Recently in Scotland Category

Two stories today illustrate the worrying levels of care for vulnerable people in hospitals. The Care Quality Commission criticised as "unacceptable" failures by hospitals to meet older people's nutritional and dignity needs.

The CQC regulates in England only.

However the Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland has reported concerns surrounding inappropriate care and treatment involving Mrs V, a woman diagnosed with dementia, who died in a general hospital in December 2008, following a short course of treatment. Although it adds that visits to other general hospitals suggest the case was not typical, the case did underline why standards for the care of people with dementia were required.

Campaigners have backed greater access to supported employment as part of its package of measures to improve the lives of people with autism.

In response to the Scottish government's draft autism strategy respondents said they wanted greater access to mentoring and supported employment in rural communities.

Among the other responses were:
- Faster and more integrated diagnosis services
- Clearer care pathways
- Autism awareness campaign in schools
- A review and evaluation of existing research to support services

The full analysis of the consultation responses can be seen on the Scottish government website.

A new law in Scotland aims to protect victims of forced marriage and prevent them from occurring.
The Forced Marriage (Protection and Jurisdiction) (Scotland) Act 2011 introduces forced marriage protection orders to allow the courts to take actions necessary to prevent marriages and protect victims, such as taking them to a place of safety or preventing them from being taken abroad.
Breaching an order will see perpetrators face a sentence of two years in jail, a £10,000 fine, or both.
The law mirrors the Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Act 2007, which covers England and Wales and also introduced forced marriage protection orders.

One group at particular risk are people with learning disabilities, as we discussed recently in a piece that identified the dilemmas and barriers facing social workers in this area of practice.

Could the increasing policy divergence between the four UK nations make it difficult for social work professionals to move across the borders for jobs?

So far this isn't a widespread thought, though it is one that is beginning to be uttered.

As Jon Skone, director of social services in Pembrokeshire and county director of health with the Hywel Dda Health Board, said to me in relation to Wales, the systems social workers and directors work in within those two countries are physically and structurally different from each other.

Hence personalisation is different between the two as is the split between adults and children's departments in England, which remain combined in Wales.

So if someone has to move to another of the home nations to be with a partner, say from Wales to England, that person would be up against people who have worked in England before and know the systems well. Unfortunately one can imagine the outcome.

Skone admits: "I would be anxious about going in a job in England because I don't understand what a director of  a social services department does anymore. I don't have a feel about that and what does personalisation mean in England?"

Does this matter? In itself no but in somewhere like Wales where there is a small and shrinking pool of directors there may be difficulties in finding replacements, though not insurmountable.

To a degree this links with stories of social work students from Wales who study in England or other parts of the UK struggling to make ends meet after no longer being eligible for bursaries from the Welsh regulator.

We've had campaigns against disability benefit reform, campaigns against redundancies and various national groups speaking out for their own section of the sector or clients.

Now, a group of charities, baronesses and academics have launched a consorted campaign against public sector funding cuts.

The Campaign for a Fairer Society says it "wants power and control to shift from government to citizens, families and communities. But we don't want the government's 'Big Society' if that means a loss of basic human rights and unfair cuts focused on the most vulnerable".

It has even got a list of seven principles for a fairer society.

Supporters include Alzheimer's Scotland, Baroness Campbell (herself a well known disability right campaigner) and Jim Mansell (an expert in learning disabilities).

Image by Northampton Museum on Flickr

There are a couple of articles on The Guardian that I want to draw readers' attention to.

The first is a report from Carers Scotland that has found that carers suffer more illness and disability.

The study found that carers are twice as likely to be hit by illness and disability as the rest of the population.

This chimes with a survey carried out by the Princess Royal Trust for Carers, which pointed towards a growing financial hardship for carers.

There's also a really interesting feature about older drug addicts and asks whether the system is prepared to deal with the rising numbers.

Councils will probably find it tough to maintain services in the face of big central government funding cuts.

That's if the example of Edinburgh City Council is anything to go by.

Scottish councils found out how big their grants would be last week and so have had a bit longer to digest the implications.

Paul Edie, lead councillor for adult social care in Edinburgh, said: "We will be struggling to stand still on social care provision."

I think we can expect councils south of the Scottish border to feel very similar come the end of the day.

Image of Edinburgh Castle by http 2007 on Flickr

The extent of the cuts facing social care in Scotland have been revealed by a survey of directors, leaked to the Herald newspaper, with preventive services in the firing line.
The Association of Directors of Social Work poll found that a quarter of respondents (6 out of 25) are predicting cuts to preventive services for children and older people.
One director said: "In all services we will be moving away from our aspiration to deliver early intervention and preventative services ... and focusing on delivering our statutory responsibilities."
This is an inevitable response to the combination of budget cuts and rising demand (though Scottish councils will be better off than counterparts in England) but seems to be a recipe for storing up problems for the future. This conflict between early intervention and statutory services has been raised by my colleague, Judy Cooper, in relation to provision for vulnerable children. It will be a motif that will dominate the next few years in social care.

Further to my colleague Vern's blog about health secretary Andrew Lansley's appearance on BBC Radio 4's You & Yours programme there are some interesting parts of it worth drawing people's attention to.

Firstly the government appears blindly optimistic that it has provided enough for social care and local government in general or possibly it's a touching faith that local councils will do the right thing.

Despite being played a report outlining numerous concerns from charities about cuts in people's personal budgets, which also mentioned pending court cases over assessments for personal budgets and amounts these people ended up with, Lansley insisted there was no need for councils to cut eligibility because the government had provided sufficient resources.

I just wonder how long the government can continue to hold this line.

He also insisted the quality of the assessment is key and that it was for local councils to decide on priorities.

Other interesting aspects from the show concerned the regions and especially Wales and Northern Ireland. In Northern Ireland the health minister has called for an additional £1.4bn a year or the country risked facing a drastically different health service.

Social care is already feeling the pressure with waiting lists for domiciliary care packages at an all time high and pressure is on to keep a hold on new nursing home placements.

Wales is also facing residential care problems and more onus is expected on domiciliary care. 

Scotland is trying to develop more care at home and less in hospitals for elderly people through its £70m Change Fund.

However its free personal care at home policy for the elderly is obviously sacrosanct.