Standards For Disability Information And Advice Provision In Scotland
Prepared by The Scottish Accessible Information Forum
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These Standards have been developed for the Scottish Accessible Information Forum (SAIF) by Michael Bell Associates (MBA) in partnership with the Federation of Independent Advice Centres (FIAC).
SAIF is a project funded by the Scottish Executive until March 2002, based in the Scottish Consumer Council with a brief to carry forward recommendations made by the Scottish Working Group on Information Services for People with Disabilities and Carers. The Standards project was commissioned to meet the recommendations contained in this working group's final report: Enabling Information.
The Standards have been produced at a time of great change with the implementation of the Disability Discrimination Act and the establishment of a Disability Rights Commission. The legislative framework is beginning to encourage greater accessibility although there is a lack of information and co-ordination in response to these changes. Therefore, one of the likely ongoing tasks for SAIF will be to develop Standards and campaign for ever greater improvements.
The Standards themselves are written on the basis of a "social model" rather than a "medical model" of disability. As such, the Standards are designed to encourage disabled people to make demands upon service providers and to participate in ongoing improvements. They have been developed following extensive consultation both with service commissioners and providers and disabled people themselves. However, we expect them to evolve and further develop over time.
The Standards seek to address the concerns raised by disabled people. Focus groups of disabled people indicated that at present a range of very basic needs were not being met by advice and information providers. These included restrictions to:
Some of these issues, such as the physical constraints of existing premises may raise resourcing issues; others, such as staff attitudes may reflect a lack of management commitment to ensure the accessibility of services for disabled people.
The Standards are intended to assist agencies in the voluntary, private and statutory sectors to ensure that disabled people can access effective information and advice services.
The Standards recognise that disabled people access information and advice from a range of agencies. These agencies range from those that specialise in disability issues, through generalist advice services offering their services to all members of the public, to other agencies where information and advice form only a small part of their work. The Standards are designed to be applicable to all of these agencies. However, they are particularly targeted at those agencies that provide a service to all members of the public and are designed to assist them in providing a service to disabled people that is:
Standards are a means of establishing the parameters of a service. Procedures and systems are not prescribed in detail within the Standards nor do they contain targets. They are deliberately designed to identify a range of indicators; they may be used by individual agencies to develop performance targets that can be monitored and reviewed. It is important that they are not seen as providing a maximum level of service, but a framework for continual improvement and development. Future changes in individual agencies need to be informed and developed by the aspirations of disabled people.
The Standards are written to be relevant to all agencies, large and small, urban and rural. Some agencies may well see themselves as being "too small" or "too under-resourced" to meet the Standards. However, limited resources should not be seen as a reason for not striving for high standards. Innovative practices can extend the scope of even small and poorly resourced agencies. Many of the Standards require only the will of the agency to achieve a high standard, to set aside time to look at what is good practice and resolve to implement it.
Similarly, we stress that the Standards are not solely the responsibility of individual agencies. By working together agencies can greatly enhance their capacity to meet the needs of disabled people. The section entitled The Standards & Localities looks at the role that local authorities can take in supporting compliance with the Standards.
The Standards have not been designed to be purely a tool of auditing organisational performance. They are a tool for disabled people, service providers and service commissioners to assist in realising the aspirations for services to be accessible to all. As well as providing organisations with a means of reviewing past and current activities they should assist in the future development of services.
The Standards aim to be dynamic. They include guidance on how to involve disabled people or their representatives as part of the feedback loop to ensure that the Standards continue to develop and meet their needs.
The Standards include three separate components:
SAIF is planning a programme of work to support the implementation of the Standards. Further details are available from the SAIF office.
The provision of good quality information and advice should be seen as central to any service. Without access to this information people's capacity to access services or to exercise their rights is severely restricted. As such, information and advice should play a key role in any strategy to promote social inclusion.
Advice should be about more than the resolution of problems; it should be about presenting options. As such, advice and information needs to consider more than just the presenting issues. It should include the identification of:
The term "advice" needs some definition as it is used in a number of ways by different organisations and even within single organisations. We have taken the term to be a generic one relating to a range of complementary activities and processes. We define advice as:
The advice service will need to decide which of these interventions it is competent and sufficiently resourced to undertake. Within this framework the role of the individual adviser is to work in partnership with the client to assess which of these interventions is appropriate.
Each of these activities may be more or less resource intensive and require either general or specific skills from the adviser. At this time there is no "industry" standard definition of the advice process. We have broken these activities down into three principal categories:
Level One - Information, Signposting and Explanation:
This work refers to activities such as providing information either orally or in writing, signposting or referring the user to other available resources or services, and, the explanation of technical terms or clarifying an official document, such as a tenancy agreement or a possession order.
