Government, Social Services Departments and the Health of Children and Young People: Which Way Forward?

Summary Despite the dearth of research into the health of children andyoung people in contact with or ‘looked after’ bylocal authorities, a series of official and quasi-official reportshave begun to raise awareness of this issue. There are goodreasons to believe that this group of children will be disadvantagedin terms of health as they are in other aspects of their lives.The evidence suggests that local authorities do not live upto the standards of ‘good parents’. Current notionsof good practice are critically appraised and the article concludesthat social work is unable to do more than mitigate the effectsof Government policies which affect health and social servicesand which have lead to widening social inequalities.