Whatever Happened to Teamwork? Reflections on CMHTs

Correspondence to Morag McGrath, Centre for Social Policy Research and Development, Bryn Afon, University College of North Wales, Bangor, Gwynedd LL57 2DG. Summary This paper is based on a survey of Community Mental HandicapTeams (CMHTs) in Wales undertaken in 1987. After briefly describingthe range of community teams, individual planning is examined.It is argued that although other models for service co-ordinationat a case level are possible, teamwork has the advantage ofalso providing a framework for service planning and development.Teams' progress in planning and their perceptions of barriersto effective planning are outlined. Despite deficiencies indifferent areas of team functioning, teams can be seen to havemade much progress in terms of service development. Apart fromresource limitation, a central theme in discussing constraintsto more effective team working was the appropriate level ofdelegated responsibility. It is suggested that this is a crucialfactor when considering three important concepts in the All-WalesStrategy for the development of mental handicap services—needs-ledservices, local community-based services and consumer participation.These three concepts are explored within a continuum of teamdevelopment from ‘traditional’ through ‘transitional’to a ‘needs-led’ service model. The necessary managementsupport to achieve a needs-led model is summarized. Althoughfurther research is required to evaluate the different modelsof multi-disciplinary teams and the new arrangements advocatedin the White Paper of separating service assessment and purchasingfrom service delivery, the experience of the CMHTs in Walespoints to the potential of multi-disciplinary teamwork.     

Gender and the Child Protection Process

Correspondence to Dr Elaine Farmer, Centre for Family Policy and Child Welfare, School for Policy Studies, University of Bristol, Block F, 8 Woodland Road, Bristol BS8 ITN, UK. Summary In the debates about finding a new balance between child protectionand family support, there has been silence on the issue of theimpact of gender on child protection work. Using data from oneof the studies in the Department of Health (1995) child protectionresearch programme, this article examines the impact of genderat each stage of the child protection process. It shows thatmothers have tended to be under-represented in relation to offersof service and over-included in respect of agencies' effortsto control them. When social work practice in cases of physicalabuse by men focuses exclusively on mothers, this allows men'sviolence to their female partners to be ignored. This practicehas been sustained in recent years, even though the child protectionsystem itself developed in response to public anxiety aboutchild deaths caused by men.     

Community Work with Immigrants

Summary The paper emerges from community work with an immigrant organizationin a government-sponsored Community Development Project overa two-year period. It discusses the various approaches to workingwith immigrants, including that of the local Community RelationsCouncil, reports an action research survey of immigrant need,and in particular assesses the ‘non-directive’ communitydevelopment approach to working with an immigrant organization.The implications of this study are discussed in relation tothe general potential of community work with immigrants