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Report on Family Casework for 1965.
The principal problem for 28 of the 35 families was debt. They all had problems which
included:-
Marital difficulties.
Delinquency.
Difficulties between parents and children.
School attendance.
Poor health of one or both parents.
Inability to co-operate with authority.
Alcoholism (One case).
In only three families did inadequate housing appear to be a major factor in their inability
to cope with their difficulties and, in these cases, the families had their attention so
concentrated on their housing needs that they were unable to view their other problems realistically.
Five were cases of deserted, divorced, or separated wives.
Twenty-five of the families had five or more children. There were nine with three children
or less, (one with three, seven with two, and one with one) but five of these can be regarded as
incomplete families since the parents were either separated or were very young. Seven families
had eight children or more, the largest having twelve.
Co-ordinating Committee and Case Conferences.
In accordance with the advice given in the Joint Circular issued to Local Authorities in
1950 by the Home Office, Ministry of Health, and Ministry of Education, on children neglected or
ill treated in their own homes, the London Borough of Hammersmith has set up a Co-ordinating
Committee to co-ordinate the efforts of statutory and voluntary agencies undertaking work with
families.
The Co-ordinating Committee consists of representatives of the Personal Health, Environmental
Health, Mental Health, Children's, Welfare and Housing Departments of the Borough, the
Education Department of the Inner London Education Authority, the Housing Department of the
Greater London Council, the Ministry of Social Security and representatives of Voluntary Organisations
and other statutory bodies as necessary and appropriate. The Medical Officer of Health
is Chairman of the Committee, the Children's Officer Vice-Chairman, and the Secretary is the
Senior Social Worker in the Health Department. Anyone, whether working in a statutory or voluntary
capacity, may ask the Medical Officer of Health or the Secretary of the Committee (at the
Old Town Hall, Fulham Broadway, S.W.6) to arrange for a particular family's needs to be considered
at a Case conference, or for a matter of general social policy to be considered by the Coordinating
Committee.
Health Education.
The Introduction to this Report has already referred to health education, and to the Cohen
Report on it; and although it may strike a new note for many people, yet there is nothing new
about health education. What is new is its increasingly widening scope, its many different techniques
and media, the growing numbers of staff qualified to give instruction and advice, and the
many more subjects on which they need to be given.
That health education, in itself, is not new is proved by the fact that in 1936 both the
Public Health and Public Health (London) Acts authorised publication of information on health
and disease; made provision for lectures and films; and encouraged displays of publicity material
for preventive and curative purposes.
The National Health Service Act, 1948, not only confirmed such educational and publicity
measures as had been in force up to that date, but gave health education a great fillip by
enlarging the scope of preventive medicine and its attendant publicity. It went even further, by
giving the Local Health Authority greater responsibility for mother and child care, for widening
the duties of health visitors, and for making known all such facilities and services.
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