Murder, suicide and the skills shortage

But if you were running a commercial legal practice, in addition to this heightened conservatism you’d hardly relish qualified social workers muscling into family law practices. And if Chris’s case came before you as a case of “malpractice” you might be pretty sympathetic to Chris. You’d probably think that he was only doing his job as a lawyer. Carolyn should have seen a social worker.

How much could such approaches contribute to easing the skills shortage? It’s probably less use in more technical areas where many of the skills shortages lie. But some important skill shortages are in the right areas to benefit from more flexible approaches to credentialling. Along with expansion of roles for para-legals, para-medics, para-educationists, “fast tracking” options enabling professional career changes could help in these areas. And there are skill shortages in all these areas.

And it’s worth doing quite independently of how much it helps address skill shortages. This is not just an economic question. It’s also about the satisfaction people get from more flexible career paths that suit them better, and it’s about the quality of their work. If we could combine more flexible credentialling with professional regulation that helped measure the quality of service as well as excluding poor performers, who knows what we could achieve?

If we’d done this 15 years ago, Carolyn - a person of infinite solicitude for her vulnerable young son, if not alas for herself - might still be alive instead of lying in an unmarked grave.

I’m thinking of her now.