The journey of Nova Care Consultants
2017-2019
Our roots date back to 2017 with the creation of Social Worker Gary, a sole trading independent practice led by our Founder and Consultant Director, Gary Spencer-Humphrey. We also won the Social Worker of the Year Award in the same year, externally nominated by a County Council for our community development work. Our founder is a dual-registered social worker in England and Wales, an Approved Mental Health Professional Lead, a Best Interests Assessor, a DoLS Authoriser, an Expert Witness and a Court Appointed Deputy (Health and Welfare). Gary began his health and social work career over 25 years ago, starting as a care assistant and rising through the ranks to become the Head of Social Service. You can read more about Gary here.
2019-2024
In 2019, Social Worker Gary incorporated into Expert Social Worker Ltd, retaining the trusted brand and trading name of Social Worker Gary. The service quickly became recognised as a leader in private care, mental health, and complex capacity assessments, offering a range of private and publicly funded (legal aid) expert witness services to the legal and judicial systems. We also won our second national award as the UK Social Care Expert, again, externally nominated by a leading NHS Continuing Healthcare firm of lawyers for securing health-funded care for individuals deprived of their legal rights.
In 2020, our referrals quadrupled, and we welcomed our first associate, who is now our assistant director. We ran our services from our headquarters in Hampshire. In 2021, we expanded our operations into Wales and opened our second office the following year. In 2022, we were shortlisted and received the finalist gong for the Small Business Excellence Award. In 2023, we grew again and onboarded our first Personal Assistant (PA) to support the consultant director.
In 2024, we were joined by two social work consultants, Jaimie and Akhil. Jaimie is our expert in older adults, and Akhil is our lead in learning disabilities.
2025-Now
In 2025, we took on our first non-social-work professional, an independent occupational therapy consultant, Michelle, who specialises in moving and handling, and won another award, the Solent Business Awards for Excellence. In March 2025, we rebranded Social Worker Gary to Nova Care Consultants, marking our birth and evolution from a single-led practice to a multi-disciplinary national company that now spans five UK offices across England and Wales, but maintaining the same high standards in care, capacity and consultancy we've become known for across England and Wales. We also onboarded a new senior associate OT to assist the work of Michelle Tandy, followed by an additional three social work consultants.
We have some exciting plans for 2026, including the development of two new key services as we closely follow changes to the Mental Health Act, and the opening of two Nova Care branches in the North West and North East. We're also expanding our training services, developing more direct access to Technology Enabled Care, and partnering with progressive law firms to bring you something special. Keep your eyes on this page for more details.
