Community care policy

When Social Services Departments were formed, the intention was to co-ordinate their activities as far as possible with health services. The Griffiths report on Community Care, published in 1988, proposed a different kind of arrangement. Rather than depending on co-ordination and integration of services, there should be one service with clearly defined responsibility, which would commission services from others. This function, in the case of community care, would be performed by Social Services Departments (Social Work Departments in Scotland). Each budget would be redirected to come under the SSD's control. In principle, the role of social services departments would be the purchasing of care from a range of providers. The departments were to develop the range of provision they need by making contracts with providers for services. Care managers were to be responsible for allocating resources and setting priorities; practitioners would assess individual cases and guide the selection for each person. (2)

Although the government announced that Griffiths would be implemented, the reform of community care stopped short of this. Care management in practice is unlikely to be devolved close to the practitioner level; there are not multiple purchasers, but one main purchaser - the Social Services Department; and there is much more emphasis on co-ordination than on choice and the market. The systems which have been put in place seem at first blush to have more in common with the planning of the 70s than with market ideology, and in practice emphasis on co-ordinated activity with other services has increased rather than diminished. Current indications are that the services have become disorganised and demoralised.

9. The Police service in Britain.

Police forces are strategically managed by a Police Authority, or Board, that ensures there is local

accountability for policing. Their duties include:

- Negotiating and aligning policing and community safety priorities,

- Working with Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnership (CDRP) partners and other local bodies.

- Assessing the success of locally developed strategies to tackle anti-social behaviour and volume

and violent crime at basic command unit and neighbourhood level

- Ensuring adjustments are put into place and remedial action taken where necessary.

The tripartite system of police accountability

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: Responsibilities are distributed between the Home

Office, the local police authority, and the chief constable of the force.

However, case-law has made it clear that the police are the servants of the law in terms of their

operational discretion, and are not subject to administrative or political direction in this respect.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) is an organisation that has overall responsibility

for the system and complaints against the police (as well as for the Serious Organised Crime Agency, HM

Revenue and Customs and the UK Border Agency). Any conduct matters, or the consideration of

appeals made by members of the public about the way their complaints were handled, also fall under

the IPCC remit.

(iii) Cost of the police force

£4,683mn: Total grant allocated to the police by government in England and Wales for 2009/2010.

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But

the total annual budget of the Police Service is £17.5bn

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, more than half the entire public order and

safety budget (which includes fire services, law courts and prison services).

The government grant to the police increased by more than £3.7billion between 1998 -2011 – this is an

increase of 60%.