Contents

Enabling Information: A report on improving access and raising standards in information services for disabled people and their carers in Scotland.

Part 4 Recommendations

1 The Secretary of State should promote the establishment of an advisory body to drive forward:

• the framing of national policy in this area;
• the development and monitoring of national standards;
• the functioning of the Scottish disability information service; and
• the convening of regular forums for the sharing of knowledge and experience between national providers, and between national and local providers; and to
• provide feedback to the Secretary of State about the provision of information to disabled people and their carers at national and local level.

2 This advisory body should be made up of disabled people and carers, particularly those who represent organisations of and for disabled people and their carers, as well as other people with appropriate expertise. Members should as far as possible represent the range of types of impairment, as well as rural and remote parts of Scotland, and ethnic minority groups. Members should be paid a daily allowance.

3 The Scottish Office should provide the necessary funding through the advisory body for a Scottish national disability information service whose functions would include the distribution of material created by other bodies, the creation of information products, advising on the applicability of UK information in Scotland, and providing advice and training to local information providers. The service should not be funded to provide information or advice directly to members of the public.

4 The Secretary of State, in the interests of ensuring that the policy of care in the community is implemented consistently and to high standards, should issue guidance to local authorities about:

1. a the desirability of implementing local information and advice strategies within the new unitary authorities; and
2. b effective information provision at local level, and give examples of good practice in this area.

5 The Secretary of State should issue a national community care charter to the new shadow authorities elected in April 1995 which will become the new authorities in April 1996, identifying the legislative framework, and establishing core standards which should apply in all local community care provision. These would include the crucial role of information in community care and the importance of making information available in forms and languages which are most appropriate for clients.

6 In the funding of national organisations, the Secretary of State should consider:

1. a how far those bodies are meeting the national standards; and
2. b the extent to which national bodies are meeting the needs of local information services.

7 The Secretary of State should ensure that accurate records are kept about the amount of money which organisations which receive funding from the Scottish Office devote to information services.

8 The Secretary of State should conduct a consultation exercise on the basis of this report, with particular reference to:

• the creation of an advisory body, its functions, composition, and establishment; and
• the establishment of a Scottish disability information service, its functions and composition, and alternative methods of setting it up.

2 Addressed to local authorities

1 Local authorities should draw up and implement information and advice strategies as outlined in this report, with guidance from the Scottish Office.

2 Within these strategies the need for targeted services for disabled people should be recognised, including:

• general information and advice;
• advice about aids and equipment; and
• information and advice about independent living.

3 The local strategy should be based on the principles described in Part 3, section 1 of this paper, and should involve representatives from both the statutory and voluntary sectors.

4 Within the strategy, the importance of creating and encouraging one stop information and advice should be highlighted, and consideration should be given to ways in which networking between the whole range of agencies can be encouraged.

5 Local authorities should address in their strategy the particular problems highlighted in this report, for instance the need to raise the profile of libraries as sources of information, as well as the particular needs of children, ethnic minority groups, carers, and those living in remote or rural areas.

6 Local authorities should draw up community care charters based on any national charter or other framework document drawn up by the Scottish Office, or ensure that it meets the requirements of any national community care charter.

7 Local strategies should give a high priority to means of raising the awareness of all the local community, and especially of disabled people and their carers, of appropriate sources of information and advice.

3 Addressed to professional bodies

1 Service providers at national and local level, in the statutory and independent sector, for instance in the fields of social work, health and housing, should receive information training as part of their professional training.

2 The various parts of the health service should address the pressing need to improve their role in the provision of information and advice, whether by becoming involved in local strategy groups, working with local forums to improve referral to appropriate sources of information, or through direct funding of advice services in health centres or hospitals.

3 The possibility of providing financial incentives, through the GP contract, to GPs and health centres which provide information and advice services should be explored.

4 Addressed to service providers

1 Service providers at both national and local level in the statutory and voluntary sectors should receive disability and race equality awareness training, and should liaise better with disability groups.

2 All service providers should take account of the national standards to be agreed for use in relation to information and advice services for disabled people, and seek to comply with those standards.