The Personalisation Agenda Dissertation Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 8000 words

The Personalisation Agenda - Dissertation Example In the same year, a concordat was issued between central government, local government and the social care sector. The document is entitled â€Å"Putting People First: A Shared Vision and Commitment to the Transformation of Adult Social Care (2007)† and through it the idea of a personalised adult social care system was first introduced. The plan called for affording people maximum choice and control over the health care and services they receive. The plan dovetails a more broad-based government strategy that included the notion of â€Å"place-shaping† and other concepts contained in the local government white paper â€Å"Strong and Prosperous Communities† (2006). In the 2008 Carers’ Strategy, the New Deal has advanced the initiatives of integrated and personalised services. Carers called for recognition of their work and expertise, better service coordination and information, improved collaboration between staff and agencies, and health and social care. The Carers’ Strategy was arrived at after a wide consultation and with the cooperation and agreement of various government departments. Many of the themes articulated in recent developments in the personalisation agenda are not new, having been contained in the community care reforms under the National Health Service and Community Care Act of 1990. These reforms aimed to develop a needs-led approach wherein new arrangements for assessment and health care management would include individuals receiving tailored packages of care rather than block-contracted services. The practical advantage in the development of individual or personal budgets is the direct payments scheme, initially made available to disabled adults of working age, but since then has been extended to other groups. The success of the scheme covered some 54,000 individuals as of March 2007, including parents who cared for disabled children and young carers, who used direct payments. The use of direct payments actuall y came about as an initiative championed by disabled people. Among the driving forces behind direct payments were the service user movement, the mental health survivor movement, and the social model of disability, which originally took root in the 1970s when people first lobbied for change. Throughout the development of personalisation, key concepts included independent living, participation, control, choice and empowerment. 2.2 The Social Model of Disability The social model of disability was developed in the 1970s by progressive members of the Union of the Physically Impaired Against Segregation (UPIAS), and given academic validity by the works of Finkelstein (1981), Barnes (1991) and Oliver (1996) (cited in Shakespeare & Watson, 2002). The model is now described as the â€Å"ideological litmus test of disability politics in Britain† (Shakespeare & Watson, 2002). It is relied upon when distinguishing among organisations, policies, legislations and concepts regarding the pro gressive view of disability. The core definition of the British social model was first articulated in the UPIAS document â€Å"Fundamental Principles of Disability.† An edited version that was reprinted in Oliver (1996) and Shakespeare and Watson (2002) is reproduced here, for purposes of elucidation, as follows: â€Å"†¦In our view, it is society which disables physically impaired people. Disability is something imposed on top of our