ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on social workers employed as professionals by local authorities and directly involved in implementing both the Children Act and the National Health and Community Care Act, through their practice. It explores whether social work as a professional service may be useful to families of children with cerebral palsy, known to ‘have difficulty in making plans for their lives under the stress of unrelieved emotions’ provoked by their child’s impairments. The most significant findings were about the categories of families prioritised by social services and about the social workers’ experiences of professional practice within the local authority context. Perhaps an accurate conclusion might be that social workers appeared to serve as the ‘whipping boys’ for the failings in provision stemming directly from restricted public spending. In the public eye social workers are people who are interested mainly in child abuse and may take people children away.
