Pay deal to reduce social worker burn-out - Oranga Tamariki

A supervisor at Oranga Tamariki says the agency struggled to keep social workers who burned out in the past, but the new $114 million pay equity settlement will change that. The settlement was reached on Tuesday and 1,300 employees will now receive an average pay rise of 30 percent over two years. Oranga Tamariki's outgoing chief social worker Paul Nixon told RNZ social workers were dealing with about 26 children each when the ideal number should be 15. He says between 700 to 800 new staff are needed to keep the numbers down. One supervisor, Rachael Baxter-Mackay, told our reporter Jessie Chiang the pay rise will encourage social workers not to quit the profession.