Fears over shake-up in adult social care
A Labour councillor has claimed approving a redesign of adult social care services before the draft Older People's Strategy was putting "the cart before the horse."
Councillor Norman Hampshire, Dunbar and East Linton, made the comment during a debate at a full meeting of East Lothian Council.
Gordon Miller, acting head of social care, said that like many social work services in Scotland, the county's adult social care service has struggled to meet growing and changing demand, brought about by legislation, demography, changing public expectations, and local and national policy that aimed to support people to live independently in communities wherever possible.
Outcomes
A wide range of services were provided for older people and adults with disabilities, he added.
Mr Miller explained: "While the Social Work Inspection Agency noted that social work services in East Lothian provide good outcomes for people who use them, it is clear that without major redesign of how we deliver services, adult social care will be unable to keep pace with growing and changing needs."
Councillor Hampshire said: "You produced a draft strategy and there are lots of implications within that draft strategy that a lot of people out there are very, very unhappy with and for me in my own community, there's Belhaven Hospital.
Mentioned
"We are now moving forward to make changes to that service in this paper and to look to make savings on what we are doing just now.
"The Older People's Strategy is mentioned in the paper.
"It is much more appropriate for the Older People's Strategy to be approved by the council before we start making changes to the service."
Full report in East Lothian News, February 26, 2010 It’s not the way things should be carried out.”
Councillor Ruth Currie, SNP, commented: “We are in no way trying to put the cart before the horse. To allow adult social care to develop in the way it has to for the future, we need to approve the recommendations in this paper. The Older People’s Strategy lies alongside it and much of what is happening here will help the implementation of what comes out of the final recommendation on the Older People’s Strategy.”
She said the draft strategy would come before the council for debate next month.
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Wednesday 08 February 2012
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