Social Work England’s use of emerging technologies
Social Work England’s use of emerging technologies
Our commitment
Social Work England is exploring how emerging technologies (including generative artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning) could support the way we deliver our regulatory and other legal responsibilities. Our priority is to use these technologies in ways that are safe, ethical, transparent and strengthen the quality and fairness of our services.
We are committed to maintaining public trust and ensuring that the use of emerging technologies always upholds our core duty to protect the public.
How we use emerging technologies
We are using emerging technologies in a limited and carefully controlled way. Where AI or automation is used, it is designed to:
meet our users’ needs
support staff
reduce administrative burden
improve the efficiency of routine processes
It does not replace human judgement or decision making.
Our current use includes (all of the following):
government tools for supporting communications work
staff use of generative AI tools for internal, low risk administrative tasks
exploration of tools that help analyse large volumes of text or data, improve content clarity, or automate repetitive tasks
Some of the technologies we use are provided by third-party suppliers. Where this is the case, we ensure these tools meet our standards for safety, data protection and fairness.
We do not use AI to make regulatory decisions. All decisions about a social worker’s registration, fitness to practise, or education quality assurance remain human led.
As we continue to explore emerging technologies, we will only introduce tools where there is a clear problem to solve and where the technology is the most appropriate and safe solution.
Our principles for adopting emerging technologies
We follow 6 core principles:
Start with the problem, not the technology.
Learn and adapt, and foster a culture for responsible adoption.
Always retain human oversight and accountability.
Be transparent about our use of emerging technology.
Actively mitigate bias and protect fairness.
Consider alternatives, reuse, and value before building or buying.
We also follow wider public sector expectations, including those in the AI Playbook for the UK Government. This includes:
using AI securely
managing the AI lifecycle responsibly
working openly
ensuring staff have the right skills
considering environmental impact
How we protect data and privacy
We take data protection and information security extremely seriously. We will never use open or public AI tools to process personal, confidential or sensitive information.
When emerging technologies involve personal data, we will:
carry out a data protection impact assessment (DPIA), and comply fully with UK GDPR and relevant legislation
ensure appropriate human oversight
assess and monitor risks, including fairness and bias
protect data in line with our privacy policy
Your rights
Individuals have the right to:
opt out of any fully automated process
request human review at any time, even where automation has been used to support part of a process
Where an emerging technology is used in our public facing services, we will inform users clearly at the relevant points in the journey.
Governance and accountability
We have strengthened our internal governance so that emerging technology proposals are reviewed consistently and safely. This includes:
oversight from our digital development board
clear ownership for each emerging technology use case
ongoing monitoring of accuracy, fairness and unintended consequences
Our future plans
We plan to run further small scale pilots and discovery work to understand where emerging technologies could offer value in our services. This will run alongside our ongoing work to improve our digital, data and technology (DDaT) capabilities.
Any new use of emerging technologies will be introduced gradually, with proportionate oversight and evaluation.
Keeping this page updated
As our work with emerging technologies develops, we will update this statement so that social workers, employers and the public always have clear and accurate information about our approach.