A PARENT has called for a return to two social work teams in West Dunbartonshire over a lack of support for their child.

The parent, who we are not identifying to protect the youth, said they had not seen their assigned worker in months.

And while their child is not at risk and there are youngsters needing more urgent interventions from social work, the parent said they felt forgotten by the service.

Last week we revealed a collective grievance had been filed by 60 social workers about the closure of the Bridge Street centre in the Vale of Leven last year and merger into Aurora House in Clydebank.

They warned there were more than 200 unallocated cases currently in children and family services because of staffing levels and the new base.

Council chiefs insisted parents are given every assistance needed.

But workers repeated their concerns to Councillor Jim Bollan last week, even as there was a crunch meeting between staff and social work bosses.

The social workers told the councillor: “[There is] fear amongst workforce of a Baby P type incident occurring in West Dunbartonshire.”

They also said early intervention was not possible with at least 10 empty posts across the teams and families were only getting seen when they get to crisis stage.

The parent told the Reporter: “My children are not in life or death crisis, but one of my children is still suffering because they are not getting the support they require.

“To say it’s like chaos is an understatement. My child should have the support to give them the opportunity to be part of the community.

“When they were in Alexandria, they could say, ‘I’ll be down in five minutes’. I have not seen the social worker this year at all.

“There’s not enough staff and their workload has increased. There’s probably 100 parents like me who just sit and don’t know what to do.”

Cllr Bollan said: “The cuts in the social work department need to be reversed, the two local social work teams reinstated, fully staffed and resourced properly before a tragedy occurs.”

Read more: West Dunbartonshire social workers fear 'child tragedy'

Labour originally put the social work offices into a “rationalisation” programme in 2014 but it was the SNP who agreed to close it in a 2017 vote.

Labour Councillor David McBride said: “Labour opposed this because we were unwilling to accept the SNP administration guarantees and the feedback from social work professionals appear to suggest that we were right.

“Labour’s number one priority has always been the safety of the children and given the concerns being raised by our social work staff, we would be seeking assurances from the chief executive that our children and young people’s services are safe and best meet the needs of our local communities.”

A spokeswoman for West Dunbartonshire Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) said: “WDHSCP would like to reassure families who rely on our support that we are continuing to provide every assistance they require.

“Families requiring immediate support will be visited at home or arrangements can be made to meet in a location suitable for them amongst many locations available to them across West Dunbartonshire.

“Recruitment of social workers to support the team is well underway and in the meantime, agency staff will continue to support the team until new staff are in post.”