Growth and development.pdf

Aberdeenshire7. Modernising servicesThe Council has adopted a corporate approach to preparing a Race Equality Plan and hascommitted itself to level one of the Commission for Racial Equality’s standards for localgovernment. Having established close links with Grampian Race Equality Council, it is a partnerin the racist incidents sub-group of the community safety steering group. A detailed actionplan for involving social work services has been formulated by senior managers.Modernising Government funding has been secured for a pilot project to help older people inrural areas to access services with the help of clear, uncomplicated and comprehensiveinformation conveyed through a new Internet portal. Once piloted, a training package on use ofthe portal is to be rolled out across Aberdeenshire and made available throughout Scotland.A bid is planned for second round funding for a common information system with NHSpartners, which will enable the introduction of electronic single shared assessment.8. The FutureThe prospect of a steep increase in the older population continues to dominate the planningand development of community care across Aberdeenshire as a whole. The Council and thehealth service have laid the strategic ground but important development priorities are:• to increase the number of older people receiving home care;• to implement successfully the recent reorganisation of the home care service to achieveobjectives of improved staff recruitment and retention and greater continuity of care;• to extend from the present 5 project areas the meals service for older people who needsupport;• to reverse the small increase in numbers of older people awaiting placement in nursinghomes; and• to carry forward plans to use smart technology in domestic settings.To build on the achievements of the mental health team, it is necessary to plan for strongersupport for the primary care of the mentally ill.Sensory impairment services have been gradually improved, but there is an outstandingrequirement to harmonise and improve the assessment process for these services.The problems created by drug and alcohol misuse continue to put pressure on local resourcesand treatment and support will continue to be a priority calling for flexible responses.To reduce the pressures on resources from expensive residential care for children and youngpeople, it will be necessary to develop and extend further community disposals.To ensure consistency of aftercare for young people, plans should be made to extendthroughout the area the service approach used by Barnardo’s in their local project.For criminal justice services, collaboration with the two neighbouring councils is now faradvanced and there is an opportunity to extend it further through such aspects of service asprobation. Work already done to harmonise and improve information systems is ready to betaken to completion.23