in 2003, the court heard.

She said in her written pleadings that violent incidents occurred on at least a daily basis. Staff were assaulted as well as nearby residents and other youths in the area.

The local MP had been asked to intervene. In one incident, four of the youngsters from the home inflicted such serious injuries on a youth that staff feared they might be fatal.

Ms Reynolds alleged that staffing problems were “acute” – in four months she worked 238 hours of overtime – and the home had 15 young people instead of the maximum of 12. Some were sleeping on sofas. In the summer of 2006, the council reorganised staff but things only got worse. New staff did not know how best to try to cope with the children, six of whom staged a rooftop protest, throwing down guttering while chanting: “We want our staff.”

Ms Reynolds went off work with anxiety attacks and depression, and a year later she was offered the depute manager’s post at Buchanan House in Coatbridge. She “wanted to continue in her career” but needed to protect her health, and a number of measures were agreed, including that the home would be fully staffed and she would not have to do overtime.

She arrived in August 2007 to find one of the children who had assaulted her numerous times had been transferred two weeks earlier from Mitchell Street. He continued to be disruptive and violent and she received no support in dealing with him, she alleged.

Also, the home was understaffed and she, like her colleagues, was expected and required to work extra hours.

Ms Reynolds claimed that because of the council’s failure to comply with conditions set down in the agreement, she again suffered anxiety and depression and went off work in February 2008, never returning.