social work

Barriers to communication

Through a scenario this resource enables the user to explore the potential barriers to communication that can exist in their everyday work. This resource will allow the understanding of how the following factors that can inhibit, interrupt or confuse the communication between social workers and service users, carers and others: time available; territory (environment and context); role and task; professional identity and use of self.

Glasgow School of Social Work Research Seminar Series - Criminal Justice Social Work after McLeish - Possibilities and Pitfalls

This podcast is taken from the 'Glasgow School of Social Work Research Seminar Series' held in Glasgow on the 6th November 2008. Professor Fergus McNeill from the Glasgow School of Social Work. Explores the implications for criminal justice social work of the recent report of the Independent Prisons Commission, 'Scotland's Choice'. Examines whether the idea of offenders paying back in the community represents a necessary and sufficient underpinning rationale for the use of community penalties and, more generally, for the future development of criminal justice social work.

'Social evils' and 'social problems' in Britain, 1904–2008

In a contribution to the JRF's 'social evils' series, Jose Harris examines social problems and changing perceptions of them since 1904. Social evils, such as hunger and destitution, were seen by the Victorians as unavoidable. Joseph Rowntree's more positive philosophy promoted social research and intervention to transform 'social evils' into less malign 'social problems' that could be cured. However, some of these problems have subsequently reappeared.

Time and income poverty

Time and money are two key constraints on what people can achieve. The income constraint is widely recognised by policy-makers and social scientists in their concern with poverty. Proposed solutions often focus on getting people into paid work, but this risks ignoring the demands people may have on their time. This study looks at individuals who are significantly limited by time and income constraints: those who could escape income poverty only by incurring time poverty, or vice versa.

Looked-after children: third report of session 2008-09: volume I: report, together with formal minutes

Presents the findings of the Children, Schools and Families Select Committee which aimed to investigate the performance of the care system in England, consider whether the Governments proposals for reform were soundly based, and to find out whether the Care Matters programme would be effective in helping looked after children.

Monitoring poverty and social exclusion in Scotland 2008

The New Policy Institute has produced its 2008 edition of indicators of poverty and social exclusion in Scotland, providing a comprehensive analysis of trends and differences between groups. Based on the latest available data, its starting point is that, while child and pensioner poverty in Scotland has fallen over the last decade, poverty among working-age adults has remained the same.