social care services

This report draws on the findings of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation's Governance and Public Services research programme and other related JRF work. It also looks at how citizens are involved, how they influence decisions and how diversity and population change affect citizen and community involvement.

The round-up outlines the challenges and dilemmas that local partners, central government, councillors, staff and communities must resolve if citizens are to have more power and influence over local services and their neighbourhoods.

This Review was commissioned on 21 February 2008 by the then Director of Children’s Services (DCS) for Nottingham City Council, where the High Court found that Nottingham Children’s Services had removed a baby from its mother unlawfully. The document provides a summary of events, review findings and recommendations.

This document examines the Court of Protection's health and welfare jurisdiction under the Mental Capacity Act 2005. The new powers enable the court to make orders in relation to not only property and affairs but also personal welfare.

Individual budgets could transform young disabled people's transition to adults' services, but only if they are implemented with proper support.

The author reports on planned pilot schemes in local authorities and what needs to be considered so that individual budgets can be used by young people in transition.

The Social work Inspection Agency (SWIA) is carrying out performance inspections of all local authority social work services in Scotland. This leaflet summarises some key findings of the inspection of East Ayrshire Council’s social work services, which are set out in the full report published in June 2009.

This progress map summary includes key research findings from a C4EO knowledge review about the diverse needs of different groups of disabled children and their families, and whether services are meeting these needs. The summary includes challenge questions which can be used as tools for strategic leaders in assessing, delivering and monitoring the ways in which the needs of disabled children from differentiated groups are met.

Trusted assessors are support workers who have the skills to provide older and disabled people with equipment to help them to maintain their independence. This document aims to inform professional development and training activity relating to equipment provision. It is divided into four parts.

The importance of meeting the social care needs of cancer patients and their carers is discussed. The article draws on findings of a report from Macmillan Cancer Support.

A Cancer Information and Support Service in County Durham, which is financed by the local PCT and also includes a welfare rights officer employed by the council is also briefly described.

Systematic mapping is a transparent technique for describing research literature on a broad topic. It allows us to take stock of the research available in any given area of social care, so that we can decide how to develop it. A map provides both a searchable database for researchers and policy makers, and a stand-alone piece of work describing the literature on that topic.

The JRF's public consultation revealed a strong sense of unease about some of the changes shaping British society. This Viewpoint continues the discussion about modern ‘socialevils’ on the theme of ‘inequality’. Jeremy Seabrook argues that, in the face of extraordinary imbalances in society, the myth that accumulating wealth is the supreme human purpose needs to be replaced before any improvement will occur.