I'm starting to feel that the personalisation agenda in adult social care is becoming a bit like motherhood and apple pie. You can hardly be in favour of depersonalising services can you?

I think this is a case in which use of language can hinder debate. There are some serious issues to discuss about the spread of individual budgets, self-assessment and direct payments: will direct payment levels be high enough or could they be a back door for cutting costs?; how will personal assistants be properly trained and recognised and adequately rewarded without a workforce infrastructure behind them?; how is personalisation compatible with tendering exercises that leave disabled people's organisations out in the cold when it comes to contracts for direct payment support?; and what will be the role of social workers/care managers in this brave new world?

A bit like anyone who questions the spread of the internet in journalism today, I fear anyone who raises questions about personalisation will be cast as representing the past and, worse, being anti-service user. This can't be allowed to happen.

I'm not sure everything about personalisation is necessarily good - there are people out there who don't want to end up as employers and have all the added stress that entails, they just want to receive a good quality service from their local council. Also, there are lots of staff who don't necessarily want to work directly for an individual but are happier working for a council with all the rights that entails.

I agree that personalisation is not always what it's cracked up to be. I have heard service users complain that they have had to advertise for long periods of time to recruit personal advisors only for them to leave shortly afterwards.

I like neither personalisation nor apple pie. Well actually, personalisation is good in theory but it's what is being introduced dressed up as personalisation that's the problem