Legal Liability and Accountability for Child-care Decisions

Correspondence to Tom Guthrie, School of Law, University of Glasgow, Stair Building, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QQ, UK. Summary Although decisions taken by social workers in cases of suspectedchild abuse and in looking after children in their care maybe the subject of public enquiries and press comment, they willnot in general incur any legal liability to compensate childrenwho claim to have suffered as a result of these decisions. Thisarticle examines the reasons why such liability is excludedby the courts, as well as looking briefly at other mechanismsfor challenging social workers'decisions. It is argued thatthe grounds for excluding liability are speculative and thatintroducing liability to this area might encourage good practice.     

In Search of House Effects: A Comparison of Responses to Various Questions byfferent Survey OrganizationsTOM

This paper examines the responses to various questions askedby different survey organizations. It considers the questionof whether different survey organizations produce similar measurementsof public opinion or whether house effects produce dissimilarmeasurements of the same population.     

NCH's Children in Danger campaign

SUMMARY. This article describes the thinking behind the National Children's Home's (NCH) Children in Danger campaign which began in 1985. It discusses the difficulties and benefits for a service providing child care voluntary organisation involving itself in social policy campaigning. The reasons behind the campaign are outlined, its implementation and its effects both on the public and the organisation.     

MANAGING THE ENVIRONMENTAL EXTERNALITIES OF TRAFFIC LOGISTICS: THE ISSUE OF EMISSIONS

Companies are increasingly being held accountable for the life‐cycle impact of their products and services. Transportation is frequently a major component of this life‐cycle impact. Hence, to reduce total environmental impact, logistics managers will have to become more sophisticated in their understanding of how they can reduce the environmental impact of their transportation operations, without negatively affecting the cost or effectiveness of these operations. In line with this mandate, we quantify the dynamic impact of road vehicles on the environment. In most emission models, a constant speed is used depending only on the specific road type. Using such a model will lead to an underestimation of the effective emissions. It turns out that the differences with a more realistic dynamic assessment model are significant. The analysis here suggests that the policy consequences of these differences for both public sector managers and private companies are potentially quite important.     

Engineering education on production management. Different levels and degrees in five European countries: a comparison

The paper summarizes the results of the work-session ‘Education on Production Management’, organized during the Workshop and Summer School ‘Advanced Topics in Production Systems Design and Management’, held in Varenna (Lecco, Italy), from 1–4 June 1994. The organization of studies in the production management field in Denmark, France, Germany, Italy and Norway is outlined. A comparison between them shows a range of different solutions that must be understood to reach the goal of an effective exchange of production management people throughout the European Community.     

Social experiences and variations in economic beliefs among Canadian workers

Cette communication est consacrée à l'évaluation de l'importance relative du procAeGs de travail, du marché de l'emploi, de l'état du marché du logement et de la vie au foyer, de la sous-culture ouvrière et des variables eocio-démographiques en tant que déterminants des croyances en matière d'éonomie chez les travailleurs canadiens. En préeentant son analyse cornparée de données provenant du Class Structure Project de 1982 et de l'Étude de l'élection nationale de 1984, l'auteur en tire deux grandes conclusions: 1/ que la place qu'on occupe sur les marchés du travail internes des entreprises influe sur toute une série de croyances en matière d'éonomie, tout comme le font l'appartenance de classe historique et actuelle; 2/que le contenu conceptuel du travail et le contrǒle social en milieu de travail n'ont qu'une faible influence sur la plupart des croyances. Ces conclusions font supposer qu'une approche de l'étude de la stratification de la classe ouvrière qui met l'accent sur toute l'expérience de vie des gens now aiderait à mieux comprendre les motifs et lea formes de la mobilisation ouvrière dans le Canada d'aujourd'hui. This research assesses the relative importance of labour process, labour market, housing market/home life, working-class subculture and Social/demographic variables as determinants of Canadian workers’ economic beliefs. Data from the 1982 Class Structure Project and 1984 National Election Study are comparatively analysed. Major findings include: 1/location in the internal labour markets within firms has an impact on a wide range of workers’ economic beliefs, as does past and present class affiliations; 2/conceptual job content and on-the-job social control have little influence on most beliefs. These findings suggest that an approach to working-class stratification which focusses on the lifelong experiences of persons should help us to understand patterns of working-class mobilization in contemporary Canada.     

Regression Analysis for Multistate Models Based on a Pseudo-value Approach, with Applications to Bone Marrow Transplantation Studies

Abstract.  Typically, regression analysis for multistate models has been based on regression models for the transition intensities. These models lead to highly nonlinear and very complex models for the effects of covariates on state occupation probabilities. We present a technique that models the state occupation or transition probabilities in a multistate model directly. The method is based on the pseudo-values from a jackknife statistic constructed from non-parametric estimators for the probability in question. These pseudo-values are used as outcome variables in a generalized estimating equation to obtain estimates of model parameters. We examine this approach and its properties in detail for two special multistate model probabilities, the cumulative incidence function in competing risks and the current leukaemia-free survival used in bone marrow transplants. The latter is the probability a patient is alive and in either a first or second post-transplant remission. The techniques are illustrated on a dataset of leukaemia patients given a marrow transplant. We also discuss extensions of the model that are of current research interest.