A SOCIAL worker has been struck off after admitting to an inappropriate sexual relationship with a vulnerable adult.

Christopher Ernest Bracchi, who was employed by North Yorkshire County Council, was involved in a four year relationship from 2008 to 2012 with a “vulnerable” mother he was working with.

He was struck off following a hearing in London which found Bracchi’s conduct “over a very long period of time, was entirely inconsistent with the role of a responsible social worker”.

The Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) panel said: “In the knowledge that a striking off order is a sanction of last resort for serious and deliberate acts which involve an abuse of trust, the panel nonetheless considers that this is the only proportionate and appropriate sanction in this case.

“There seems to the panel no other way to protect the public nor indeed any other way properly to maintain the requisite trust and confidence in the profession.”

Bracchi was employed by North Yorkshire County Council as a registered social worker from 2003.

Four years later he became the social worker for one child of the woman, and then, from 2008 to 2012, he became social worker for three of her other children.

Their relationship was found out after the woman told North Yorkshire County Council that she had been having a sexual relationship with Bracchi and he was suspended.

The panel heard Bracchi initially denied an unprofessional relationship but when a disciplinary hearing started in November 2013, he admitted having an inappropriate relationship but strongly disputed it was sexual. That month he was dismissed from North Yorkshire County Council.

Earlier this year he then accepted that he had acted unprofessionally by entering into a consensual sexual relationship with the vulnerable person.

The HCPC panel stated: “He acknowledged that this was a betrayal of her trust and added that he had no intention of challenging the contention that his fitness to practise was impaired.”

Bracchi was also found to have disclosed confidential information to her children and a neighbour.