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16
PART 1
REORGANISATION OF THE
HEALTH DEPARTMENT
The implementation of the Local Authority Social Services Act.
1970, entailed the transfer of certain services from the Health
Department to the newly-formed Social Services Department, the
main functions so to be transferred being the Mental Health
Service, the Home Help Service, and the services for the day care
of children, including the day nurseries hitherto operated by the
Health Department. The knowledge that these services were to
leave the Department, and that a comprehensive review of the
organisation of the Department had not been undertaken since its
inception in 1965, prompted a further review as a result of which
a scheme for the re-shaping of the Health Department was submitted
to a special committee of the Council in December 1970.
The new organisation envisaged that there would be five
functional divisions within the Department, these being medical,
dental, environmental, nursing and administrative. The medical
division would be headed by the Deputy Medical Officer of Health
and the remaining divisions by the Chief Dental Officer, the Chief
Public Health Inspector, the Chief Nursing Officer and the Principal
Administrative Officer respectively, these five officers together with
the Medical Officer of Health forming the management team of the
Department. This new organisation was framed with three basic
aims in mind, namely:—
1. To enable the Medical Officer of Health to continue to be a
" quality controller " of the services for which he is responsible,
keeping a finger on the pulse of the Department as a
whole, devising yardsticks to measure achievement in the
field and up-dating these in the light of experience, so that
the resources available are used to the full and are responsive
to the changing needs of the community.
2. To give responsibility for day-to-day management to the
head of each division and to supply the senior support necessary
for this to be undertaken.
3. To encourage all members of the staff of the Health Department
to apply to their work a sense of purpose and enthusiasm
which can only be engendered by the relevance and
importance of their tasks.