CONFERENCE & EXHIBITION 2025 Thursday 9 October 2025 in association with
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We’re delighted to be back in central Glasgow for our key annual conference, creating a space for networking, collaboration, connection and reflection.
This year’s conference theme, ‘Relationships as catalysts for change’, has been chosen to underline the importance of relationship-based social work practice, and to highlight how relationships shape the leadership context within which we work.
Together we will explore
• the complexity of applying relationships theory into practice,
• the practicalities of partnerships and collaboration,
• the importance of individual and collective empowerment,
• the effects of change demographically, politically, and economically, and the increasingly critical role of social work services and leaders,
• the demands of social work leadership today, requiring unique relationship skills and the integration of professional values with managerial responsibilities.
As we meet for this year’s conference attention is beginning to turn to next year’s elections to the Scottish Parliament, and more immediately, what the UK and Scottish budgets will mean for people and communities. For social work, there is also anticipation about the National Social Work Agency and Scottish Social Work Partnership, and the appointment of a new Chief Social Work Advisor to the Scottish Government. All this against a backdrop of continuing recruitment and retention challenges for local social work teams, and a public service reform agenda, paired with ongoing squeeze to budgets, which is unsettling for those who use and work in the affected services. Over the past few years’ relationships have been tested at all levels, and the next few years promises more of the same. If ever there was a time for social work to be discussing how relationships are the catalysts for change, this is it.
Finally, a thank you. Social Work Scotland could not exist without our individual members, who contribute and give voice to the incredible range and depth of activity that happens every day in Scotland. From representing Social Work Scotland in national forums, contributing to our standing committees and subgroups, to the individual relationships and support you provide to individuals and families, you are modelling social work leadership, turning up and making a difference. Without our members there would be no Social Work Scotland; thank you.
The coming months and years will bring changes that impact Social Work Scotland directly, and we will need to adapt and change in response. We want that process to be driven by our members, for our members. If you’re not already a member – please consider joining us; we’re stronger with you.
Ben Farrugia
Director,
Social Work Scotland
A big thank you to all of our sponsors
08:30 09:30 Registration, refreshments, and exhibition
09:30 09:35 Conference welcome
09:35 09:45 Sponsor welcome Victor Bamigboye Senior Sales and Partnerships Lead, Beam
09:45 09:55 Social Work Scotland opening address
09:55 10:15
10:15 10:35
Keynote: The relationship as a catalyst for change: its creative possibilities and challenging limitations
Trainer Convenor, Social Work Scotland
Dr Pamela Trevithick
Retired academic and author, and visiting professor, Buckinghamshire New University
Keynote: Relationship skills through a leaders journey Susanne Millar Chief Executive, Glasgow City Council
10:35 10:45 Speech Iona Colvin OBE Chief Social Work Adviser, OCSWA, Scottish Government
10:45 11:15 Refreshments, networking, and exhibition
11:15 12:00 Panel: Partnerships for meaningful change
SallyAnn Kelly OBE
Professor Neil Quinn
Chief Executive, Aberlour Children's Charity
Head of Social Work and Social Policy Department and Professor in Social Work and Health Equity, University of Strathclyde
Leigh Jolly Chief Officer, Aberdeenshire Health and Social Care Partnership
Beth-Anne McDowall Promise Lead Officer, NHS Lanarkshire
12:00 13:15 Workshops part 1
13:15 14:15 Lunch, networking, and exhibition
14:15 15:30 Workshops part 2
15:30 15:35 Welcome back David Lee Chair
15:35 16:10
'I love you. For god's sake don't leave me'. Kate and John's story after an Alzheimer's diagnosis. The power of relationships in attachment theory Kate White Psychotherapist and Author
16:10 16:20 Scottish Government address
16:20 16:30 Closing remarks
16:30 16:35 Closing remarks
16:35 Conference close
Constance MSP
Secretary for Justice and Home Affairs, Scottish Government
Work Scotland
Workshops
Title Organisation Presenters
Relationships in the age of AI
Using Restorative Justice to Promote Positive Systemic Change, Boost Social Work Job Satisfaction, and Improve the Experience of Service Users
Scottish Children's Reporter Administration
Children & Young People’s Centre for Justice (CYCJ)
Relationship-based practice from an emotional and neuroscience perspective N/A
Community-Orientated Practice Makes a Difference!
Language and Communication as catalysts for change
Reflective spaces: creating supportive and containing spaces to relate, think and feel through professional consultation and creative supervision groups
Why We Do the Things We Do – supporting parents to understand their child’s emotional wellbeing and development
Glasgow HSCP
Annie Taylor
Lauren Emmerson & Pamela Morrison
Dr Pamela Trevithick
Caroline Mcdonald, Lorena Noto & Elaine Lyttle
RCSLT/NHS Ayrshire and Arran
Family Change, Perth and Kinross Council
Children’s Wellbeing Team, Aberdeenshire Council
Katy Pearson & Ruth Emond
Leanne Cheyne & Steph Herbert
Annemarie Macrae
Speakers
John Trainer
Convenor, Social Work Scotland
Chief Social Work Officer, Renfrewshire Council
John is a qualified social worker and the current Chief Social Work Officer for Renfrewshire in addition to his role as Head of Child Care and Criminal Justice. During his career John has worked in children, justice and adult social work. John has extensive experience in operational and strategic posts across social work. John was Head of Early Years and Inclusion in Renfrewshire before taking up his current post in September 2018.
