© British Association of Social Workers
Developmental Social Care: Experimental Community Mental Handicap Teams in Nottinghamshire
Correspondence to Professor Adrian Webb, Dept of Social Sciences, Loughborough University, Loughborough, Leics. LE11 3TU.
Summary
Social care is an important field of practice in which policy proposals and prescriptions need to be tested systematically against field experience. The article reports on research evaluation of a ‘field experiment’ in the use of multi-disciplinary teams to develop as well as to deliver services. Although based in the care of people with learning disabilities, the work outlined and the conclusions drawn have a far wider relevance. They relate to such key issues as: the long-standing debate about specialist and generic modes of working; the advocacy of teams based in small neighbourhood patches and the assertion that such teams are the best way of working with informal networks and non-statutory agencies; the official enthusiasm for ‘mobilizing resources’ and casting social services in an enabling role; and the advocacy of a demarcation between ‘purchaser’ and provider roles. Above all, the article addresses the issue of how sufficient, varied, and responsive services may be generated in order to make a reality of community care.