ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that referral agents played an important role in leading certain individuals to the Family Welfare Association (FWA). Easing the mechanics of contact was seemingly the major way in which 'push' was provided by official agencies. The chapter argues that nearly all the clients were extremely distressed before coming to the agency. The problems which they brought to the agency were in no sense 'new'. By and large, they had been plagued with these difficulties for some time, generally about two years, and by the time they came to the FWA they felt themselves to be in serious difficulty. The referral sources mentioned frequently did more than bring the FWA into the client's consciousness. In varying degrees, they pushed the client in the direction of the agency. Only five respondents had any first-hand knowledge of the agency—three had been former clients and two knew of the agency's existence through their own observation.
