Hundreds of social workers in England are now using an artificial intelligence system designed to streamline their workload and improve efficiency. The Magic Notes AI tool, which deploys AI algorithms made by San Francisco companies Deepgram and OpenAI, records conversations, drafts letters to doctors and suggests potential actions, with an aim of saving up to £2 billion annually.
Seven councils, including Swindon, Barnet and Kingston, have adopted the tool, which is installed on social workers’ phones to record and analyse face-to-face meetings. The system generates instant summaries and proposes follow-up actions, such as drafting letters to GPs. Over two dozen more councils are piloting or considering adopting the technology.
While the tool has the potential to free up social workers’ time for more meaningful interactions with clients, it has also raised concerns about its impact on decision-making. The British Association of Social Workers welcomed the technology but emphasized the importance of maintaining relationship-based social work practices.
Seb Barker, the chief operating officer of Beam, the company behind Magic Notes, assured that the AI tool is not intended to replace human judgment. The summaries and follow-up actions generated by the system must be approved by a social worker, and there is no evidence that the technology is leading to a decline in the quality of client interactions.
The shortage of social workers in England has reached critical levels, with one in ten adult social worker jobs vacant and the vacancy rate for child and family social workers at its highest since 2017. Swindon Borough Council has found the Magic Notes system to be particularly beneficial for social workers with dyslexia.
The tool collects sensitive information about clients, including health conditions, personal finances, addresses, dates of birth, telephone numbers, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, and religious beliefs. Beam assures that the recordings are securely stored on UK servers and are not used to train Magic Notes or other AI systems.
