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HOME HELP
Introduction
In London, prior to 1948, all the metropolitan boroughs (but not the City of London) had
schemes for providing home helps for maternity cases and (except Bethnal Green and
the City of London) had schemes for the provision of help for sick or infirm persons
not themselves able to provide such assistance. The extent of the provision and the
nature of the staff employed, however, varied considerably from borough to borough.
The Council has administered a home help service since 5 July, 1948 when the National
Health Service Act, 1946, came into force. The service provides assistance where such help
is required because of the presence in the household of a sick person, a lying-in or expectant
mother, a mentally subnormal person, an aged person or a child under school-leaving age.
The home help service has been developed to meet these varied circumstances and special
types of help made available to deal with differing social problems and circumstances.
Organisation
The service is organised in each of the nine health divisions. Each division has three or
four home help organisers whose areas coincide in many cases with those of the metropolitan
boroughs which provided the service before 1948. Each organiser has a conveniently
situated office, generally at one of the Council's welfare centres. Whilst of
necessity much of her time is spent there on such work as preparing visiting schedules for
her staff and discussing problems with them, she and her assistant (one or two) are occupied
for a considerable part of their time in visiting households in their area. A visit is paid to
each applicant for help to ascertain what kind of assistance is needed, whether home helpcan
be provided and how many hours' service is necessary to meet the specific need. The
organiser or her assistant may pay several subsequent visits to supervise the service.
A departmental working party examined all aspects of the home help service in 1956,
made certain recommendations designed to bring about a greater measure of uniformity
in the administration of the service and concluded that organisers should not be
hampered by responsibility for unduly large areas where, although the clerical work
involved could be provided for by additional clerical staff, the organiser and her assistant
might find it impossible to maintain a satisfactory standard of home visiting. It is accordingly
the general aim that a district shall be of a size which will yield not more than 1,000
and not fewer than 500 cases.
Charges
The charge to the recipient of home help of any kind is three shillings an hour.* In cases
of hardship this may be abated in the light of the family income and expenses of
maintaining the household, in accordance with the Council's assessment scale and, in
many cases, particularly among old age pensioners and those in receipt of National
Assistance, the service is therefore provided free.
Staff training
Formal training is not generally given to home helps engaged on routine cases but those
who have obtained the Diploma of the National Institute of Houseworkers receive an
additional payment of a penny an hour. In-service training is, in the main, confined to
selected home helps who from time to time attend a short course, organised by one or
other of the divisions, to enable them to undertake work with problem families. Organised
on a divisional basis, home helps from two or three divisions may attend together to hear
talks given by speakers such as a divisional nursing officer, a welfare centre superintendent
and a health visitor. The syllabus for the course provides for talks and discussion on
*The charge was increased in 1960.
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