Social worker accuses Pohde of repeatedly breaking the law

A social worker at North Ostrobothnia’s wellbeing services county says nurses are taking part in work that should be done by qualified social workers. Pohde disputes the criticism, and a court has found that nurses performed the same or nearly the same duties as social workers in a labour dispute, Yle reports.

The disagreement concerns Pohde’s social and crisis emergency service, which responds to urgent situations such as children not being collected from day care, family emergencies and child protection alerts. About half of the unit’s roughly 20 employees are nurses, a staffing model that has sparked debate and led to complaints and legal proceedings.

Some staff say having both social work and healthcare expertise helps them respond more fully to clients’ needs. Social worker Timo Parkkila and nurse Hannele Hekkala say the service’s duties are clearly divided between the professions. Most of the social workers signed a newspaper opinion piece defending the multidisciplinary approach.

Social worker Harri Ojanperä argues that nurses are involved in duties that require a qualified social worker. Pohde’s own review found 10 cases in 2024 in which a nurse was listed as a second preparer for a child’s emergency placement. The county said the entries resulted from a recording error. Ojanperä says nurses’ involvement in such placements was widely known in the unit. Even social work students are not allowed to make emergency placements.

Ojanperä has raised concerns about the division of work on LinkedIn and filed reports about problems in his unit. He says the service handles far fewer crisis-work cases than social emergency cases, creating pressure to assign nurses other duties. He has received a warning after a workplace dispute over the division of work. Last summer, he was moved to another building, where he handles concern reports and no longer takes part in the unit’s usual paired working.

Complaints about the service have been reviewed by several authorities, including the Regional State Administrative Agency, Valvira and the Licensing and Supervisory Authority. They referred the matters to Pohde’s own supervision, which found no major problems apart from the emergency placement cases.

A court found in a labour dispute that nurses had carried out the same or nearly the same tasks as social workers. Pohde has appealed the decision to the Supreme Administrative Court.