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families' of their own if they are not helped, as they are so unable
to give them the care and control children need for the vital early
experience of a stable family life. The difficulties of these families
have often gone on for very many years, and social work care and
support sometimes has to be given them for very many years too
before they can be helped to change sufficiently to break the vicious
circle of instability and low standards in one generation leading to
instability and low standards in the next.
The Department's social work in these cases often took the
form of helping the families over the immediate crisis which had
often precipitated their referral to the Department. The next stage
was to bring some stability into a disturbed situation — help the
husband to get back into work, if he was unemployed, ensure a
regular income for the family, and guidance on how it might best
be spent where many debts were competing for available cash. Help
was often needed to resolve bad feeling and bitterness between
members of the family, or to work out good plans where it seemed
unlikely that both sides would ever come together again. The
social worker often found himself contacting many other offices
and agencies, or advising the families how to do this, and helping
them to use the many medical and social services available for
their assistance.
The Department has always offered help to families referred
to its social workers, even though sometimes those coming to the
office asking to be admitted to Suttons Hostel were refused admission
there. This was only done when it seemed that they could
be helped much more adequately by advising them on another
course of action, and when the social worker was convinced the
family would be better housed in other ways. In all such cases,
the social worker continued to be available to help the family to
see them through their pressing difficulties, and to work with them,
when they wished, towards a more stable future.
This service is extending its scope as more and more families—
and individuals — are being referred to the Department who have
complicated social problems to contend with. Where they are
found to have problems connected with mental illness, physical disability,
care of their children or of elderly relatives, a valuable result
of the integration of Health and Welfare services in this department
is that it is easily possible for a social worker from another section
— from the Mental Health service for instance or the service for
the Physically Handicapped — to be called in to help the family,
and also the appropriate Health Visitor, District Nurse or other
person in the Department.
Temporary Accommodation
Under Section 21 National Assistance Act 1948 the Borough
is required to provide temporary accommodation for persons who
are in urgent need thereof, being need arising in circumstances
which could not reasonably have been foreseen or in such other
circumstances as the authority may in any particular case determine.
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