Children’s minister Margaret Hodge has warned that care must be taken to prevent a return to divided social services as the proposals in the green paper are implemented, writes Sally Gillen.
Speaking this week on the ‘Every Child Matters’ consultation paper, which sets out plans for huge structural reform of children’s services, Hodge stressed it was essential to integrate workers. But she said this could not be achieved by joint training or pooled resources alone.
“In the end it is down to willingness to work together,” she told delegates at a conference in London, organised by left-leaning thinktank the Institute of Public Policy Research.
But she added: “We must be careful that new boundaries are not developed and that what led to Seebolm – [when centralised council social services departments were established] - in the 1970s does not happen again.”
The paper, released last week, proposes the new post of director of children’s services whose job it will be to oversee the work of the children’s trust.