Outside of work John is a runner, cyclist, skier and football fan. He is also active in the credit union movement.
Dr Pamela Trevithick
Retired academic and author, and visiting professor, Buckinghamshire New University
Pamela Trevithick is a retired social work academic. In the past she has been the Manager of a Child and Family Support Centre, Director of University of Gloucestershire’s social work training programme, and for ten years was the Visiting Professor in Social Work at Buckinghamshire New University. She is known nationally and internationally for her scholarship on knowledge and skills, and her bestselling 3d edition text Social Work Skills and Knowledge: A Practice Handbook, published in six languages. She is currently writing a 4” edition of her book and an article on the significance of neuroscience research for social work.
Susanne Millar
Chief Executive, Glasgow City Council
Susanne Millar became Chief Executive of Glasgow City Council in May 2024, after more than 30 years working for the city. She was previously Chief Officer of Glasgow’s Health and Social Care Partnership, having spent her earlier career working in social work and social care services in the city – starting in residential care for older people, then working with vulnerable children and families.
After holding strategy and planning roles, she became the Head of Children’s Services and Head of Homelessness and Asylum Services. In 2012, Susanne became Assistant Director of Social Work Services in Glasgow, then Chief Officer for Planning, Strategy & Commissioning for the newly-formed Glasgow City HSCP.
From 2019, Susanne led a team of more than 12,000 people as Chief Officer.
Speakers (cont.)
SallyAnn Kelly OBE Chief Executive, Aberlour Children’s Charity
SallyAnn has over 30 years of experience working in Children’s Services, having qualified as a social worker in 1990. She was promoted to her first management post in 1996 and has worked in several Scottish local authorities in middle and senior management positions until 2008.
Prior to joining Aberlour as CEO in 2014, SallyAnn worked for Barnardo’s Scotland, first as Head of Operations, then as Acting Director of Barnardo’s Scotland.
SallyAnn has a keen interest in strengthening and improving practice with an emphasis on taking rights based approaches. She has a particular interest in improving the experiences of children and young people who have experience of the wider care system in Scotland. She has enabled Aberlour to put in place ambitious plans for improvement in how the organisation works alongside children and families – not being afraid to be led by the views of children and young people and their families.
SallyAnn has a commitment to challenging and reducing poverty and inequality and she has worked with colleagues within Aberlour and across Scotland over a number of years to ensure that reducing child poverty is at the heart of the political agenda.
She has supported colleagues in Aberlour to focus on digital transformation and the organisation is currently involved in a number of initiatives to take change forward.
SallyAnn is currently the Chair of STAF (Scottish Throughcare and Aftercare Forum) and was awarded an OBE in 2022.
Kate White Psychotherapist and Author
Kate is an activist and researcher inspired by her lived experience as a former care partner for John Southgate as they navigated their lives together following his diagnosis of Alzheimer’s. Kate originally trained as a district nurse in Scotland and she is now a retired psychotherapist and co-founded The Bowlby Centre in London. The perspective provided by attachment theory has, in her view, a great deal to offer us in understanding the emotional complexity which faces us all following a diagnosis of dementia.
Leigh Jolly
Vice Convenor, Social Work Scotland
Chief Officer, Aberdeenshire Health and Social Care Partnership
Leigh Jolly qualified as a social worker in 1996 and has spent the majority of her career in Children’s Services Social Work. She started out in Aberdeen City working in Children & Families Social Work in two areas with high deprivation prior to taking up the post of Child Protection Manager with Aberdeenshire Council in 2002. Since then Leigh has worked as a Team Manager in Children & Families, a Service Manager for looked after children services and has been Head of Children’s Services Social Work since 2018 taking on the role of Chief Social Work Officer in 2020. As CSWO works closely with Health & Social Care and is passionate about social work practice and the importance of relationships in practice.
Recently appointed Chief Officer at Aberdeenshire Health and Social Care Partnership.
Professor Neil Quinn
Head of Social Work and Social Policy Department and Professor in Social Work and Health Equity, University of Strathclyde
Neil Quinn is Professor in Social Work and Health Equity and Founding Director of the University’s Centre for Health Policy. He is an international leader in social work and public health has been invited to be a Visiting Professor at New York and Yale Universities.
He has a particular expertise in health inequalities, human rights and citizenship and has a specific commitment to working with vulnerable groups, including people with mental health problems, asylum seekers and refugees and people experiencing homelessness.
He is committed to working in partnership with service users and communities and has 25 years’ experience in social work, community development and public health at a local, national and international level. He has led a major community development and health programme in one of Europe’s areas of highest deprivation, chaired the national Sanctuary programme working with asylum seekers and refugees and is on the steering group of People’s Health Movement Scotland. He is also a co-founder of the Declaration health and human rights arts festival.
Beth-Anne McDowall Promise Lead Officer, NHS Lanarkshire
Beth-Anne is a national award winning care-experienced advocate and campaigner. She is Scotland’s youngest Non-executive director – appointed to the board of Children’s Hearings Scotland at just 19. She is now a non-exec for The Mental Welfare Commission. She has a breadth of experience in her short career spanning a Promise centric role in a large local authority, a team manager at a large children’s charity and now her subsequent role in NHS Lanarkshire. As well as consultancy for public and third sector organisations She blends lived and learned experience aptly – all founded on authenticity and integrity and passion for transformational systemic change.
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