ABSTRACT
The development of neighbourhood teams inevitably means a changed relationship between front-line practitioners and management. Neighbourhood teams require devolved budgets (with which social services already has some valuable experience, as does education) to the front line with the teams then held accountable for achieving holistic outcomes that actually show up in the improvement of quality of life and the promotion of inclusion in the locality. This can then lead to pooled budgets in which service agencies and local authority departments look at the combined resources at their disposal and then, after discussion and the creation of jointly agreed action plans, proceed to commission the services required (Taylor 2000: 24).