Level Two - Casework:
Initially this work will include:
Once it has been established that the person has a case that can be pursued, activities may include:
Level Three - Assistance:
This work includes a range of further actions arising from the casework undertaken above. This preparation may have been undertaken by the adviser or may have come to the adviser by referral from another organisation or adviser. The principal activities may include:
Strategic Work:
In addition to these principal activities advice providers may also have a role in Policy Comment. In this they use their experiences in providing direct advice to the public to inform and alert policy makers to issues of concern and promote specific changes in law or practice that may help larger numbers of people. An example of this approach may involve an advice centre gathering statistics on repossessions arising from rent arrears in an attempt to secure a change in policy from the local authority or other social landlord.
In considering the issue of the involvement of service users and disabled people we have drawn upon a model that covers the four key areas of organisational activity. These are:
Since the Griffiths Report into Community Care there has been a growing emphasis upon involving individuals in determining their own independent living packages. This is based upon the assumption that individual interventions have the best chance of success where recipients are actively engaged in determining what they may receive. Whilst developed for personal social services, this principle may also be applied to the provision of advice and information.
This is not without boundaries and is particularly constrained by the capacity of an agency to deliver what is requested and by available resources. However, even within these constraints, there is substantial anecdotal evidence of resources being reallocated to reflect users' own perceptions of needs rather than provision determined solely by professionals. Such an approach should not only lead to the more efficient allocation of resources and more appropriate services but also by so empowering individuals to a lessening of demand for services in the longer term.
There are four key stages and different organisations will be at different points in this continuum. The stages are:
These Standards aim to reflect these stages. However, as a minimum we suggest that the Standards will need to encourage organisations to inform and consult with service users.
These Standards have been produced at a time of great change in both legislation regarding the rights of disabled people and the structures of Government that may assist in enforcing these rights. These include:
The Scottish Parliament is already committed to pursuing an "equalities agenda" and it is likely that issues around promoting "social inclusion" will be high priorities for the incoming Members of the Scottish Parliament.
The establishment of a Disability Rights Commission to promote the needs of disabled people may bring about radical change. At this stage, whilst there will be a commissioner for Scotland, the authority of this body will rest in Westminster. At the time of writing no-one quite knows how this body will work and how it will relate to the other commissions for race equality (Commission for Racial Equality) and around gender (the Equal Opportunities Commission).
For local authorities, health boards and others with specific duties regarding the planning and provision of services to disabled people the most pressing area is, perhaps, the introduction of the remaining provisions of Part III of the Disability Discrimination Act, 1995. These provisions come into force in two stages:
From October 1999:
From 2004:
Alongside the DDA other relevant Legislation and Regulation includes:
Care Management and Assessment - Summary of Practice Guidance published by the Department of Health, the Social Services Inspectorate and the Scottish Office Social Work Services Group (1991) is concerned that services should strive to meet the needs of disadvantaged individuals more effectively. It states:
"In the past mainstream services have not satisfactorily addressed the needs of disabled people and those from black and minority ethnic communities...if agencies are to take full advantage of the opportunities offered by care management to rid themselves of discriminatory practices they will require:
It should be noted that people have a legal right to have access to information held about them by social work departments and health boards etc.
As far as social work files are concerned, the relevant legislation is: Access to Personal Files (Social Work)(Scotland) Regulations 1989. This legislation was added to by the Scottish Office Guidance to Local Authorities from the Social Work Services Group (Circular SW2/89).
Under these two pieces of legislation people have a right to see and, if requested, have copies of information held by the Social Work Department, including files, Community Care Assessments etc. There are some restrictions on the type of information e.g. if a third party is identified his/her permission must be obtained before disclosure. The same applies to information provided by other professionals e.g. G.P.s etc. The Social Work Department must respond within 40 days.
As far as health records are concerned, the relevant empowering legislation is: Access to Health Records Act 1990 and specifically in Scotland, Access to Health Records (Steps to secure compliance and complaints procedure) (Scotland) Regulations 1991, Statutory Instrument 1191/2295. Applications have to be in writing and a response should be received within 21 days if it is recent information or 40 days otherwise. It is important to note that people do not have a right to information older than 1st November 1991, the day the Act came into effect.
Anyone who uses any social work service is entitled to be told by the Social Work Department of any other services which the local authority provides which might be relevant to his/her needs. The Department is also expected to inform people about any other services that they are aware other organisations provide. S1(2)(b) of the Chronically Sick and Disabled Person's Act (Scotland) 1972 as amended by s9 of the Disabled Persons (Services, Consultation and Representation) Act 1986.
This is potentially important as it says that there is a clear duty on social work departments to 'ensure' that people receive this information (rather than, for example, leaving it up on notice boards).
The Regulations and Guidance to the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 state that local authorities must publish information about relevant services they provide for children, including disabled children, by 1st April 1998. By this date they must also have produced children's services plans. Information should also include details of services provided by voluntary organisations or others, if those services are ones which the authority has the power to provide.
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SAIF C/o The Scottish Consumer Council 100 Queen Street Glasgow G1 3DN Tel: 0141 226 5261 Fax: 0141 221 0731 Minicom: 0141 226 8459 E-mail: Web-site: http://www.connections.gcal.ac.uk/saif/
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