Blairs new social exclusion policy

Blair in families Pledge....

Well I have to hand it to Blair, I may not like him alot, But this new programme he is introducing is well overdue.

The Prime Minister warned some aspects of social exclusion were "deeply intractable" with the most socially excluded often very hard to reach.

He was making a speech at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation in York on the fight to end social exclusion.

I for one welcome it, I know what social exclusion feels like.

I just hope it works.


Link

[edit on 5-9-2006 by spencerjohnstone]

Well sounds noble enough .

But . . . I got a question . . . who is going to monitor the families that are dysfunctional .

Actually who is going to dictate which family is dysfunctional and which one is not.

Can it become a conflict of interest? Between parents the government and the children best interest?

The biggest problem is that this will yet another case of all spin and no action, for instance they claimed that they were going to save £60mil by 2008 fr4om the DWP yet they spent £141 mil on the computer system that was supposed to bring these saving and at the end of it the computer system has now been shelved link and in another case they originaly used education, education, education as their mantra yet now they have done a hatchet job on adult education funding which means if you did badly at school and you now want to improve yourself and your employability you have to get yourself into debt

So a computerisation scheme failed.

....and what? It happens sometimes, unfortunately.

This sometimes happens when you are trying to break new ground and link up disparate old clerical systems spread all over the country and do something no-one has attempted before.

.....and if you are going to try and say that all the additional investment in education since this government came to power is worthless because you've found a part of the adult further education system you don't like?!



Unfortunate as it may be adult education has always been the 'cinderella' of the education system.
Most people when given the choice usually back the idea that the education of the nations children and young adults should come first (which it has - massively - under this government......the largest sustained increase in education spending to record levels post-war, no less).

But even so whilst it may not be perfection the facts are that this government has increased investment by a very large amount in the further education sector (a far larger increase than anything seen under the only realistic - tory - alternative).
From the Guardian education supplement -

Bill Rammell, the further education minister, said: "Older learners, like other learners, have benefited significantly from the £2.5bn - or 48% real term - increase in further education expenditure since 1997.

"The numbers aged 60-plus have increased by over 40,000, or approximately 50% over that period."

education.guardian.co.uk...



[edit on 5-9-2006 by sminkeypinkey]

Can it become a conflict of interest? Between parents the government and the children best interest?

Well alot of the news agencies over here in the UK are calling it as part of Blairs Legacy Tour, weither anyone believes this or not is a mater off opinion.

Like all his other policies I will wait and seeif he will implement it, until the next Gov comes into power, and does away with it. (More tax payers money down the toilet pan).

Currently Blair is socially excluded not just within the Labour party but also the wider opinion polls.
This is why his social exclusion policy might work; if people can be focussed on controversial measures to interfere with the lives of ordinary Chavs then it might just be that we see him in office for a while longer.
However the reality is that people are saying “you can dream of excluding whoever you like; because right now we wish to exclude you from politics”

The Idea
Statistics tell a lot and they form the backbone of our individual understanding of risk. So I agree statistics should be used to help deliver the work of social services more effectively. Of course they can be over relied on; but if used properly then they ultimately amount to one more tool in the arsenal. That said they’re use is hardly invaluable ether.

It’s Blair’s general approach to social services which I find dysfunctional. He thinks government employed social service workers can go into people’s homes and act as a mini police force. I guess they will be welcome? Will the family really leave the Marianna plants on the window still or will they instead put them up in the attic? If the granddads a paedophile don’t you think he will stop molesting little Johnny at least until the social workers close the door?

Suggestion1
I think the way to make it work is to interview the children at school on their home life. This needn’t target just children whose parents have (say) been to prison more than three times; it could be a classroom activity. School diaries and other things are a useful ways of developing both reading and writing skills whilst simultaneously seeing directly into a Childs life.

In any case Social Service workers are already quite effective at what they do (identifying problems) what they aren’t so good at is taking children away from their abusive parents. So ultimately it’s not more power (in the way of bigger eyes) social services needs but instead more consistent action.
I hate the adoption system because right now it often introduces children to several different families in very short amounts of time. This unstable search for a stable background often has the effect of messing them up some more.

Suggestion 2
Personally I think the solution is to create state boarding schools where children can be taken away from their parents completely until the parents can prove before a family court that they are suitable (on a guilty to proven innocent basis). And I think a child should only go back to their parents if they want to.
This sounds harsh on the parents but given that they would already have done something seriously wrong to have their children taken away in the first place
I think it’s only fair that we guarantee a child is taken away from one guaranteed safe environment (state boarding school) into another guaranteed safe one (a real family home).

Summary
I think Blair’s current approach risks only giving parents forms to fill in, and parenting test exams (which like any qualification you never have to implement, no matter how well you learn it). Ultimately logic dictates that good parents who need help will ask for it (when it’s offered in an available fashion). So Blair’s idea of pre-emptive compulsory “help” is a waist of time; I agree screening should be pre-emptive, but believe help should always be voluntary, and only action can be compulsory.