Social Services departments, created after the 1970 Local Authority Social Services Act, survived for nearly half a century. Their ability to meet the vision set out in the Seebohm Report was compromised by curtailment of expansion after the financial crisis in 1975. Their reputation was damaged by a number of widely reported child deaths in which social work was seen as passive and ineffective. Severe criticism followed when they were viewed as over active as in Cleveland and Orkney. As a result social services were seen as toxic in deprived communities. Despite winning responsibility for community care in the 1990 NHS and Community Care Act, departments suffered, first, from the requirement to spend the bulk of transferred social security funds in the independent sector and secondly from the prolonged squeeze on local government spending. The potential of care management for innovation and empowering service users was never fully realised.
PHP63 THE ECONOMIC IMPACT OF THE INITIATION OF PRESCRIPTION CONTROL IN THE GREEK SOCIAL SECURITY FUNDS