DISABILITIES

Fulfilling and rewarding lives: the strategy for adults with autism in England (3rd March 2010)

The first autism strategy for England will kick-start fundamental change in public services helping adults with autism to live independent lives and find work.

Autism is a lifelong developmental disability and although some people can live relatively independently, others will have high dependency needs requiring a lifetime of specialist care. There are approximately 400,000 adults with ASC in England, around half of whom have a learning disability.

Published on 3 March 2010, the strategy sets a clear framework for all mainstream services across the public sector to work together for adults with autism.

Strategy

PUBLIC SERVICES

Oneplace National Overview Report (24th February 2010)
This report looks at the findings from the first year of Comprehensive Area Assessment (CAA). It is published by the six inspectorates responsible for assessing local public services in England - the Audit Commission, Care Quality Commission, Her Majesty’s Inspectorates of Constabulary, Prisons and Probation, and Ofsted.

The report concludes that local public bodies need to learn from each other and work more closely together if they are to improve services and increase value for money.
Report

PUBLIC SERVICES

Personalisation and the social care 'revolution': future options for the reform of public services (29th January 2010)
The Health Services Management Centre (HSMC) has recently launched a new policy paper entitled Personalisation and the social care 'revolution': future options for the reform of public services.

The paper written by Simon Duffy, Director of the Centre for Welfare Reform, John Waters, of In Control and HSMC's Professor Jon Glasby, introduces the concept of personal budgets as 'Conditional Resource Entitlements' (CREs) - a means of targeting resources towards those who are eligible, but with specific conditions attached. The authors suggest personal budgets, if framed as a form of CRE, can form part of a wider strategy for welfare reform which places emphasis on promoting citizenship and personal responsibility.
Paper

PUBLIC SERVICES

Nothing but the truth? A discussion paper (5th November 2009)
The high-profile failure of public authorities to both safeguard Baby Peter in Haringey, and prevent the high number of deaths in Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, has directed attention to the accuracy and reliability of the data underpinning local service delivery.

This paper sets out important issues as the basis for discussion on how to ensure data about local public services is fit for purpose. It asks if citizens, along with frontline staff, managers, politicians, central government and local public service regulators, can have confidence in the data they rely on. And if not, what needs to be done about it?
Paper

PUBLIC SERVICES

Working together - public services on your side (March 2009)
This document details the steps the Government is taking to give people, communities and frontline staff the information and real power they need to personalise public services. Reflecting their local and individual needs will create a richer, fairer and safer society.
Document

PUBLIC SERVICES

Comprehensive Area Assessment (Framework Document) (10th February 2009)
Comprehensive Area Assessment (CAA) is the new framework for the independent assessment of local public services in England. This document, from the Audit Commission, sets out how CAA will be delivered from April 2009. CAA provides an independent assessment of how well people are being served by their local public services. It focuses on how well these services, working together, are achieving improvement and progressing towards long-term goals.
Document

PUBLIC SERVICES

Prospects for more local, more personalised public services: a North East perspective (19th January 2009)

This discussion paper sets out some of the key questions that Institute for Public Policy Research (ippr) north's Commission on Public Sector Reform in the North East will be considering over the coming months, and the analysis that forms the backdrop to these questions. The commission brings together a number of senior figures from the region's public, private and voluntary sectors and is looking in particular at four key public service sectors: Education, Health, Welfare-to-work and Criminal Justice.
Paper

PUBLIC SERVICES

Public officials and community involvement in local services (6th November 2008)
An examination of community involvement in the governance of local services, with an emphasis on the role of public officials. The role played by public officials in community engagement has important effects on the extent to which community views can influence local services. This study explores the experiences and views of public officials, comparing a local authority, a police service and a Primary Care Trust in one part of London.
Report
Findings

PUBLIC SERVICES

Person-centred support: What service users and practitioners say (23rd July 2008)
This study examines person-centred support, a key new concern in public services. It does this by bringing together for the first time the views, ideas and experience of service users, face to face practitioners and managers. Government is committed to ‘personalisation’, ‘self-directed support’ and ‘individual budgets’ in social care, aiming for increased choice and control for the people who use services. This is a move away from traditional, 'one-size-fits-all' approaches.
Click here for the Report
Click here for the Findings

PUBLIC SERVICES

Managing financial resources to deliver better public services (20th February 2008)
Since 2003, government departments have improved the management of their finances. But stronger financial management is now more important than ever to ensure that every pound of public money is spent to best effect in an increasingly challenging financial environment. Central government manages more financial resources than ever before, and these are expected to grow to £678 billion a year by 2010-11 – some £11,000 for every person in the UK. But, many departments have tighter settlements under the 2007 Comprehensive Spending Review than they had under previous spending rounds. Today’s report, a follow-up to the NAO’s 2003 report, looks at how capable departments are at managing their financial resources.
Click here for the Full Report
Click here for the Executive Summary
Click here for the Survey Results

PUBLIC SERVICES

Making it Personal (18th January 2008)
Demos has produced a report which advocates a simple yet transformational approach to public services - self-directed services - which allocates people budgets so they can shape, with the advice of professionals and peers, the support they need. Self-directed services, it is argued, will enable people to create solutions that work for them and as a result deliver better value for money for the taxpayer. Such an approach could also empower those least confident.
Click here for the Report